POCATELLO

city, seat (1893) of Bannock county, southeastern Idaho, U.S., in the Portneuf River valley. Originally an intermontane stopover point on the Oregon Trail, it was settled in 1882 and named for a Bannock Indian chief who granted rights-of-way to the railroads. It grew slowly at first because of its location on the Fort Hall Indian Reservation. The opening of the reservation to settlement in 1902 provided impetus for development, and Pocatello became a prominent railway depot on the Union Pacific line between Omaha, Neb., and Portland, Ore. It progressed as a processing and distribution centre for an irrigated agricultural area, with trucking augmenting rail freight transportation. The community expanded industrially with the acquisition in the 1940s of a large naval ordnance plant and a phosphate reduction works. In 1962 it annexed Alameda. The city is the seat of Idaho State University (established as the Academy of Idaho, 1901). It is the headquarters for the Caribou National Forest. Inc. village, 1889; city, 1893. Pop. (1990) 46,117; (1994 est.) 49,634.