BONNEVILLE COUNTY
The History of Idaho, The Gem of the Mountain, by James H. Hawley, Volume I, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, 1920:
"Bonneville County was created by the act of February 7, 1911, from the north(east)ern part of Bingham County, and was named in honor of Capt. Benjamin L. E. Bonneville, who visited the Snake River Valley in the early '30's and in the fall of 1833 established his winter quarters at the mouth of the Port Neuf River. The county is bounded on the north by the counties of Jefferson, Madison and Teton; on the east by the State of Wyoming; on the south by Bannock and Bingham counties; and on the west by Bingham. The act creating the county assigned it to the sixth judicial district and the fifth senatorial district, and designated Idaho Falls as the county seat.
The first permanent settlements were made near the Snake River, first at the Eagle Rock Ferry, which was established by Harry Ricketts in 1864 near the present northern boundary, and second where the City of Idaho Falls now stands. A wagon bridge over the Snake River at this point was built in 1865-66 by J. M. Taylor and Robert Anderson and a settlement soon afterward began to grow up about the bridge. James M. Taylor and his cousin, Samuel F. Taylor, came to this section of Idaho while it was still a part of Oneida County and the latter was elected sheriff of that county in 1884. Then Bingham County was created and he was elected to represent the new county in the council in the last Territorial Legislature. Mr. Taylor was also one of Bingham County's delegates to the constitutional convention in 1889.
Other early settlers were James Thomas, who was ordained bishop in the Mormon Church in 1885, and who was one of the first merchant tailors and clothing dealers in Idaho Falls; Carlyle J. Pelot, a man of French extraction, who brought a drove of horses from Wyoming and opened the first livery stable in Idaho Falls in July, 1879; and Addison V. Scott, a real estate man, whose wife was the first woman to be elected to the office of justice of the peace in Idaho.
Idaho Falls, the county seat, is at the junction of the main line of the Oregon Short Line Railroad from Salt Lake to Butte and the Yellowstone branch of the same system. The principal railroad stations in the county are Ammon, Coltman, Iona and Ucon, and there are a number of small villages farther inland away from the railroad.
Grain farming. raising sugar beets and fruit, dairying and stock raising are the leading industries. Two national forests—the Caribou and Palisade—have an area of 467,352 acres in Bonneville County and furnish excellent grazing for the stock raisers near the Wyoming line. Heise Hot Springs, about twenty-five miles northeast of Idaho Falls, near the Jefferson County line, are rapidly growing in favor as a health and pleasure resort. Bonneville County is proud of its good wagon roads and its annual fair and 'War–Bonnet Roundup,' which is held in a park of sixty acres just south of Idaho Falls.
In 1910 the population of Bonneville County was included in the census enumeration of Bingham County. The assessed valuation of property in 1918 was $13,961,919, only nine of the forty-one counties of the state showing a larger property valuation."
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