The last best knock-out blow

Sen. Max Baucus says he's delivered the "knock-out blow" needed to safeguard the popular Montana phrase "the last best place."

Baucus included language in the fiscal year 2009 omnibus appropriation bill that would prohibit the slogan from being trademarked.

Similar provisions in the past had to be renewed annually, but the provision this year should permanently prevent the trademarking of the phrase.

"I hope that we have finally KO'd this preposterous idea of trademarking 'the last best place,'" Baucus said. "But rest assured, if lawyers in Washington try to fight this and auction off our saying, I am going to battle them tooth and nail."

The provision Baucus included would prohibit using any funds included in this year's omnibus bill — or in any other bill — to approve the trademark, effectively killing any chance of the slogan being trademarked

Sen. Jon Tester supported Baucus' measure.

"As a third-generation Montana farmer, I know that folks in our state treasure our status as the last best place," Tester said. "Montana's slogan isn't for sale."

The battle over the trademark has been ongoing since 2002, when Nevada businessman David Lipson tried to gain exclusive rights to the term for his Paws Up Lodge in the Blackfoot Valley.

The slogan may have originated in Whitefish, Writer and wildlife biologist Douglas Chadwick says he first used the phrase in his 1983 book on mountain goats, "A Beast The Color Of Winter."

Missoula writer William Kittredge, however, has said he coined the phrase sometime in 1988 while lounging at Chico Hot Springs. He said he thought of a line from Richard Hugo's poem "Degrees of Gray in Philipsburg," which refers to "the last good kiss."

The late Missoula writer James Crumley used the Hugo line for the title of his 1988 detective novel. Kittredge and Annick Smith then used the phrase "the last best place" as a title for their Montana anthology.