Idaho Directories

Online Resources

 * Idaho City Directories Index and images ($)

History
City and county directories are similar to telephone books and are useful for locating people. They were often published annually, listing heads of households, employed household members, and their occupations and addresses. They can be used with census records or as substitutes for them.

Directories are particularly helpful for research in large cities where a high percentage of the people were renters, new arrivals, or temporary residents. In fact, they may be the only source to list an ancestor who was not registered to vote, did not attend church, did not pay taxes, or did not own property. Most households were included because the directories were created for salesmen, merchants, and others interested in contacting residents of an area. They are also useful tools for studying occupations and migration patterns.

Directories of heads of households have been published for major cities in Idaho.

City Directories
Directories of heads of households have been published for all the major cities and many of the smaller cities in Idaho. Many counties also have directories of their residents for scattered years. Many of these directories are in the holdings of the Idaho State Archives in Boise.

Family History Library
The Family History Library has city directories for various years from throughout the state of Idaho including:

Boise Coeur d'Alene Idaho Falls Pocatello

To find directories, consult the Place Search of the FamilySearch Catalog under:


 * IDAHO, [COUNTY] — DIRECTORIES
 * IDAHO, [COUNTY], [TOWN] — DIRECTORIES

Farm Directories
The Gem State Rural Publishing Company published books and magazines out of Caldwell, Idaho during the early part of the 20th Century. One of the series envisioned by this company was the Gem State Rural (Farm) Directory, to be published in several volumes. The intention was to print a directory for each county or combination of counties for the state. At least five volumes were printed, and a sixth was planned. At least one of these volumes is available online. Some are quite rare and copies are difficult to locate.


 * Ada County, 1917-1918
 * Bonneville, Madison, and Jefferson Counties, [dates??; copies not yet located]
 * Canyon County, 1916-1917
 * Gooding, Minidoka, and Lincoln Counties [planned but apparently never printed]
 * Malheur County, Oregon and Owyhee County, Idaho, 1918-1919
 * Twin Falls County, 1916-1917

These farm directories listed land owners by town, including those who resided outside the county. Names of owners, size of family, acreage, location of the land, and a list of produce and livestock grown are included.

Websites

 * US City Directories This web site identifies printed, microfilmed, and online directories and their repositories.