Southwest Montana Blog
Montana History

Many feet of water should cover St. Joseph’s church. Built in 1875, on the banks of the Missouri River in the town of Canton, Montana, St. Joseph’s is Montana’s seventh oldest church, and was the first built by community members, rather than a religious order. The rich ranchland around...

Brian Dunning aired a piece on his blog Skeptoid discussing the Montana symbol 3-7-77. In it, Dunning covered much the same ground as anyone else who writes on the topic: the fact that the Montana Highway Patrol and other Montana institutions use the numbers in their logos, the five or so main theories, and...

If I’m not careful, my mind will relegate Montana’s gold rush days to a dusty haze of saloon brawls and hangings, populated by a pungent assortment of what Laura Ingalls Wilder might call “rough men” using “rough language” (yes, a twenty three year old guy did just quote By...

Here’s a tale that has all the trappings of a good Montana yarn. Legend has it that some time in 1945, a military fighter plane roared through Helena and flew sideways between the twin spires of the Helena Cathedral before disappearing over the mountains to the north. I first heard the story as a kid, &...

No doubt many people are getting ready for long trips to visit relatives this Thanksgiving, so here’s a story about Brother Van, one of Montana’s most famous travelers. As an itinerant Methodist preacher during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, William Wesley Van Orsdel probably logged more...