Eagle’s History Highlighted in New Book

Nov. 20, 2012 - PRLog -- New to Arcadia Publishing’s popular Images of America series is Eagle by the City of Eagle. This pictorial history boasts more than 200 vintage images and provides readers with a unique opportunity to reconnect with the history that shaped their community.

Eagle may be the only city in the arid American West that was first settled on an island. Four young miners left Idaho’s gold fields in 1863 to farm what is today called Eagle Island, between the Boise River’s north and south channels. Not easily accessed by Indian raiding parties, the island also allowed ready irrigation of the first croplands. It was an island farming couple, Tom and Mary Aiken, who founded the village of Eagle on the north “mainland” starting in 1895.

An interurban trolley in 1907 greatly stimulated the growth of the township which became a service and food processing center for a large, rural hinterland. Nevertheless, Eagle was still a small farming town when it finally incorporated in 1971. During subsequent decades though it was transformed by explosive growth and upscale development into one of the wealthiest communities in the Pacific Northwest.

Golf courses, hobby farms, a preoccupation with the arts, and foothill vineyards all attest to Eagle’s modern affluence. However, this history largely focuses on Eagle’s modest agricultural yesteryear.

Highlights of Eagle include:
•   Eagle Island Beginnings
•   Townships and Transportation on the North Shore
•   Arid Land Watered by Ditches
•   Processing an Abundant Harvest
•   From Blacksmithing to Industry
•   Business in Orville Jackson’s Tall Shadow


Available at area bookstores, independent retailers, and online retailers, or through Arcadia Publishing at (888)-313-2665 or online.

Arcadia Publishing is the leading publisher of local and regional history in the United States.  Our mission is to make history accessible and meaningful through the publication of books on the heritage of America’s people and places.  Have we done a book on your town?  Visit www.arcadiapublishing.com.