The Nicholia Charcoal Kilns, sixteen in all, were erected in 1885 to provide fuel for the smelter at Nicholia, today a site of two log cabins within a private ranch. The smelter reduced the ore from the Viola, a lead and silver mine, which was located in a canyon above Nicholia. The mine began production in 1881 and yielded $2.5 million in paying ore. The same smelter also processed ore from Gilmore (see following entry, pages 150–151).
The Nicholia beehive brick kilns were used to convert wood to charcoal. An informative sign near the kilns describes the process. You can also find out more about how kilns work in the Piedmont, Wyoming, entry (pages 136–139).
Loggers decimated the Douglas fir forests of the Lemhi Range for wood for these kilns, located at the mouth of Coal Kiln Canyon (a misnomer: there was no coal, only wood). The sixteen kilns used about 75,000 cords of wood per year. No doubt you have seen huge logging trucks lumbering (sorry) down the highway. The interpretive sign says those trucks carry approximately ten cords per load; however, a forestry industry spokesman told me that a truck actually carries more like 6.25 cords per load. That would mean the kilns used 12,000 truckloads per year, or 33 per day for every single day of the year. As the kilns were in production for five years, you can imagine the effect upon the local forest.
When ore production ceased at the Nicholia smelter in 1890, the reason for the kilns to fire ceased as well. An astonishing forty acres of neatly stacked four-foot-long cordwood, ready for processing to charcoal, was left abandoned near the kilns. Most of the wood was carried off, as were the bricks of twelve of the kilns, for use by settlers in the Lemhi Valley, north of Gilmore, and in the Snake River Plain, to the southeast.
We may be able to see only four of Nicholia’s sixteen original kilns, but they are a marvelous sight. Two are partial, the other two virtually complete. Each was originally twenty feet high, plastered almost a foot thick. Be sure to take the walking loop tour, as you will learn a great deal about the kilns and the surrounding area.
The Nicholia Charcoal Kilns sit in lovely Birch Creek Valley with the Lemhi Range as a backdrop.
WHEN YOU GO
From Chesterfield, drive to Idaho Falls, a distance of about 102 miles. From Idaho Falls, take Interstate 15 north for 24 miles to Idaho Highway 33. Turn left (west) and proceed 15 miles to the junction with Idaho Highway 28. Follow Highway 28 northwest for 47 miles to the turnoff to the charcoal kilns. A large interpretive sign stands across the street from the turnoff. The kilns themselves are 5.2 miles west of the sign.