North Idaho town marks 100th

ATHOL, Idaho – The North Idaho town of Athol is getting ready to throw a big birthday party.

The town named after a Scottish duke is marking its 100th anniversary Saturday. Residents will celebrate with a downtown parade, food, live music and cutest baby and watermelon-eating contests, wrapping the event into the city’s annual Athol Daze festivities.

When the Kootenai County town was incorporated in August 1909, it had a lumber mill, railroad depot and post office.

Settled near the southern tip of picturesque Lake Pend Oreille, the community got an economic boost when the U.S. Navy established the Farragut Naval Station during World War II.

The first batch of naval recruits arrived in 1942 and spread across 4,000 acres that eventually served as the temporary home of nearly 300,000 naval recruits.

The promise of work created by the station brought longtime resident Joreen Bohn’s family to town in 1942, when she was 9 years old.

“That was the drawing card for everybody. There was wall-to-wall people,” Bohn told the Coeur d’Alene Press. “There were tents and cabins all over. Wherever they could, they just camped or sat on property.”

The station was decommissioned in 1946. The land was transferred to the state in 1963 and turned into a park.

Athol’s population has shrunk significantly over the years and now stands at about 684, with 1.2 percent growth between 2006 and 2008.

Another notable moment came in 1966, when Bohn and some other women in town took over the Fire Department because they were frustrated over its slow response time. The delays were caused because many men were in the woods logging, mining or working for the railroad.

“Anybody that was left here was old, disabled or drunk,” female firefighter Ruth Hunter-Ewing remarked at the time.

Bohn and Vicki Upchurch, another remaining member of the ladies fire brigade, will ride an old firetruck in Saturday’s parade.

“We’ve seen the good and the bad,” Bohn said. “This is where we’re supposed to be.”