People & Place

  • Lakeshore Cabins and Campground Will Give You the "Don't-Wanna-Go Blues"

    By Joseph Shelton, with Photos by Lynn Donaldson
    I start thinking about all of the stuff that I presumably went on a getaway to get away from—bills to pay, offices to sit in all day, responsibilities to mind. If you're like me, you get a sort of hangdog feeling a few days after coming back, as if in mourning for your dear departed excursion. I call it the "don't-wanna-go blues."
  • Get To Know Flathead County

    By Bryan Spellman, with photos by the author
    The Great Northern Railroad, building its way west, reached Kalispell in 1892, and built their depot at the north end of downtown. In 1904, the railroad moved its main line north to Whitefish, leaving Kalispell to be served by a spur line only.
  • Great Falls: Defined by the Railroad and the Falls

    By Russell Rowland
    Perhaps one of the most significant towns that originally came about because of the railroad is Great Falls, although Great Falls developed a strong foundation around many other industries after its founding.
  • Dorothy M. Johnson's Recycled Cinema

    By Sue Hart
    In the 1940s and early ‘50s, a double feature always included at least one Western, usually depicting Hollywood’s version of what Johnson claimed as her West—the frontier on which she set the majority of her stories.
  • Beautiful Montana Roads for All Seasons

    By Todd Klassy, Photos by the Author
    These are some of my most favorite drives in Montana, regardless of the season. But I think they can be appreciated even more so in the colder months of the year. So, grab your Thermos of hot cocoa, an extra warm blanket or two, and your best winter tires. Let’s go for a drive.
  • The Lakota Delegation: Portraits from 1868 - 1877

    By Douglas Schmittou
    Studio photographs of Spotted Tail’s wife and Running Antelope, a Hunkpapa headman, were taken by Gardner in Washington, D.C., during 1872. Running Antelope was splendidly dressed in a magnificent quilled shirt, peace medal, dentalia-shell ear pendants, otter-fur hair wraps, and three eagle feathers, one of which bears specific war-exploit markings.
  • Old Red and 27 Seasons of Calving

    By Holly Matkin    
    Her body’s muscling and fat cover rival those of cows one-fifth her age, but the reality of time is less hidden in the telltale angles and shadows of her fa
  • Telling "The Story of Butte"

    By Sherman Cahill
    There are, at the time of this writing, 329 separate entries in the Story of Butte database, with more coming all the time. In addition to discrete entries, there are also many tours that organize locations into a series of stops that tell a fuller story, such as the 11 locations featured in the Murder of Frank Little tour.
  • Montana on The Move!

    By Rob Rath
    Historically, agriculture has always been Montana's foremost economic engine from jobs to exports. Because of the Great Depression and World War II, only 30% of working farms used gas-powered equipment into the 1940s, while the rest still relied on horses to work in the fields.
  • The Day Jack Dempsey Cheated Shelby

    By Sherman Cahill
    If Dempsey had it made, then Shelby, Montana was on the make. The little Hi-Line railroad town had been on the map since the late 19th century, but had fallen on hard times when homesteading in the region went bust. But in 1921, oil was discovered north of Shelby. Within months, the town filled with oil field workers, geologists, and drillers.
  • Get To Know Chouteau County

    By Bryan Spellman, with Photos By the Author
    Of special note is the Chouteau County Court House.  Built in 1883, to replace the original court house destroyed by fire that year, today the building is the second oldest court house still serving that function in the state of Montana.
  • Get To Know A County: Rosebud

    By Bryan Spellman
    Roughly halfway between Lame Deer and Colstrip, the Deer Medicine Rocks are a National Historic Landmark, located on private property with no public access. The landmark memorializes the site where Lakota Chief Sitting Bull had a vision foretelling his success over the U.S. 7th Cavalry led by General George Armstrong Custer.
  • Get To Know Fergus County

    By Bryan Spellman, With Photos by the Author
    Located at the geographical center of the state of Montana, Fergus County was formed on March 12, 1885, with land taken from Meagher and Chouteau Counties. James Fergus, a territorial delegate from Meagher County, proposed the new county, and it was named for him.
  • Get To Know a County: Carbon County

    By Bryan Spellman, with Photos by the Author
    Carbon County has sixty-six listings on the National Register of Historic Places, including eleven in Red Lodge. The county courthouse and the former Carbon County Hospital and Sanitorium are both part of the Red Lodge Historic Commercial District.
  • Why I Believe in Bigfoot

    By Kelly Berdahl
    Highly unusual sounds recorded near Ennis (MT) have strikingly similar characteristics to those captured in the Sierra Nevada range (CA) in the early ’70s. Witnesses all describe the overwhelming magnitude and power of these sounds.
  • For the Birds: Passion and Happiness in the Mission Valley

    By Everett Headley, with photos by the author
    John has become a local celebrity after ushering nearly 10,000 students through his passion project. When walking into a bar recently a middle-aged man pointed a figure finger at him asking if he was the “bird guy.”
  • Haunted Hotels of Southwest Montana

    By Sherman Cahill
    Suddenly and without explanation, he discovered a solitary elk steak on the hallway floor. Then another here. Another couple there. It was 6 or 8 elk steaks all told, and Lee still can't figure out who, or what, is responsible for moving them.
  • Roadtrip to Dillon and the Andrus Hotel

    By Joseph Shelton, with photos by the author
    Our room was the Carnegie Suite, which, in addition to a handsome kitchen, living room, and two full bathrooms (one featuring a luxurious walk-in shower), also featured two bedrooms, each with its own television.
  • For the Love Of... Chinook Horses

    The great American writer Herman Melville, author of Moby Dick, proved he knew horses nearly as well as whales when he said, "No philosophers so thoroughly comprehend us as dogs and horses." That comprehension shows itself in remarkable ways—horses will sidle up close, nuzzle you, even lovingly nip at you.