A sweeping new mural now greets visitors entering Clark Fork, Idaho, covering nearly a thousand square feet of building wall with imagery pulled from the community’s deep history — from 19th-century loggers and river pigs to the mythical Wampus Cat and the wildflowers that sustained plateau peoples for generations.
The work, titled informally as a tribute to Clark Fork, was completed in spring 2026 on the exterior of the Lightning Creek, Inc. storage building — a structure owned by Clark Fork Mayor Russ Schenck. The project began modestly enough: Schenck initially wanted a replacement for an existing sign that had stood on the building for roughly 30 years. What resulted was something far more ambitious.
From Sign Replacement to Community Landmark
The path from a simple signage update to a full-scale mural commission began in December 2022, when local resident Cheryl Meadows connected the Schencks with artist Claire Green. After reviewing samples of Green’s work, the Schencks decided to expand the scope dramatically.
“Little did we know we were about to greenlight a masterpiece,” Mayor Schenck said.
Green, the Sandpoint-area artist behind the finished piece, spent years developing the mural’s imagery into a layered visual narrative of Clark Fork’s past and natural landscape. The finished work spans 960 square feet and incorporates an Idaho state seal, a United States flag, a 1930s-era postcard aesthetic, postage stamp-style vignettes, children fishing along the river, the Pend Oreille Paddler, historic logging scenes, and a cast of local wildlife — fish, deer, bear, wolves, eagles, and hawks among them. The camas lily, a plant of deep cultural significance to indigenous peoples of the Columbia Plateau, appears alongside Coyote, a central figure in regional Plateau oral traditions.
Green’s attention to accuracy extended beyond research. She caught fish herself to ensure the species depicted in the mural were rendered correctly.
The Technical Challenge Behind the Art
The mural was painted by hand using exterior acrylic latex house paint applied to MDO — medium-density overlay, a resin-infused plywood — which served as the canvas material. Each element received between two and six coats of paint. Green hand-mixed 10 distinct tones of gray to achieve the tonal range needed across the composition, and the American flag was painted separately using CMYK color values for precision.
The medium presented its own demands. “It’s thick, dries fast, and destroys brushes quickly,” Green noted of the exterior acrylic latex.
Installation of the finished panels was handled by Sandpoint Builders, led by contractor Bruce Wickboldt, who mounted the completed sections onto the building facade.
A Town’s Story Told on One Wall
Clark Fork sits at the eastern end of Lake Pend Oreille along Highway 200, a small community with a history shaped by the river, the timber industry, and the natural landscape that surrounds it. The mural draws on all of those threads, weaving together historical imagery and folklore into a single continuous work visible from the road.
The inclusion of the Wampus Cat — a creature rooted in Appalachian and later American frontier legend — alongside regionally specific indigenous stories and accurate renderings of local wildlife reflects the breadth of cultural history Green worked to represent. The 1930s postcard framing gives portions of the mural a nostalgic warmth, evoking the era when North Idaho’s timber and outdoor recreation economies were at their peak.
The project illustrates how community identity can take physical shape through public art. For a town of Clark Fork’s size, a 960-square-foot mural commissioned by the mayor and painted by a local artist represents a meaningful investment in civic pride. Sandpoint and surrounding Bonner County communities have seen a growing interest in public-facing community projects in recent years, from infrastructure improvements to cultural installations.
The mural is now visible on Lightning Creek, Inc.’s storage building along the Clark Fork corridor, welcoming travelers and residents alike with a painted record of the town’s character — one that took more than three years from initial concept to installation to complete.
What Comes Next
No formal dedication ceremony has been announced as of publication, but the mural’s completion marks the end of a multi-year collaboration that began with a simple request to replace an aging sign. Green’s finished work is expected to stand as a permanent landmark for Clark Fork, one that future generations of residents and visitors will encounter as they arrive in the community. Local interest in public art and community-driven projects across Bonner County continues to grow, and Clark Fork’s new mural sets a high standard for what a small Idaho town can accomplish with the right vision — and the right artist.