Montana County Courthouses

Struggling to tame the wild land in which they settled, Montana’s early settlers worked to establish Euro-American concepts of governance in their growing communities. Montanans moved quickly after the creation of the 1889 Montana Constitution, passing county-wide bond measures financing the construction of courthouses that would both provide and celebrate law and order. Symbols of democratic ideals, the finished products were often the finest buildings in their communities, functioning as offices for law enforcement, government officials, and county services.


Showcasing their importance to the community, courthouses were frequently built in imposing Classical styles, richly adorned with stained glass, domed towers, and marble columns. The Deer Lodge County Courthouse in Anaconda finished in 1900 in the Neoclassical style, is made of dressed sandstone and crowned with an ornately decorated, two-tiered domed tower. The 1888 Jefferson County Courthouse in Boulder uses the Richardsonian Romanesque style to assert the frontier community’s expectations of prospering through the ages. The building’s asymmetrical design, octagonally-crowned tower, and rough-cut stone walls evoke medieval influences, emphasizing the frontier community’s permanence.


After 1910, as larger counties split and reorganized to create today’s fifty-six counties, communities with limited budgets struggled to build courthouses as grand as those constructed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The Daniels County Courthouse, built in Scobey in 1913, was originally a saloon and brothel. The courthouse typifies the early days of Montana with its Western false-front façade and a second-floor balcony. Yet the courthouse still functions as the heart of its community and county, housing essential government offices and civil courts. Witnesses to the state’s rich history, courthouses remain the crown jewel of most Montana county seats, continuing to stand as symbols of justice and democracy.

This valley known by Native Americans as “Lodge of the White Tailed Deer” officially became Deer Lodge County when this area was part of the Territory of Idaho. After the creation of the Territory of Montana in 1864, the first territorial legislature named Deer Lodge one of Montana’s original nine…
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The settlement of Old Scobey relocated here from the Poplar River flats to greet the approaching Great Northern Railway branch line in 1913. By the time the first train arrived on Thanksgiving Day, the two-story Commercial Hotel—today the south half of the courthouse—was the new townsite’s largest…
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Development of this district came well after Kalispell had become an established regional center. The Flathead County Courthouse, which serves as the district’s focal point, was built in 1903 and long presided in solitary splendor over undeveloped land. Situated half a mile distant from the…
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The stock market crash of 1929 plunged the nation into an era of depression, and Bozeman, like other American communities, faced severe financial hardships and resulting challenges. By 1931, Montana’s farming, ranching, mining, and lumber industries—the state’s lifeblood—had been severely affected…
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Carved out of Yellowstone, Carbon, and Sweet Grass Counties in 1913, Stillwater County was one of twenty-six counties established between 1910 and 1920. These new counties grew from a widespread belief in Montana’s continuing growth and prosperity—sustained by the arrival of thousands of…
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In 1888, Jefferson County voters passed a $40,000 bond issue to build a permanent courthouse. Flourishing gold and silver mines and the advent of the railroad meant the county would see its population quadruple between 1870 and 1890, and there looked to be no end to the boom. Seeking a building…
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In 1879, Metis—people of French and Chippewa-Cree descent—homesteaded in this area, near the army’s Camp Lewis. Many street names memorialize these settlers, who included Francis A. Janeaux and Paul Morase. But open range cattle ranching, nearby gold discoveries, and the growth of the sheep…
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Copper king Marcus Daly established local logging operations and platted the town of Hamilton in 1890 to fuel his Anaconda copper mining ventures. When Ravalli County was carved from Missoula County in 1893, Stevensville won designation as county seat. But Daly’s interests soon brought Hamilton a…
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Scandal and intrigue surrounded the construction of Rosebud County Courthouse in 1914. Rosebud County citizens recognized the need for a new courthouse when they passed a $125,000 bond issue in 1911 to fund the building. To design a suitable replacement for the original courthouse—a wood-frame…
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In 1906, Choteau’s newspaper, the Acantha, proudly celebrated the completion of the new courthouse. “This splendid edifice,” its editor predicted, “… will stand for years as a monument to the honor and integrity of all the people of the .” Built of locally quarried sandstone, the…
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