Get to Know a Special Community

Whether you are looking for food, services, unique places to shop, or a special place to live, Tekoa is a wonderful discovery. Tucked between the border of mountainous Northern Idaho and the rolling hills of the Palouse, Tekoa is beautiful. We have well-maintained parks, a growing shopping district and will soon be connected to the Palouse to the Cascades State Park Trail. A twelve minute drive will take you to the trail head of the Trail of the Coeur d’lenes.

Tekoa is home to the Historic Empire Theater and short drives will easily take you to Spokane, Lake Coeur d’ Alene, McCroskey State Park (Idaho), and to the WSU and University of Idaho campuses. Known for our strong bonds and a rich farming history, Tekoa is a treasure.

You just might be tempted to make us your new home!

History of Tekoa

In 1875, F. P. Connell and his wife, Mary N. Welch and family (considered to be Tekoa’s first white settlers) came to the area of what would later become The City of Tekoa, a part of the newly formed Whitman county. A former Union Army soldier in the Civil War, he had traveled to the West after the War, arriving in Portland, Oregon, where he became a reporter for the Oregonian newspaper, and where he met and married his bride, Mary. Moving east, they came to the Tekoa area and located a farm and trading post to the Native Americans about a mile northeast of the present City of Tekoa.

In 1883, the Truax brothers established a saw mill on the west bank of Hangman Creek. In 1884, John McDonald, a railroad land agent, began buying right-of- ways for the soon to be coming railroad. Then came the moment when the growing community would receive its final name. The infant community wanted a Post Office of its own, and Fork of the Creek (the original name) just didn’t seem suitable to appear on the postal seal. Mrs. Dan Truax, standing on the porch of her house on the west bank of Hangman Creek, looked at the large number of tents in the city, temporary shelters for the railroad workers and others. She suggested to her husband that they call the community Tekoa, from the Hebrew word meaning “city of tents”, which was about all that Tekoa was at the time. And so the name stuck. In time, the tents were replaced by permanent wood frame buildings, and later, because of several fires in town, many wood buildings were replaced by brick ones, some of which stand to this day.

The town was finally incorporated as The City of Tekoa on March 30, 1889, S. E. Coffin serving as Chairman of its Board of Trustees, and therefore as its first mayor, John Marsh serving as the first town Marshal, and D. W. “Uncle Dan” Truax as its first Police Judge. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Find more history and pictures at www.tekoawa.com.

Learn about the past of our beloved Tekoa trestle at https://spokanehistorical.org/items/show/426. Credit: Robert M. Lambeth, “Milwaukee Road Bridge in Tekoa,” Spokane Historical

Learn about the FUTURE of the Tekoa trestle as we become part of the Palouse to Cascades State Park network of trails.

Special Places in Tekoa

Special Events in Tekoa