Communal bison hunting required tremendous sophistication and a deep understanding of bison behavior and Northern Plains topography. Although sites varied considerably, the ideal location for a large-scale hunt had water and good grazing nearby to…

Beginning in 1900, no place was more closely associated with “Cowboy Artist” Charles M. Russell (1864-1926) than his home and log-cabin studio. Born into a prominent St. Louis family, Russell arrived on the frontier in 1880, just in time to witness…

Founded in 1882, a year after the area’s first silver strike, Neihart was nearly deserted by 1887. In 1891, the Great Northern Railway laid track connecting area mines to the Great Falls smelter, and investors and miners rushed back. On a hill south…

In the 1920s, Great Falls builder George Calvert filled this block with single-family houses, some on speculation, and others for specific clients. He constructed this house for Great Northern Railway conductor John Cox, his wife Louisa, and their…

Optimistic about Great Falls’ future, town founder Paris Gibson authorized the plat of the Third Addition—the area that contains the East Side Neighborhood—in 1890. The Crash of 1893 slowed development, and a lone vernacular style home stood,…

Carroll B. McCulloh and his wife Ella constructed this elegant two-story brick home in 1911, raising their two children here. Its two-and-one-half stories, simple box shape, low-hipped roof, large central dormer, wide overhanging eaves, and offset…

A planned, tree-lined neighborhood away from the town’s industrial activity, the Northside welcomed Great Falls’ business and professional community. Charles Lemley, owner of the Bon Ton Confectionery, chose to build his family home here in 1900.…

The fertile Sun River Valley attracted twenty-six-year-old, Kentucky-born James C. Adams, whose worldly experience belied his youth. Orphaned at ten and a Civil War prisoner at sixteen, he came to Virginia City in 1864 at eighteen, already a…

The Sisters of the Order of St. Ursula came to Montana in 1884 to establish schools for Indians. When the homestead movement created a need for more urban educational facilities, the Great Falls Townsite Company offered the sisters any two city…

At the center of the African American community in Great Falls for more than a century, the Union Bethel AME Church began holding regular services in the first fire station in 1890. The following year African American residents gathered with white…