Garfield, WA

Garfield is a Whitman County town in the rolling Palouse Hills, surrounded by wheat fields and the broad farm landscape of southeastern Washington. The 2020 census counted 562 residents. The town grew in the early 1880s, when Samuel J. Tant laid out the community and named it for President James A. Garfield. Garfield's streets still serve the farms around them, and the town's small scale makes Town Hall and the local road grid easy reference points.

Palouse agriculture shapes the calendar as much as the view: wheat harvest, farm trucks, and changing field colors set the pace outside the town limits. Whitman County's older rail network helped create small commercial centers and shipping points across these hills, including Garfield. Today the town maintains municipal services, recycling and event notices, and a few spaces for visitors passing through. The town keeps a close relationship with the surrounding grain country. Garfield's story is in the rolling wheat country, the compact streets, and the way a small town serves the surrounding farms.