{"id":3700,"featured":0,"modified":"2026-10-10 23:56:13","latitude":45.78571531482369749710414907895028591156005859375,"longitude":-108.496277332305908203125,"title":"Carpenter Paper Company","subtitle":"","fullsize":"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/f3e13c72e1feb4b82de5cf495f0add4c.jpg","address":"2019 Montana Avenue, Billings, MT","all_locations":[],"zoom":17,"creator":["Montana Historical Society"],"description":"Access to three transcontinental railroads and a booming rural population led Omaha, Nebraska-based Western Newspaper Union (WNU) to build this reinforced concrete and brick warehouse in 1917. Local architect Curtis Oehme designed the Western Commercial style building, which features multicolored brick, recessed brick panels, and diamond-shaped inlays on the vertical pilasters. In the late 1890s, Western Newspaper Union revolutionized rural journalism by supplying "ready-print" to small local newspapers with limited equipment and workers. Ready-print plates were premade newspaper printing plates containing national and international news, fiction, photographs, and advertisements. Rural weekly newspapers subscribed to the service, which allowed them to offer a wider variety of inside page content. In the 1920s, WNU supplied plates to about seventy-five papers in Montana and Wyoming. In 1922, WNU added an east-side addition and merged their paper stocks with the Carpenter Paper Company. Six Carpenter brothers had started the business in 1887 in a remodeled livery stable in Des Moines, Iowa. By 1900, they grew it into one of the nation’s largest paper suppliers. The company moved to Omaha in 1907 and expanded to Billings in 1917. By 1929, Carpenter had added many new salesmen and warehouse workers and branched into flooring products and Victrola record players. That year, the company purchased the building from WNU, which remained a tenant until 1940. In 1951, Carpenter added a thirty-five-thousand square-foot warehouse addition designed by Cushing & Terrell. The Carpenter Paper Company continued to provide wholesale paper products to eastern Montana and northern Wyoming until 1996.","sponsor":null,"accessinfo":"private","lede":"","website":"","related_resources":[],"factoids":[],"files":{"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/f3e13c72e1feb4b82de5cf495f0add4c.jpg":{"id":6856,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"View of facade, facing northwest.  | Montana Historical Society | September 2026 | Arizona Duff","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/f3e13c72e1feb4b82de5cf495f0add4c.jpg"},"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/07962d85aaa9618334629d1580956f8d.jpg":{"id":6855,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"Front to side view of building, facing north.  | Montana Historical Society | September 2026 | Arizona Duff","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/07962d85aaa9618334629d1580956f8d.jpg"},"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/3657d6a34571cd5ca0ca4ec2311194c0.jpg":{"id":6857,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"Side view of facade, facing northeast.  | Montana Historical Society | September 2026 | Arizona Duff","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/3657d6a34571cd5ca0ca4ec2311194c0.jpg"},"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/abd034824a453ab04721a162d1010b20.jpg":{"id":6475,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"Black and white view of facade | National Register of Historic Places nomination | ca. 1950","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/abd034824a453ab04721a162d1010b20.jpg"},"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/045eb749d1b8bbf796fa502770a62f14.jpg":{"id":6473,"mime-type":"image/png","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"Rendering of Western Newspaper Union building preconstruction | National Register of Historic Places nomination | ca. Dec 1916 | Architect Curtis Oehme","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/045eb749d1b8bbf796fa502770a62f14.jpg"},"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/7742339cc4744c64ed8750a45670e898.jpg":{"id":6474,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"Black and white view of facade | National Register of Historic Places nomination | ca. 1920","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/7742339cc4744c64ed8750a45670e898.jpg"},"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/cef633f330af64052e5c8f130fee4f17.jpg":{"id":6476,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"View of west and south elevations, view to northeast | National Register of Historic Places nomination | ca. May 2025","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/cef633f330af64052e5c8f130fee4f17.jpg"},"https://historicmt.org/files/fullsize/2aa3d5fce847d4a6abf677f97bf02c01.jpg":{"id":6472,"mime-type":"image/jpeg","title":"Carpenter Paper Company","description":"View of original facade at south elevation, view to north | National Register of Historic Places nomination | ca. May 2025","alt":"alt=""","thumbnail":"https://historicmt.org/files/square_thumbnails/2aa3d5fce847d4a6abf677f97bf02c01.jpg"}}}