Fortifying Claims
Benjamin Young and his wife, Lizzie Young, lived for some time in their cabin located between the present Belmont Street and Chicago Street on 5th Street. They bought the cabin and adjoining hay claim in 1865 from two men known as Fish and Rain, who had harvested a crop of hay the preceeding year.
The hay claim covered the present Golden Gate Addition of North Caldwell. Sub-irrigation provided the needed moisture for the hay.
Dr. Junis B. Wright and his bride also arrived in the fall of 1864. Dr. Wright has written that all the available sites along the river...
...from the Canyon nine miles above Boise City--to its union with the Snake River fifty miles below--were taken under the law of squatter's rights.
He writes: "I had to hunt for a winter location and was fortunate in finding a little nook unclaimed at the lower end of the Canyon."
(This was near the present site of the old Tom Wheeler brick house near the Old Boise River bridge) Dr. Wright cut 16-foot logs...
...from an island in the Boise River for his cabin and made the chimney and fireplace from nearby lava rock. He continues further: "This little nook was protected from the storms of the east by Canyon Hill, and on the north and west by the timber on the Boise River, which divided here into two streams--forming an island. There was an abundance of fuel..."
"...on the island and the river was alive with salmon. The valley on the southwest side of the river was very wide, and next to the foothills two large springs boiled up--which irrigated a large tract."