Paris 4th of July Celebration

On the morning of the Fourth in Paris, Idaho, the flag goes up at Memory Park at six o’clock, and the chuckwagon breakfast begins serving at the same hour. For 2026 the city listed it at $14 for adults and $10 for children six to twelve, with toddlers two and under eating free. The city’s schedule had the griddles running until 10:30, and the Montpelier News-Examiner gave 10 a.m. Shena Smith, writing for the News-Examiner, called the breakfast “a signature tradition for generations of families.” The Bear Lake County Historical Society calls it a pancake breakfast and describes the whole day as a homecoming, when past residents and visitors “come home” to Paris.

The celebration runs two days, and the News-Examiner counts it among southeast Idaho’s longest-running. In 2026 Bear Lake County made it the local observance of the nation’s 250th anniversary. It opened Friday evening, July 3, with a free concert in Memory Park led by the country artist Levi Blom, with Heber Dunford and Brady Gardner, and with food and craft vendors on hand. The calendar has shifted from year to year. In 2024 the music came at the end, a free Jagertown Concert with Tyler and the Train Robbers at Memory Park on July 6.

Fifteen hundred in the tabernacle

At eleven the program moves to the Paris Tabernacle at 109 South Main Street for “We Sing of America.” According to the Idaho State Journal, the program began in 1981 and has been held every year since, with a hiatus during the COVID-19 pandemic. The paper’s 2024 account reported that “often as many as 1,500 people squeeze into the Tabernacle” to hear performers who have practiced for months. The program ends with a recognition of every branch of the military.

The building is open to the public through the summer, from Memorial Day weekend to Labor Day weekend. The Bear Lake Valley visitors bureau describes a free self-guided tour of its carved stone and wood ceilings, guided tours in summer, and a small museum of heirlooms and art left by the homesteaders.

Candy on Main Street, chickens at the fairgrounds

The parade starts at 1 p.m. and runs down Main Street. The 2024 account said it “has grown every year, and every year children leave the parade with enough candy to last until Halloween.” The listings also include a 5K and a one-mile run. In 2024 these were the Paris Water Run, held July 5 from Paris City Park as a fundraiser for the Bear Lake High School cross country team.

The afternoon belongs to the Bear Lake Junior Rodeo at the Paris Fairgrounds on North 3rd East Street. The fairgrounds says the Paris Fourth has included a youth rodeo “for years,” with mutton bustin’, barrel racing, and chicken and hog chasing contests. The visitors bureau lists it as a qualifier for the Junior World Finals. The fairgrounds credits K&M Ranch Flowers and Produce and local volunteers with overhauling the arena and adding events, some of which are now national qualifiers.

A craft and vendor fair runs alongside the rodeo, with art and local farm products. For 2026 the city’s schedule put the rodeo and fair together at Paris City Park and the fairgrounds from 2 to 9 p.m., with a $10 entry and children eight and under free. The News-Examiner gave the rodeo’s hours as 3 to 9. In 2024 the rodeo was held on July 6 instead, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Fireworks twelve miles north

The evening’s fireworks are held in Montpelier, 12 miles north of Paris, at dusk. In 2024 the Montpelier Rotary Club put on the show at Allinger Park. “The Lions Club used to put on the show, but they got down in numbers and decided to disband their club so the Rotary Club decided to take it over,” said Jim Griglack, the Rotary president. The club hired Acme Fireworks of Preston, and Griglack put the cost at around $10,000, raised from donations. He said people watch from Allinger Park, the football stands, the high school parking lot, and the golf course. “The show is entirely aerial so you probably can see it from anywhere in town,” he said. “Of course, you won’t be able to hear the great patriotic music.”

Red sandstone across the ice

Paris was the first community settled in the Bear Lake Valley. The historical society says the pioneers came through Emigration Canyon from Franklin on September 22, 1863, in nine wagons, led by Apostle Charles C. Rich. The 1972 National Register nomination gives the founding date as September 26. A civil engineer, Frederick T. Perris, surveyed the town in the fall of 1864, and the town was named Perris after him, a spelling that became Paris.

The Bear Lake Stake was organized on June 20, 1869, with Brigham Young and a number of apostles present. The historical society calls it the first Latter-day Saint stake outside Utah, gathering wards from Woodruff, Utah, to Soda Springs, Idaho, and Star Valley, Wyoming.

Work on a tabernacle for the stake began in 1884. The architect was Joseph Don Carlos Young of Salt Lake City, a son of Brigham Young, and he drew it in the Romanesque revival style with a six-story bell tower. The red sandstone was quarried in Indian Creek Canyon, eighteen miles away, and hauled around the lake by horse and ox teams. According to the nomination, “in winter, much of the stone was sledded across the ice of Bear Lake.”

The stone was cut and carved by Jacob Tueller, a Swiss mason recently arrived in Utah, and his three sons. They moved to Paris and gave four years to the project. All the wood, down to the shingles, was cut in nearby canyons. The nomination says most of the work was done by the settlers themselves, “each contributing his own skill,” and singles out James Nye’s work on the pulpit and choir ceiling. The building measures 127 feet 6 inches by 73 feet 4 inches.

The sources date the finished building differently. The historical society says it was completed in 1888 at a cost of about $50,000. The visitors bureau dates its construction to 1889.

The society also tells how the dedication was delayed. At a choir practice for the ceremony, an oil lamp’s wick set fire to the rope that held it, and the lamp fell, burning part of the choir loft and podium. The damage was repaired, and the dedication was held in September 1889. The tabernacle and the statue of Charles C. Rich were refurbished in 2006. The building still serves for stake conferences and graduations. The Idaho State Liaison Officer nominated it to the National Register on February 24, 1972, and the form recorded it in excellent condition, unaltered since its dedication on September 15, 1889.