St. Mary's Catholic Church

A potlatch is a northwest Native American Feast where gifts are dispersed by the chieftain to show his material wealth. Often the chieftain challenged a guest to "exceed him in power" by giving away or destroying more goods. If the guest did not outdo the chieftain, he was then diminished in power and took a "lower place on the totem pole," and the chief remained in power. At the Potlatch the tribe hosted horse racing, archery, spear throwing, and displays of beadwork, clothing and blankets.

One of those potlatch sites along the Palouse River, just behind the present baseball park in town, later became the area where the Potlatch Lumber Mill was built. The mill grew to be the largest white pine lumber mill in the world. Potlatch was a company town, in 1905, planned much on the order of the Pullman Palace Car Company in Illinois where every resident worked for the company.

St. Mary's Catholic Church in Potlatch, Idaho, 1907-1910, courtesy of the Latah County Historical Society, 12-06-018.

In the years 1906-7 two hundred residences were built by the company, along with a fire department, school, boarding houses, general store, gymnasium, hotel, and Catholic Church.  Alcohol and prostitution were prohibited and marriage encouraged as homes were only rented to married couples.

You are standing before the St. Mary's Catholic Church, built in the fall of 1907, under the direction of Father Henrickx who was the priest in the Moscow parish. In 1906 he had reported that there were 30 Catholic families and 15 converts in Potlatch so he would come to Potlatch and us the Potlatch Mercantile Company store and the basement of the school for Sunday Mass. The first resident pastor was Father A. Aufmkolk from 1908-1909. After Father Aufmkolk, there was a series of 35 pastors, serving the church, an average of 2.9 years each.

The church is a one and one-half story building on a concrete foundation, with a three story bell tower on the west side. It was constructed by the company at the cost of $3,942. The congregation used the building rent-free and when the town was sold in the 1950's the company donated the church to the congregation. Rooms built onto the back in 1914 served as a rectory until 1927. The metal statue of Mary in the yard was created around 2011 by Dennis Frei, a Potlatch artist in memory of a long time member.


References:

A History of St. Mary's Catholic Church for the Centennial Celebration 1907-2007, Personal Collection of Shirley King.

Discussion between Shirley King and Ginger Rankin, April 2014.

Petersen, Keith C., Company Town: Potlatch, Idaho, and the Potlatch Lumber Company. (Pullman, Washington: Washington State University Press, 1987).

Petersen, Keith, Inventory Sheet for Group Nominations, Idaho State Historical Society: Historic Resources of Potlatch: Workers' Neighborhood Historic District, May 1985.