Trails Leading to Montana 103 pages
An introduction prepares us for our travels by way of the author’s journey and a historical experience all of us may know. As we start our journey together archaeologist discoveries have gone back as far as 10,000 years in what will later become Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park. Our early trails lead to MontanaTerritory in 1864.
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E. Folsom, Charles W. Cook, and William Peterson, all from the Montana Territory area journey through Yellowstone. The following year, Henry Dana Washburn, surveyor general of Montana, leads a six-week expedition including a U.S. Calvary escort.100 Others on the expedition include Nathaniel Pitt Langford and Cornelius Hedges. They leave Fort Ellis in Montana Territory on August 22, 1870 and approach the Yellowstone area four days later. During an evening campfire on September 19, 1870, Cornelius Hedges suggests this area be set aside as a park.
The larger part of the grain arrives at Minnetonka Mill by rail over the spur track built by the Minnesota and Pacific Railroad Company. We are seeing up to 104 trains daily carrying many new immigrants into the spacious St. Paul Union Depot by the 1870s. Thousands of Poles and Finns are traveling on to the mines and lumber camps of the far north while Germans and Swedes are journeying to the rich farming country, and others are remaining in the crowded capital city of St. Paul.101 The next official census in 1870 shows there are 439,000 people living in Minnesota. During the 1870s Minnesota’s population will grow to 780,773, Dakota Territory’s will grow from 14,181 to 135,177 and Montana Territory’s rise from 20,595 to 39,159. Railroads are being built directly to some farm populations in the 1870s and farmers are locating in accordance with projected or anticipated railroad construction. Finally, having reached the already settled areas, the railroad begins dictating where we will settle as we head further west. Settlements are seen behind train depots and below grain elevators. As the rail industry is establishing itself in Minnesota after 1870, flour milling is beginning to grow rapidly, and the state emerges as the single most important milling center in the world.
New railroad technology is shifting the commercial advantage from St. Louis to Chicago, and from Missouri to Illinois. A Captain notices the difference early in 1870 when he is aboard the Kate Kearney engaging in commerce between St. Louis and areas in the lower Missouri River.
Cattle have been riding to market via trains until the 1870s, and now, we are seeing the advent of refrigerator cars take place. Ambitious plans are never successfully completed. “De Mores was a Frenchman, a soldier of fortune, a world traveler, and one of the finest swordsmen in Europe. In the United.
Montana becomes a state in 1889 at the same time as the Great Northern Railroad is looking to cross the Northern Rockies.
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the railroad will go through Flathead Valley on the way to the Pacific Coast as the valley has both rich soil and is undeveloped territory. Hill asks Conrad to associate himself with men from St. Paul, buy land for the Kalispell Townsite Company, move to the valley, and be in charge of the town site company. Another version indicates Charles Conrad goes to St. Paul, Minnesota to visit his old friend James J. Hill who agrees to locate a division point for his Great Northern Railroad wherever Conrad chooses to buy land. Conrad persuades several Flathead Valley settlers to sell land to him, names the place Kalispell, and begins platting a town site.23 The first Kalispell post office is started in 1891 with Charles F. Harrigan as postmaster.
In the meantime, twelve miles to the north, C.E. Ramsey is building the first hotel west of the river at Whitefish Lake calling this the Lake View House. Initially, we are referring to the town as Ramsey.
Ten miles to the east of Ramsey:
The Kennedy’s were very early comers to the new town. ‘Uncle Jim,’ as he was affectionately called by the towns people, operated a drug store. In May of 1891 he was appointed the first post master. When he applied for the name of Columbia, he was informed from Washington that there was a Columbus in Montana, and that a similar name might be very confusing. He was asked to make a second choice. Mrs. Kennedy was quick to solve the problem. She said just add ‘Falls’ to it. And so Columbia changed to Columbia Falls.24
In 1891 George Grinnell expresses the government should purchase the mountains around St. Mary Lakes and turn the eastern region of the Northern Rockies into a national park. Several years later Dr. Lyman B. Sperry is voicing the same sentiment regarding the west side of the Northern Rockies.
“On the last day of December 1891, the Great Northern’s locomotive arrived. From the beginning, however, the Great Northern experienced problems on its route through the Kalispell area. The curves and steep grade on the line west of town finally led officials to reroute through Whitefish. People in Kalispell were furious.”25
The words “All Aboard” remind us of challenges we are about to face on our adventure. Many of us will experience a paradise when reaching our destination.
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Chapter Four - All Aboard!! 1892 to 1894
We are seeing the creation of Ellis Island in 1892. The Great Northern Railroad’s main competitor, Northern Pacific Railroad, is establishing a shipping connection across the North Pacific. The Sierra Club is founded in 1892 by John Muir and others to protect our natural environment.
Mitchell, a small prairie town of 3,000 in South Dakota, is leading the way in 1892 with the first Corn Palace Exposition. The town’s residents have built a whimsical fairy-tale structure with Byzantine towers, spiraling minarets of Dakota grain, and dazzling outdoor mosaics of corn and grass.1 The Corn Belt Real Estate Association is developing a plan to encourage immigration to the state utilizing this twelve year old city. By touting the fertility of the land, organizers believe they are able to convince farmers from adjoining states that South Dakota can support abundant crops. Residents are joining forces to construct an exposition hall imaginatively trimmed with native grasses, grains, and featuring murals created from colorful ears of corn. The original wooden structure will be replaced in 1905 by a larger building and then again in 1921 by a steel-and-concrete version. The Corn Palace will have been home to an annual harvest celebration almost continually starting in 1892.2 The spectacle is a one of a kind memorable experience for travelers.
Tracklayers have reached Kalispell January 1, 1892 and this evening we are hearing the first locomotive whistle in Kalispell. The Spike is driven to unite Kalispell and St. Paul by rail thus linking Kalispell with the commercial world. “Old timers say, with the coming of the railroad on January 1, 1892, ended the Pioneer days in the Flathead, and quite a number left for new fields due to overcrowding.”3 Flathead County is created in 1892 being named from...
Courtesy of Glacier National Park Archives.
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