Idaho

Idaho's name is completely made up. In 1860, a mining lobbyist named George Willing told Congress that "Idaho" was a Shoshone word meaning "gem of the mountains." Congress liked it.

Then they found out Willing had invented the whole thing. They renamed that territory Colorado instead.

But a few years later, when they needed a name for a new territory out west, they went with Idaho anyway. The fake word stuck.

The Nez Perce, Shoshone, Bannock, and other Native peoples had lived across this land for thousands of years before any Europeans arrived. In 1805, when Lewis and Clark stumbled out of the Bitterroot Mountains half-starved and lost, it was the Nez Perce who saved them.

They fed the expedition, drew maps on elk skin, and helped them build the canoes that carried them to the Pacific. The Nez Perce asked for one thing in return: friendship. The U.S. repaid them by shrinking their land from 17 million acres to 770,000.

In 1877, rather than be forced onto a tiny reservation, about 800 Nez Perce men, women, and children fled across 1,170 miles of Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana. They outfought and outmaneuvered the U.S. Army for over three months. They were caught just 40 miles from the Canadian border.

Chief Joseph surrendered with some of the most famous words in American history: "I am tired. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands I will fight no more forever."

Gold and silver mining drove Idaho's early economy, and the state still produces nearly half of all silver mined in the United States. Idaho became the 43rd state in 1890.

You can stand at the rim of Hells Canyon, the deepest river gorge in North America, deeper even than the Grand Canyon. At Shoshone Falls near Twin Falls, watch water plunge 212 feet, over 40 feet farther than Niagara.

Up in the panhandle, paddle the glassy waters of Lake Coeur d'Alene. And yes, you should try a fresh Idaho baked potato.