Heaton, James E.

Antoine Plante, a French Canadian voyageur who had come overland with the Astor party, settled in the Spokane Valley near what is now the town of Millwood in 1849. In 1861, an act was passed authorizing "Antoine Plante his heirs and assigns to establish and keep a ferry across the Spokane River at or near the point where the military road (Mullan Trail) from Fort Walla Walla to Fort Benton crosses said river." Plante's Ferry was also the site of Antoine's first residence in 1849. In 1865, Isaac Kellog built a bridge here that connected both sides of the river. In the 1870s, Plante sold his land and moved to the Flathead Reservation in Montana, where he died in 1890.