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Idaho Day celebrated statewide and in Boundary
County |
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March 9, 2015 |
Idaho celebrated its first ever Idaho Day last
Wednesday, March 4. Celebretory activities were
held at the state capitol building in Boise,
around the state, and even here in Boundary
County.
"It was a great opportunity to reflect and honor
what makes Idaho so incredible," said Butch
Otter, governor of Idaho. "We had several dance
performances, singers, and even a cowboy poet in
the Lincoln Auditorium."
Here in Boundary County, the Museum put on a
program for 4th graders from around the county.
Fourth graders were selected as the Museum's
guests for Idaho Day, as fourth grade is when
the Idaho history curriculum is taught in our
schools.
Here is the Museum's report on their Idaho Day
activities:
Oh, What a Dig!
by Dottie Gray, Boundary County
Museum
Plastic spoons, toothpicks, and paint brushes
were transformed into tools needed by budding
junior archaeologists, as fourth graders from
Mt. Hall, Naples, and Valley View schools came
to the Museum on Wednesday, March 4 to celebrate
Idaho Day. 152 years ago, in 1863, on this date,
President Abraham Lincoln signed the act that
created the Territory of Idaho. The 2014 Idaho
Legislature established March 4 as a day to
commemorate this historic event.
 In small groups, (with a cadre of Museum
volunteers as leaders who were having as much
fun as the kids!), the students constructed a
grid using measurement skills over their “dig
sites.” They labeled the axes to give common
language to each sextant of the site. They
imagined themselves as homesteaders to this new
territory and prepared to clear their land. But,
oh look! There is something sticking out of the
dirt and gravel. Their challenge was to discover
what artifacts might be waiting to be uncovered,
and to do so carefully so as not to damage the
treasures that await them.
Each site contained at least one real artifact
from the Museum’s collection: stone scrapers,
stone axes, stone fish weights, and even some
trade beads. They discovered other clues to
plants and animals that may have been here at
the time: huckleberries, morel mushrooms, rose
hips, sweet grass, snail shells, bones, leather
strips, feathers, and deer hair. The children
easily identified the Kootenai Tribe as the
first inhabitants of the land, and these
artifacts would have been a part of their lives
and culture.
Following the enthusiastic and successful dig,
Curator Sue Kemmis, led the groups in a
debriefing “show and share” discussion of what
can be learned about people and places from the
artifacts left behind. The children were eager
to share what they had found and what they had
learned. After a brief clean-up, each student
was treated to an Idaho shaped cookie, before
boarding their buses back to school. We thank
the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho for providing funds
to bus children to the museum for this and other
programs.
The Museum appreciates the opportunity to work
with the schools, teachers, and students. In
April a “trunk story” will go out to all
district 4th grades, as well as to the private
schools in the county. And in May students will
board those buses once again for the annual tour
of the Boundary County Museum. |
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