Polly Bemis House

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.

From the record

“Polly Bemis House was the home of Charles Bemis and his wife Polly Bemis, two pioneers to Idaho County, Idaho, United States, who lived alongside the Salmon River in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Polly was a Chinese American former teenage slave whose story became a biographical novel and was fictionalized in the 1991 film A Thousand Pieces of Gold.”
Wikipedia article Polly Bemis House, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 42 National Register listings published here for Idaho County · listed in 1988 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

Listed as. Bemis, Polly, House - the National Register files a house under its owner's surname.
Address. Accessible on Salmon River via boat, Riggins, 83638
When was it listed? March 1988
Category. building
Census division. Riggins
National Register reference number. 87002152 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

45 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 45 fires within 5 miles of Polly Bemis House between 1992 and 2019, burning about 128,142 acres in total. 44 started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Natural	44
Equipment and vehicle use	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
13 September 1994	Natural	under an acre	Payette National Forest	JAMES RANCH
8 August 2013	Natural	under an acre	Payette National Forest	REPUBLICAN
7 August 2006	Natural	under an acre	Nez Perce - Clearwater National Forests	INDIAN
4 August 2002	Natural	under an acre	Nez Perce - Clearwater National Forests	INDIAN RIDGE
4 August 1997	Natural	under an acre	Payette National Forest	WARREN CREEK
30 August 1992	Equipment and vehicle use	2,365 acres	Payette National Forest	TOMATO POINT
3 August 1995	Natural	under an acre	Payette National Forest	WARREN CREEK
29 August 2011	Natural	under an acre	Payette National Forest	RUGGED

Every fire recorded in Idaho County

Mines and quarries near this property

6 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 6 workings within 5 miles of Polly Bemis House: 5 past producers, 1 prospect. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Gold, Copper, Silver, Gold, Lead, Zinc, Lead, Copper, Zinc, Silver, Molybdenum, Tungsten. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Blue Jay	Gold, Silver, Lead, Copper, Zinc	Past Producer
Blue Jay Mine/Sterling Silver 1,2,3	Gold, Lead, Copper, Zinc, Silver, Molybdenum, Tungsten	Past Producer
Wallis Prospect	Titanium	Prospect
War Eagle Mine	Copper, Silver, Gold, Lead, Zinc	Past Producer	1898
War Eagle Mine	Gold, Tungsten, Silver, Molybdenum, Lead, Copper, Zinc	Past Producer
Salmon River Placer Co.	Gold	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Idaho County

Storms near this property

10 since 1997

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Riggins, the town this property stands in, in 10 storm reports between 1997 and 2022: 4 hail, 2 thunderstorm wind, 2 heavy rain, 1 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
August 2022	Hail	Riggins	-	Minor damage to vegetation was reported, with lots of leaves down.
June 2012	Hail	Riggins	-	Broadcast media reported hail estimated at 1.25 inches in diameter.
June 2010	Flood	Riggins	-	The Little Salmon River washed over Highway 95 south of Riggins. Culvert failure let water and debris flow across Highway 13 near Stites.
June 2007	Hail	Riggins	-	A person reported hail the size of golf balls at Slate Creek along with strong winds and heavy rain.
May 1997	Thunderstorm Wind	Riggins	-	Two reports of thunderstorm wind gusts 60-70 mph at Riggins. They broke off small tree limbs, and blew shingles and parts of roofs off structures. The storm lasted about an hour.
June 2004	Heavy Rain	Riggins	-	no account filed
August 2003	Flash Flood	Riggins	-	no account filed
May 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Riggins	-	no account filed
July 2001	Heavy Rain	Riggins	-	no account filed
July 2001	Hail	Riggins	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Idaho County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 87002152 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Idaho County	All 42 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.