Crossport, Idaho — Farm Country on an Unusually Flat Piece of North Idaho

Crossport lies north of Bonners Ferry on the floor of the Kootenai Valley.

The first thing worth noticing is how flat it is. In a part of Idaho dominated by mountains, the Kootenai spreads a broad agricultural valley between steep ranges.

Farms took advantage of that ground, while railroads and roads used the same north-south corridor toward Canada.

Crossport developed inside that working landscape rather than around a substantial commercial center. Bonners Ferry handled most regional business and government.

The community is easy to overlook because the farms are the dominant architecture. Here, the unusual thing is not that people settled beside mountains; it is that the mountains briefly stepped far enough apart to leave room for fields.