The weekly miner. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1878-1881, 1880-09-28
DEER DID, +.


Our county town is enjoying its full share
of the prosperity with which Montana has re-
Gently been blessed. The visitor from Butte
will miss the vast street crowds to whose APP
pearance we have grown so familiar in this
city but their absence at Deer Lodge is ex-
planned by the wide difference that exists be-
tween the industries of thattown and those Of
ouryoung mining city. At Deer Lodge the local
industries furnish employment to busy work
ers during the daytime only; and this in
connection with the further fact that it has
industrious citizens who are coutin-
ually at work will explain. the "deserted
Streets concerning which the Butte man las
always something to say. In this camp,
however, work IN the mines and in the mills
is prosecuted quite as vigorously during the
night as in the daytime, the night.shift CIV
ing employment to fully as many men as the
day-shift. Owing to This unceasing ~c,larac-
ter of the work going on about Butte a very
large proportion, nearly one-half, of cur la
boring men are unemployed and apparently
idle during the afternoon of each day. The
Butte man, then, who describes Deer Lodge
as "dead' because he sees no great crowds On
the streets, and the Deer Lodge man who
describes Butte as a place populated prlnci-
pally by FOUNDERS and idlers, because he finds
large crowds of unemployed men on our
streets every day-both are wrong. Deer
Lodge looks quiet and its streets deserted be-
cause its industrious citizens are all busily at
work. Butte has the appearance of being
peopled in the main with idlers because half
its working population, the best miners and
hardest workers in the country, are at work
only at night, passing the afternoons in appa-
rent idleness s%trolling about the streets. In
proportion to its population Deer Lodge is
fully as lively as Butte, the great superficial
difference between the two towns being fully
explained by the circumstance that one town
has a very large and constantly employed
corps of night workers, while the other has
not even a single establishment of any kind
in which a night-shift is employed.
But Deer Lodge is prosperous, even more
so than Butte. Here, when help is needed,
there is not much trouble in finding unem-
ployed men even in our busiest season, but in
Deer Lodge one of the greatest incorvenien-
ces experienced by the citizens is the impos-
Of finding an unemployed hand to
take charge, at short notice, of any piece of
work to be done. Another very healthy sign
of prosperity is the great scarcity of dwelling
houses, or apartments to be had under rent.
This wa mt of house room has made itself so
distinctly felt of late that after a much longer
rest than there was any occasion for, building
either already under way, or else will soon be
in process of construction. Those who have
been absent from the city for a year or more
will be pleasantly surprised at the substan-
tial and permanent nature of the improve
ments made during that time. These consist
of two fine brick business houses,
built by the go-ahead firm of Z. l.. Bonner
Co.; an elegant brick dwelling house be-
to Mr.. Bonncr. senior member of the
above firm; and last, but not least, the insti-
tuition which Butte patronizes so literally, to
wit, the new county jail, also of brick. The
last is a we'll built and handsome cdifce, but
for all that its location is a matter of regret
70 many Deer Lodsers. 1t stands il. 'ou,t
house square, and in that situation no matter
what its architectul al merit may be, the prison
cannot be otherwise than a blot and defor-
nifty to the square, which, had the jail been
located elsewhere, would have served admir-
ably the purposes of a city park, albeit of
rather small size. Deer Lodgers, proverbial
for their hospitality, are we'll pleased with
their town, and exert themselves to the ut
in the endeavor to make the stranger
who tarries within their gates as well salts.
fed as they are themselves with the Garden
City OF Montana. Free from the fey.rish ex-
as well as from the deadly depres-
sIons, OF a mining town, Deer Lodge has be-
tore it an assured future of steady, healthy
growth, and is decidedly a town which anv
home-seeker can tie to with the utmost
safety.
BUTTE AND PIPEsTONE DIRECT ROAD.