{"id":177,"featured":0,"modified":"2026-04-17 19:40:06","latitude":47.5067149999999998044586391188204288482666015625,"longitude":-111.29842500000000882209860719740390777587890625,"title":"Bungalow Bakery","subtitle":"Great Falls Central Business Historic District","fullsize":"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/9d527e19c46dcae465fb0e21e1a1d658.jpg","address":"509 1st Avenue North, Great Falls, Montana","all_locations":[],"zoom":17,"creator":["Montana National Register Sign Program"],"description":"Edward and Celia Harberson constructed this building for their bakery in 1946. Its simple plan and design, typical of the period, reflect the post–World War II boom as the work force returned and small businesses, like the Harbersons’ bakery, prospered. Edward Harberson came to Great Falls from Billings as an orphan in 1909. He was among the first children taken into St. Thomas Orphans’ Home where Sister Hermina taught him the art of baking. Harberson worked for the Eddy Bakery but later started baking in his home and delivering the baked goods by wagon. He and his wife, also a baker, established the Bungalow Bakery in 1937. In 1952, one of the Harbersons’ three sons died of polio. The following year, the Harbersons created Doughnut Day at the bakery to raise funds for the March of Dimes; it became a Great Falls tradition. The Harbersons closed the bakery in 1957. A series of tenant businesses then occupied the space until Carroll and Virginia Blend purchased the property for their small business, Blends’ Copy Shop, in 1981.","sponsor":null,"accessinfo":"Private","lede":"","website":"","related_resources":["<a href=\"https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/1aad086e-a12e-4ed6-87a2-fb2b0e59c8f8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Read about the Great Falls Central Business Historic District</a>","<a href=\"https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/5076ac91-787f-43e8-b172-2700323e584c/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">See photos of the Great Falls Central Business Historic District</a>"],"factoids":[],"files":{"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/9d527e19c46dcae465fb0e21e1a1d658.jpg":{"id":2936,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Bungalow Bakery","description":"Bungalow Bakery (PAc 91-51 Great Falls R24 F44). Front view of the building, facing north on 1st Avenue North. B&amp;W. | Montana State Historic Preservation Office from the Photograph Archives at the Montana Historical Society | 1983 | Photographer unidentified","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/9d527e19c46dcae465fb0e21e1a1d658.jpg"}}}