Emergency Biohazard Cleanup Services in Ione, WA

Ione, pronounced eye-OWN, is a small incorporated town on the west bank of the Pend Oreille River in Washington's far northeastern corner.

Homesteader Elmer Hall first settled the site in 1894, and Ione was officially incorporated on January 3, 1910.

Timber built Ione: in the early 1900s, Frederick A. Blackwell's Panhandle Lumber Company opened the Inland Northwest's first all-electric sawmill here.

The railroad reached Ione in 1910, when Blackwell built the Idaho and Washington Northern Railroad, connecting Ione with Metaline Falls to the north and Newport to the south.

When Pend Oreille County was established in 1911, Ione was one of four towns vying for the county seat, along with Newport, Cusick and Usk; Newport won the honor in 1912.

The town's last major sawmill, operated by Vaagen Brothers, closed in 1995, ending a timber-based economy that had lasted nearly a century.

Since the mill closure, most local jobs have come from the area's hydroelectric dams — Box Canyon Dam, operated by the Pend Oreille County Public Utility District, and Boundary Dam, operated by Seattle City Light.

The 2020 census counted 428 residents in Ione, down from 447 in 2010, when the town had 195 households.

The Ione Bridge, on the southern edge of town along State Route 31, is the only road crossing of the Pend Oreille River between Metaline Falls to the north and Usk to the south.

The town itself sits on a relatively flat bench along the river at about 2,090 feet above sea level, but the Selkirk Mountains rise dramatically on both sides — Cement Mountain reaches 3,003 feet about a mile north of town, and Molybdenite Mountain rises to 6,788 feet across the river.