Speaking of patents, Idaho remains the spud state
One of our items below looks at general trends in Washington and in Spokane County for the number of patents issued to companies or inventors.
At the time, we didn't have the comparable numbers for Idaho.
Here they are: in 2005 the U.S. Patent Office issued 1,529 patents to businesses or inventors based in Idaho.
By 2010 that number had fallen sharply; the Patent Office said 1,095 patents were issued in that year. That was at least a bump upward, from 941 awarded in 2009.