Octagon Spring Park

The kiosk at Main and Hooper

At the corner of Main Street and Hooper Avenue in Soda Springs, an eight-sided roof stands over a spring that bubbles up out of the ground. Benches ring the spring beneath the roof. The water is naturally carbonated. The Bear River Heritage Area calls it carbonated and sweet, “a perfect mixture for drinking,” and visitors are welcome to take a sip at no charge. A historical marker in town traces the soda water’s slightly sour taste to carbonic acid, which forms where water and carbon dioxide mix. The Idaho Heritage Trust reports that, according to the locals, the water tastes as fresh and effervescent as it always has.

The ground around the spring is extremely wet and soft at times, and a wooden boardwalk crosses it. The City of Soda Springs runs the park, which has a covered pavilion, a restroom, picnic tables, and a large number of memorial trees. The restroom is unlocked during daylight from May through August. Like all the city’s parks, Octagon closes at nightfall.

This is one of hundreds of mineral springs in Soda Springs. The California Trail Interpretive Center writes that the town’s development blocked and destroyed many of the old watering holes, and it lists Octagon Spring among those that can still be found. The World Famous Water marker places it just north of the railroad tracks and names it among the waters mentioned by emigrants that can still be sampled.

In August 2024 the Caribou County News reported on a tour led by Bill Horsley. Galen Wilson and Jerry Stoor of the Caribou Historical Society came along, with a score of “spring-devotees and the spring-curious.” The group traveled by car caravan from Steamboat Springs to Hooper Spring, sampling the waters along the way. The tour finished at Octagon Spring with the version of soda water many people prefer, which adds lemon juice, lime juice, and sugar. Families and tour members chatted while Horsley answered questions.

Ludvig Shurke’s canopy

The paper named the original builder of the eight-sided canopy as Ludvig Shurke, whose name it also spells Suhrke in the same story. Shurke also built the walkway and benches at Lover’s Delight spring on Soda Creek. That spring was also known as Svengali Springs because Ludvig was said to resemble Svengali, the villain of the novel Trilby. Horsley explained that no one knows for sure whether the spring was named after the canopy or the canopy after the spring. The likely explanation, he said, is that the structure came first and its design was kept through later reconstructions.

The sources differ on the canopy’s age. The city says the original kiosk was built in the 1890s. The Idaho Heritage Trust bases its estimate on the square nails and rough sawn sheathing and dates the structure to before 1900.

In 1994 the city had recently acquired Octagon Springs, and officials discussed a suggestion to salvage the old octagon cover. Most everyone they talked with said it could not be saved, so the city prepared materials to rebuild it. Construction of the park began in 1995. The city says the kiosk was restored that year with an Idaho Heritage Trust grant, though the Trust’s own project page lists the grant as 1993. In 1999 the Trust counted Octagon Springs among the projects it had funded across Idaho. In 2004 the city received $3,000 from the Trust toward the creation of Octagon Spring. The city calls it Soda Springs’s newest park.

Across the street, the Idan-ha

Long before it became a park, the spring was a gathering place for local residents and for guests of the Idan-ha Hotel, just across the street to the south. Union Pacific Railroad built the hotel in 1887 as a dining station. Some guests came to see the bubbling springs. Others were patients of Dr. Ellis Kackley, a Soda Springs physician whose patients filled the town’s hotels from 1898 to 1943. In 1893 mineral water from Soda Springs won recognition at the World’s Fair and Exposition in Chicago. A marker in town says that around the turn of the twentieth century the train brought guests eager to enjoy the springs, and many of them stayed at the Idanha. The hotel was destroyed by fire on June 7, 1921.

Beer Springs before the town

The town carried its name well before 1937, when local businessmen drilling for hot water struck the gas that became the Soda Springs Geyser. BoiseDev names Octagon Springs, Hooper Springs, and Lover’s Delight among the naturally carbonated springs that gave Soda Springs its name.

The springs are older than the town. The Idaho Heritage Trust writes that Native Americans used the carbonated springs of Caribou County as a camping and gathering site from before recorded history, and that the earliest European explorers and trappers knew them. Fur traders called the place Beer Springs. Washington Irving wrote up Captain Bonneville’s travels and described trappers who turned aside from their route to drink there “with as much eagerness as the Arab seeks some famous well of the desert.” Bonneville found that the water tasted of beer. “The Indians, however, refuse to taste it,” Irving added.

A state marker says most Oregon Trail travelers stopped to try the “acid taste and effervessing gasses.” Sarah White Smith camped at Soda Springs on July 24, 1838, and found the water excellent for bread: “Take it from the fountain & the bread is as light as any prepared with yeast.”