The people's voice. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1939-1969, 1947-10-17

influence on Montana agriculture until
the 1900's when the Homestead Acts
of 1909 and 1912 provided a sufficient
base of operations for the promotional
work of men like Jim Hill of the Great
Northern. The homestead movement
set in with great earnestness by the
time Of the World War, during which
time migration to the great dryland
country became almost Historically
enthusiastic-and economically mad.
Montana population almost doubled
between 1900 and 1920. Indeed, the
state added over 100000 every decade
beginning with 1890. The "grimly
utilitarian, uncompromisingl ugly
towns" as Howard calls them, of the
"honyockers, the war-excited dryland
farmers, contrasted duly with the boi-
sterous COW towns of the cattleman's
days, contrast which expresses some
thing of the shift which took place in
the life of the plains during this per-
iod. By the time of the first World
War Montana had settled down-a
much too optimistic phrase perhaps
into a raw material economy, which it
had indeed always been. It's vicissi-
tudes and problems this present study
Will attempt TO describe.
Butte: Montana Leitmotif
1t is difficult to find a figure which
can best express life in the frontier
Montana, or for that matter in con-
temporary Montana, because in part
that life has varied from one time to
another, in part because the state itself
differs from one area to another But
one theme always calls up picture
of the state and arouses emotion:
Butte. Clyde Murphy and other Mon
tana novelists have written about this
"glittering hill'', "the richest hill on
EARTH" as Montanans always say; for
Butte has drama. But to an observer
of the folkways and stateways of Mon
tana society it offers other possibili-
ties, which have been suggested by
Joseph Kinsey Howard. Butte
"affords unequalIed opportunity for
scrutiny of the major economic
trend of our era, the reversal of the
the frontier and monopolist concen-
tration of the means of production.
The men came west, but more and
more of the products of their toll and
| the resources of their earth have
| gone east; and due to recurring
market crises, war, chronological
advancement, and curtaiIment in real
wages, less and less has come back"
EXPLOITATION-key Word In
Montana History
Here is the Montana story or at
least a great part of it, and most of
this cultural study of the state will
simply weave with some of these
threads and with this pattern. The
pattern is the thing, for there has
been almost uninterruptedly one pat
tern: exploitation. 'tThe predominant
theme" writes Montana State College
historian, Merrill Burlingame, which
runs throughout the frontier period of
Montana is the exploitation of it's
natural resources. A first tremendous
surge of acquisition took it's furs; a
second which dwarfed the first, at
tackled it's mineral with gusto A third
resource was it's range lands :" A
new theme is being written in this
story; it is being written, as we will
see, with tragic lateness. For it we
WILL have to find another image; Butte |
will no longer suffice, for Butte is
nearly finished Perhaps Montanans
will find their new image somewhere |
in the great dryland country; perhaps |
along the old Missouri. But most |
Montanans have no doubt that it will
be found.
Social Forces in Montana History
The map makers have pulled Mon
tana since 1905, this way and that.
The state east of the Divide belonged |
at one time to "the Territory of In
DIANA" in 1912 to the TERRITORY of
in 1921 to the Indian Coun-
try" in 1854 to the Nebraska Terri
tory" in 1861 the Dakota Territory"
The state west of the Divide had
similar experience. In 1S43 it was
part of the "Clackamas District of
the Oregon Country, in 1845 of the
District of Vancouver" in 1847 of
CLARK County" in 1853 of Washing
ton Territory" in 1858 of Spokane
County," in 1860 of "Missoula County,"
and in 1863 of the TERRITORY of Idaho"
In 1854 the two sections of the state
were joined as "The Territory of
Montana" with it's own governor. By
1890 it was one of the states of the
union.
This shuffling and re-shuffling is
symbolic of the tensions and strains
which have gone on in the state from
it's earliest days. Social forces have
always worked their will in this state.