The original town was across the Pend Oreille River and was named
by miners in the golden days of 1849 because they thought the
entire district was covered with minerals. The placer miners moved on but large deposits of limestone and quartz were soon discovered in the area, giving rise to the Lehigh Portland Cement Company (originally Inland Portland Cement Company), incorporated at Metaline Falls in 1909.
Soon Frederick Blackwell extended his Idaho & Washington Northern Railroad, later to be taken over by the Milwaukee Railroad, to Metaline Falls. At its peak the Lehigh plant employed 400, and Blackwell’s railroad, which terminated at the plant, hauled 12 to 15 cars of cement a day to the outside world. Lehigh closed the plant in 1990 but the grounds are still surrounded by a tall chain link fence and the tall concrete cement silos can still be seen within.
It fell to investor Lewis P. Larsen (1876-1955) to found the town of Metaline Falls around 1900, situated on three of his mining claims. Metaline Falls was officially incorporated on 13 May 1911. The
Lewis P. Larsen home, designed by Spokane’s renowned architect Kirtland Cutter, is today a National Historic
Place. Others in the town include the
Washington Hotel, the
Pend Oreille Mines and Metals Building, and the
Metaline Falls School, now the
Cutter Theatre. Much of the movie,
The Postman, was shot in Metaline Falls and the Boundary Dam, on the Pend Oreille River a few miles north.
On occasional weekends, the North Pend Oreille Valley Lions Club runs a popular re-enactment of the old passenger service between Ione and Metaline Falls, a
diesel powered train that chugs through the valley on a two hour round trip tour. The highlight of the tour is a stop atop the 1909 railway bridge in Box Canyon, high above the Pend Oreille River and the
Box Canyon Hydro Dam.
The entry from the American Series book
Washington: A guide to the Evergreen State follows.
METALINE FALLS, 66.4 m. (1,925 alt., 316 pop.), occupies a rocky, sloping bench on the east bank of the Clark Fork River. The town was founded in 1910, and the promotion of the Mammoth and Morning mines brought the first settlers to the site. Silver, lead, cement materials, fire clay, and lime are found in this region. Mining activities, as elsewhere in the State, have known periods of boom and decline.
The Grange and the Nonpartisan League have considerable strength in the MetalineFalls vicinity. It is said that, in its time, the I.W.W. had great influence in this region, even among the farmers. Important plants are those of the Lehigh Cement Company, the Pend Oreille Mines and Metal Company, American Lead and Zinc Company, and the Metaline Mining and Smelting Company. Two hydroelectric plants supply power for municipal and industrial use.
From Washington: A guide to the Evergreen State