The Hall Bungalow, built in 1916-17, is a distinctive, unpretentious but elegant log residence that reflects its early history as a private summer residence. Chicago Board of Trade members James M. Hall and John H. Scoville formed the Hall Ranch Company and purchased David Middlemas’s ranch in September 1916. The sale was reported as “one of the biggest deals ever made in the valley.” The partners soon constructed this ten-room log bungalow but visited with their families only a few times. They sold the ranch in 1919 to John “Jack” Patten (son of Chicago “Wheat King” James Patten). Patten named the ranch the Lazy T Ranch, but only three years later he sold it to Courtney R. Gleason, a Chicago real estate broker. While Gleason leased the ranch, he protected “this beautiful house,” keeping it unoccupied but well maintained. The Hall bungalow embodies classic Craftsman architectural details in the home’s low-pitched roof, wide eaves, and symmetrical façade with recessed front porch. The bungalow’s natural setting and the use of log and stone evoke the Rustic style. The blending of these styles continues in the stately but comfortable interior, which features log walls, wood floors, tongue-and-groove seventeen-foot ceilings, and a massive double river-rock fireplace. Paul T. Smith, whose family settled in the Boulder valley in the 1860s, and his new wife Vivian, purchased the ranch in 1938. Generations of the Smith family have lived in the residence ever since while operating a cattle ranch.
]]>Montana pledged its commitment to children with disabilities in 1887 when Territorial Governor Preston Leslie requested funds for a Montana Deaf and Dumb Asylum. Its title, although shocking by today’s standards, reflects accepted nineteenth-century terminology and attitudes. Upon statehood in 1889, Congress granted Montana 50,000 acres of land to raise funds for the school. The 1893 legislature provided operating expenses and chose Boulder as the site. Students attended classes in a private home while the school built this first campus building, begun in 1896 and completed in 1898. Despite its formidable name, the school offered innovative college-preparatory instruction and training for deaf and blind youth. In 1903, the state legislature changed the name to the Montana School for the Deaf and Dumb, thereby acknowledging that it was not an “asylum,” but rather a public school for children with special needs. By 1915, additional buildings increased the campus capacity to 200 students, who ranged from ages 5 to 20. By this time its mission had expanded to include educating developmentally disabled youth. Until the 1930s, this building served numerous purposes as the center of activities, housing for students and staff, and dining rooms. Blind students learned various manual industries and deaf students learned lip-reading in addition to the usual public school curriculum. The school also offered an extensive music program. State architect John C. Paulsen designed the building of local brick and granite, appropriately trimmed in Montana copper. The blending of Italianate and Renaissance revival styles, and its long institutional service, mark this Boulder landmark as a state milestone.
]]>In 1888, Jefferson County voters passed a $40,000 bond issue to build a permanent courthouse. Flourishing gold and silver mines and the advent of the railroad meant the county would see its population quadruple between 1870 and 1890, and there looked to be no end to the boom. Seeking a building that mirrored their confidence in the future, county commissioners hired Montana Territory’s most noted architect, the German-born and trained John Paulsen, to draw up plans. Paulsen reflected the young settlement’s ambitions with this Richardsonian Romanesque style building. Inspired by the enduring structures of the Middle Ages, the style particularly appealed to frontier communities that wanted to assert their staying power. The massive courthouse features a tall square tower capped by an octagonal spire and two turrets. It also boasts the semi-circular arches, rough-cut stone accents, and asymmetrical roofline that typify Richardsonian Romanesque. Gargoyles at the building’s corners, perched just below the eaveline, add a touch of whimsy. Contractor J. S. McKenzie built the two-story monument from locally quarried granite and bricks burned within a mile of the construction site. The interior features elaborate woodwork, including decorative door and window trim and an ornately carved staircase. In the courtroom itself, walls rise twenty feet to a ceiling of stained beams and planking. Completed the year Montana achieved statehood, the building ultimately cost the county approximately $50,000 (an estimated $1.1 million in today’s dollars). Built for the ages, it is one of the oldest courthouses in Montana still used for its original purpose.
]]>For centuries Native Americans have been coming to these pure, flowing hot water springs for rest and healing. Legend tells that they called this area Peace Valley. They agreed to lay down their weapons when they sojourned here, believing that the land and the waters were for everyone to share and could not be owned. In the 1860s, prospector James Riley chanced upon the springs and filed a land and water rights claim. In 1864, he built a crude bathhouse and tavern. When Riley succumbed to smallpox in 1882, new owners built a small, more fashionable hotel. In 1891, it was remodeled and enlarged in the Queen Anne style and boasted fifty-two rooms, electricity, facilities for invalids, a resident physician, gymnasium, and various entertainments. Between 1910 and 1913, the present bathhouse, east wing and an addition at the west were built. The older building was also remodeled with raised parapets and a covering of stucco, creating a grand hotel in the present California Mission style. Opulent interior appointments included Tiffany glass lighting, beamed ceilings, and hand-stenciled walls in the Arts and Crafts tradition. Under various names and owners, Boulder Hot Springs has catered to a widely varying clientele. Architecturally significant as vintage Queen Anne remodeled to a newer style, Boulder Hot Springs is the last vestige of the many large-scale hot spring retreats that provided respite and recreation to early Montanans.
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