Coming from Canada, the famous map maker and trader for the North West Company explored this area and river in 1808. On May 8 somewhere near here, Thompson's famished party, all sick from eating a "much tainted" antelope, met ten lodges of Indians who could give them only "a few dried Carp (of last year's catch!) and some Moss bread...but acceptable to the hungry." Leaving here, he found the route which US 95 follows north. Next year, he returned to establish Idaho's first trading post on Lake Pend d'Oreille.