An 1884 map shows a wooden block with a trio of businesses here: a saloon, variety theatre, and fruit market. By 1912, the building housed a secondhand store. Sometime before 1927, the old wooden block was torn down, replaced by this one-story brick addition. Just like the “thoroughly modern” Baltimore Hotel that had gone up next door in 1918, this two-tone building has raised brick (corbelled) detailing and prominent pilasters separating a façade of three symmetrical bays. In 1922, widow Minna Stuve sold candy at 230 East Main (Art Nash would add groceries, cigars, magazines, and newspapers by 1931) while Lobdell Rubber Company was vulcanizing, repairing, and retreading tires at 232 East Main. Hotel guests traveling the state’s rough and pot-holed roads—Montana had just twenty-six miles of paved highway by 1926—surely appreciated the convenient location. A well-preserved “Lobdell’s” ghost stencil still exists on an interior brick wall. Numerous businesses have occupied this building since, none more beloved than Mackenzie River Pizza Company, which opened in 1993.
Images