A little Montana history lesson

G. George Ostrom 

Just read a majority of Americans aren't keeping up knowledge of history. That's not good. History is fascinating and here's a quick fix.

Montana became a new star on the American flag in November 1889, as a state 120 years ago. What seems incredulous to me is, "I have been around for over half that time." Nevertheless, had to look up what was actually going on in 1889.

The population of the United States was above 62 million. Montana's population was around 140,000 with most in valleys of the western part. The "Copper Kings" were fighting for power by resorting to every legal and illegal trick known to man. Marcus Daley had formed a logging operation known as the "Montana Improvement Company." It was so rampant in its cutting on public land the federal government began civil and criminal actions against him which dragged through courts for years.

The massacre of Indians at Wounded Knee and the surrender of the Sioux was two years off when Montana became a state. The last major herds of buffalo were wiped out five years earlier. The first simple box camera with roll film came out in 1888 and made George Eastman very rich.

By 1893, half the Anaconda Company stock was owned by Englishmen in London. In 1899, the "Copper Kings" power in the legislature overrode the governor's veto and passed a bill allowing Standard Oil to buy the Anaconda Company. From 1880 to 1900, Montana had in the words of K. Ross Toole, "Gone from near wilderness to booming industrialism."

The first regular Great Northern train pulled into the Flathead Valley on the last day of January, 1891. Population of Kalispell was about 2,500 but with the arrival of the railroad it boomed to over 5,500 by 1910. Then the moving of the mainline and division headquarters to Whitefish dropped Kalispell's count back to 5,147. In the 1920 census Whitefish had 2,867 and a lot of stumps.

Benjamin Harrison was President when Montana became a state. He was preceded by Grover Cleveland and followed by Grover Cleveland. Those were days of sweat houses, child labor, and the use of state militias against unskilled workers who struck for higher wages; but, the days of outrageous treatment of workers was drawing to a close. Samuel Gompers had formed the AFL in 1886 and the next century saw the growth of giant unions with the corruption pendulum swinging far to the other side.

What else was going on in the world 120 years ago? The U.S. Government got a group of Sioux chiefs to meet without Sitting Bull's knowledge and they signed away 9 million acres of their Indian land for use of railroads and for speculators to sell to white immigrants. The population of New York City was soaring and over half of those had been born in Europe. In the far Pacific on March 16th, a gathering of American, British, and German warships was anchored near the Somoan Islands, set for a naval battle to see which nation would rule that part of the planet. A hurricane came screaming across the water and sunk all but one ship. The Somoans were free for nine more years.

On May 31, 1889, an abandoned reservoir was washed out by spring swollen river waters and Johnstown, Pennsylvania was inundated. 2,200 people were killed.

Also in 1889 - "New York World" newspaper sponsored a trip around the world by a "volunteer maiden," Nellie Bly. Her goal was to beat the record of Jules Verne's fictional character, Phileas Fogg who went "Around the World in Eighty Days." Nellie was a daring lass and made it in 72 days and 6 hours, thereby beating Phileas by 8 days. She became an international heroine, songs and stories were written about her. When Nellie was 28 she married a 72 year old millionaire who had one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel. As soon as he had departed, she took over his manufacturing empire and led it into bankruptcy.

That's a sample of the 120 year old stuff I looked up. Much of what happened since … has been covered in this column.