Interview with Ellen Baumler

Ellen Baumler (Helena) is the Interpretive Historian at the Montana Historical Society.  Her responsibilities have included composing interpretive signs for historical sites in Montana, developing and writing walking tours of historic districts, successfully writing National Register nominations, writing and reviewing roadside historical markers for the Montana Department of Transportation, and sharing Montana’s heritage with students of all ages across the state. She is an award-winning author of diverse articles and books such as Montana Chillers: 13 True Tales of Ghosts and Hauntings for young readers, Dark Spaces—Montana’s Historic Penitentiary at Deer Lodge, and most recently Montana Moments: History on the Go.

DM Editor, Valerie Harms, Interviews Ellen Baumler...

DM: You are receiving a well-deserved Governor’s Humanities Award this spring.  How do you feel about this honor?

It’s truly humbling. I just do my job, like many other colleagues I work with. It was a surprise and it’s quite an honor to be counted among such distinguished recipients. It’s even more meaningful that a number of people wrote letters and supported me.    

DM: How many years have you been at the Montana Historical Society?  How many programs a year do you estimate that you give around the state?

I’ve been the National Register sign coordinator since 1992. I must do upwards of 40 programs a year on many different topics. In addition to public programs, lectures, and guest teaching in various classrooms, I also spend a great deal of time with third and fourth graders in the Helena public schools, teaching them about their community heritage through daylong excursions to local historic places. And I have been teaching Montana history at UM-Helena since 1995. I really enjoy working with such diverse age groups.   

DM: Plus you write books.  What started you off writing your tales about ghosts and such?  You have a new book coming out this fall, right?

My family had an interesting experience in the house where we still live in Helena. We would hear a radio playing in the night. Sometimes just one family member would hear it; sometimes we would all hear it at the same time. After a few years of putting up with this weird quirk in the house, the elderly man who grew up in the house visited us and we learned that in the 1920s, he had Helena’s first ham radio operation set up in an upstairs bedroom and people came from all over town to hear his radio! We still hear it sometimes. Linking our present experiences with the history of the house taught me that sometimes seemingly unexplainable events can be explained by searching the past. In my National Register sign research, I began to look for these types of situations. I realized it would be a great way to hook people who might not pick up a history book into reading about Montana’s historic places. It worked, and I have written three books of historically based ghost stories.

DM: In Bozeman you gave a presentation about African Americans in Montana and in the Spring issue of this magazine you write about the Chinese people.  What other groups of people have you written about?

I have written about Montana’s Jewish population, completing the nominations that placed Helena’s Jewish Cemetery (the oldest in the state) and its Temple Emanu El (the first Jewish temple between St. Paul and Portland) in the National Register of Historic Places. I have written about the Salish in the Bitterroot Valley and their poignant move to the Flathead Reservation (again for a successful National Register nomination of St. Mary’s Mission Historic District). My book Dark Spaces is about men and women in the Montana prison system at Deer Lodge. I have also written articles about women in the justice system, about women and prostitution, and about the history of the Florence Crittenton Home in Montana and the young women who have sought refuge there over the past century. I have also done presentations on the Methodist Deaconesses who founded hospitals across Montana and were instrumental in the founding of the Montana Nurses Association. I think the human dramas of history are what people want to discover, and I have made it a personal mission to seek those stories out and entice people to want to read about them. 

DM: What is your most compelling desire for people to know about historic landmarks and the National Register?  Or, what are some of your favorite places?

Well, my all-time favorite place is Virginia City—a National Historic Landmark. I think most people don’t understand its importance. It’s a place every Montanan should visit. I’ve spent a good part of my career promoting it in various ways. I know its stories and its darker places, and I love it for the richness of its historic layers. But the town struggles because people just don’t get to know it. That’s a real tragedy and the lack of understanding endangers its preservation. Helena also is a very special place that even those who live here don’t fully appreciate. I spend much time giving tours of Helena’s National Register-listed districts and important places. My Haunted Helena tours, partnering with the Last Chance Tour Train, include so much history, but with a darker focus. They quickly fill up especially during October.        

DM: Tell us about Montana Moments and how that came to be?

A few years ago I had a local radio program called “History Half-Notes.” It ran for a couple of years, five days a week. I wrote twenty 90-second scripts every month for those two years, and amassed some 450 “history minutes.” The book is a collection of more than half of them. They cover a huge range of topics from axolotls to the strange reburial of Peter Zortman. It’s a fun book of quick reads.    

DM: I love how you always have great pictures to show.

Working at the Montana Historical Society affords me a wealth of resources, and I love to find illustrations for my talks.

DM: What’s a day in your job like?  Is your desk tidy or cluttered?

Good grief! My desk is always strewn with files, papers, and coffee cups. As soon as I finish a project and clean up the area, it’s a mess again. I know where most everything is, but no one else could find anything in my “organized” chaos! A typical day, if I am not traveling, consists of answering public queries, researching signs or programs, writing work-related articles, attending meetings in the community and/or with other staff. Once home in the evenings, I cook dinner then settle in front of my computer answering emails, working on whatever outside project I have going at the moment, or preparing programs or classes for the next day. I am adept at keeping one eye on the TV throughout the evening, so unless I am up against a tight deadline, the evenings are relaxed—part work, part recreation. I have a very, very tolerant husband.    

DM: What’s next for you?

The Historical Society landed a very important NEH grant bringing 80 teachers from across the US to Virginia City, Helena, and Butte this summer, and I am involved in teaching a number of those seminars. The Society has also applied for a Big Read grant, pairing one of my favorite projects, Girl from the Gulches: The Story of Mary Ronan (which is partly about growing up in the mining camps) with Tom Sawyer. If we get the grant, it will allow me to travel to six rural schools and communities next year discussing 19^th century childhood experiences. Each project—whatever it is—is like a blank page, and it is a great deal of fun to fill it up. I am sure I will have several things going at one time. I always do.

Thanks Ellen.