Little evidence survives today of the industrial giant that once consumed this neighborhood. By 1889 when the first cable car ran on an impressive trestle to the north above the settlement, the Moulton and Alice mines were fully developed and Walkerville was an industrial hub. By this time, Canadian-born George Dent was already in business at this location. Hundreds of miners, especially from Cornwall, England, lived and worked in this Butte suburb and frequented Dent’s small shop. From at least 1889 until his death in 1936, George Dent was a veritable institution, clipping and shaving Walkerville’s miners. An early photograph shows Dent’s front-room, one-chair barbershop ornately wallpapered and lavishly decorated with photographs and female pinups, no doubt to keep the miners busy as Dent worked his transformations. Three large front windows and two more on the west allowed his workspace ample daylight. The family occupied the rear, where Dent and his wife raised two sons. Now clad in metal siding, this wood-frame home rests on a sturdy granite foundation and its original footprint is wholly intact.
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