Mountain Home City Information

Local History

Mountain Home is located on the Snake River basin plain that covers most of the south end of the State of Idaho. Mountain Home is about 40 miles southeast of what is described as the "Treasure Valley" because of its economic prosperity. Mountain Home is located on a higher plateau plain than the Treasure Valley where Boise is located and has relatively poor irrigation water access and lower quality soil conditions. This is considered a high desert area with most of the moisture occurring and collecting in the surrounding mountains and then being transferred into the valley by creeks, streams and rivers. These waterways, using diversion dams and canals, provide the irrigation water, when available, used by farmers and ranchers across most of the south end of the state.

Mountain Home's history is part of the overall history of Elmore County and Southwest Idaho. Recent history starts with the purchase of the "Oregon Country," of which Idaho is inclusive, by President Thomas Jefferson from Napoleon Bonaparte in 1803 for 3 or 4 cents per acre. In 1804, the Lewis and Clark Expedition was sent out by Jefferson and came through this location in about 1805 following the Snake River, the fur trappers followed shortly after in 1811 and began harvesting the beaver in about 1818 in Idaho. By 1840, the trappers had almost made the beaver extinct in Idaho. These fur traders surveyed and established the route which would later be called the Oregon Trail or the "longest grave yard in history" due to the high death rate of the early pioneers along the trail.

Elmore County was the site of the most popular Snake River crossing point on the Oregon Trail, in the "Three Island location" near present day Glenn’s Ferry, Idaho. Over 250,000 pioneers passed through Elmore County between 1840 and 1862 just before Idaho was made a territory of the Union, on the Oregon Trail. With the discovery of gold and silver within the county in 1862, the first reverse migration in the history of the US, occurred with pioneers migrating back from the west coast, to work the gold and silver fields of Idaho. Elmore County was named after the Ida Elmore mines, which were the most productive gold and silver mines in the 1860's in Idaho.

In 1863, Idaho was made a territory and became a primary source of monetary ores that funded the north during the Civil War. In 1883 the railroad came into the area to bring supplies in and raw materials out and changed the way settlers would continue to come to the valleys of Idaho. On Feb. 7, 1889, Elmore County was created as the last thing the territorial legislature did before Idaho was made a state the following year. Before the railroad arrived everything was transported by horse drawn wagons, pack mules and stage coaches. Mountain Home was one of these stage stops, being located on a small stream, in an otherwise barren desert. It was originally called Rattlesnake Station. The original station was moved about 7 miles west or down creek to where the railroad came through at which time it was renamed Mountain Home. Elmore County had a few boom years until the mines played out around 1900 with some ranching activities that provided food supplies to the miners.

After the mines left, the ranching became marginal, and the population dwindled down to almost nothing, with Mountain Home being little more than a stopover oasis out in the desert between Boise and eastern Idaho. Later with the development of irrigation, mostly in some smaller areas down near the Snake River, agriculture and ranching took a more permanent hold. The first major economic player to come to the county since mining was the establishment of the Mountain Home Air Force Base in 1943 that supported the war efforts of WWII. It started out as a bomber squadron and training center and has mutated and transformed over the years. It is currently a fighter squadron command and still in active use.

Today Mountain Home is part of the greater Boise economic region of Southwest Idaho. Boise is the economic and political hub of this region being the capital of the state, the largest city in the state and the primary location for non- agriculturally based jobs in the region. Recent growth has come mainly through the introduction of clean industries, such as Hewlett Packard and Micron Technologies, in the last 20 years. Mountain Home is part of the Boise Metro area that now has the greatest concentration of people between Salt Lake City Utah and Portland Oregon at about 588,000.

Boise and the surrounding areas have also become a hub for transportation and storage, higher education, communication call centers, medical services and most other major demographic factors that allow clean and sustained growth. Because Mountain Home is connected to Boise by the I-84 Freeway the main; transportation artery in Idaho and because Micron Technologies are located on the east end of Boise closest to Mountain Home, it became a viable commuter's or bedroom community being only about 30 minutes away at freeway speeds and with comparatively light traffic. This brought growth to the community and began is transition from an "air base" community over to a "support" community for the Boise Metro Area. Mountain Home has become a unique location with remote recreation activities only a few minutes away either down to the rivers for fishing and boating or up to the mountains for hiking or skiing in the winter. It is still the oasis in the desert but it is now thriving being only minutes away from Boise’s metropolitan offering of goods, education, entertainment, employment and services.

Whatever your reasons for coming to Mountain Home, it can be considered a good choice and one of the positive puzzle pieces that make up the "Treasure Valley" whose real treasure has always been its people. Trust the experts at Stewart Realty, LLC to help you find your own piece of Mountain Home Idaho real estate.

Still unsure about where you want to move? Keep reading about Mountain Home Idaho or check out other city pages to find the area of the Treasure Valley that best fits your needs. This site also has up to date information from the Boise MLS on available homes in the area so you can find the perfect home.