Payette: A Fur Trapper's Name on the Map

Almost everything in this corner of Idaho named Payette, the county, the city, and the river, traces back to one French Canadian fur trapper. Francois Payette came to the Pacific Northwest in eighteen twelve with John Jacob Astor's fur venture, later worked for the Hudson's Bay Company, and trapped so extensively along the river that flows into the Snake near here that it began to carry his name.

From eighteen thirty-five to eighteen forty-four, Payette ran old Fort Boise at the confluence of the Boise and Snake Rivers, dispensing hospitality and supplies to Oregon Trail emigrants who were by then crossing in large numbers. He had a reputation for generosity that travelers remembered.

The town of Payette itself grew from a railroad construction camp in the eighteen eighties and incorporated in eighteen ninety-one, and Payette County was carved out of Canyon County in nineteen seventeen. It is one of Idaho's smallest counties, but the name it carries has been on regional maps for over two hundred years.