Saleesh House was a North West Company fur-trading post built by David Thompson and James McMillan in the winter of 1809, about four miles downstream from present-day Thompson Falls. It was one of the first European structures built in what is now Montana, established to trade with the Salish (Flathead) people of the region. The post operated for several years before being replaced by more permanent facilities elsewhere.
A historical marker near the Clark Fork commemorates the site, though there is nothing standing — the post was a rough timber structure that did not survive. The significance is historical: this was the first commercial outpost in the region, and Thompson's subsequent mapping of the Columbia River system, which he accomplished in 1811, opened the Pacific Northwest to the fur trade. For anyone interested in the early exploration of the American West, standing near this site with Thompson's journals in hand makes for a genuinely evocative afternoon.