"JORDAN VALLEY" Jordan Valley by mtncorg

Jordan Valley is the main town found along the Jordan Creek, an oasis of sorts amongst the desert plains and mountains of southeastern Oregon. The creek was named after an early - 1863 - prospector who passed through. Just to the east in Idaho, there were important mineral discoveries which led to the formation of Silver City and the vast open-pit Kinross De Lamar mine - you can see parts of it atop the mountains when you are driving into the town of Jordan Valley from the west along US 95.

Jordan Valley grew slowly not being incorporated until 1911. You are almost into Idaho when you reach the town and the town - as you can find with much of Malheur County - probably has more ties to Idaho than Oregon. There is a sizable contingent of Basque ancestry here. A lot of Basques immigrated to this region - Idaho, southeastern Oregon and northern Nevada - from the 1890's until the First World War. The Basque men were sheperds living out with their herds for months at a time, only their animals for company.