How did we ever get here?
The Trailwatcher/G. George Ostrom
Every ten years or so, it is tradition for this columnist to write a brief history of the beautiful Valley where we live. It is that time again.
The upper Flathead was one of the last major places in the lower 48 states to be "civilized" because it was so effectively cut off from the rest of the world by natural geographic barriers of high mountains and water, plus unfriendly American Indians to the west.
Flathead Lake was recorded by David Thompson on March 1, 1812, from a high hill near what is now Polson. Joshua Pilcher with eight men camped on the west shore of the Lake in the winter of 1829-30.
Joshua was working for the short-lived Missouri Fur Trading Co., and was the first person I know of to compare the area to Switzerland, predicting there would be "roads soon."
In 1839, famed "mountain man" Jedediah Smith met Dave Jackson at Flathead Lake on their way to rendezvous in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Fort Connah was established north of St. Ignatius by Frank McArthur in 1845 and the next year, Hudson Bay Co. sent Angus McDonald to run it. This led to the entry of more non-natives into the upper Flathead. In 1850, explorer Robert Greenhour published a map showing Maria Pass. Other white men and hundreds of American Indians knew the pass, yet three years later Isaac Stevens sent Tinkham to find "a pass' in that area. Tinkham got lost so the next year Stevens sent Mullan who may have found Cut Bank Pass, a favorite American Indian crossing in what is now Glacier Park. After all his "looking for a pass," Stevens wound up getting personal credit for finding the place where his statue now stands. The first white man settling in the upper valley was Joe Ashley who built a trading post on what is now Kalispell's southwest corner in 1857.
Although getting into the area with wagons was tough, a few settlers began making it in the 1860s.
The massacre of Chief Heavy Runner and most of his starving followers on the Marias River in the winter of 1870 was a final blow to dominance of the Blackfeet on the plains east of Marias Pass.
The first post office for the upper Flathead was established at Scribner just north of Flathead Lake in 1872.
In 1883 the North Pacific Railroad reached Missoula and a wide trail was built from the Ravalli tracks up to the south shore of Flathead Lake.
By 1887, the first steamboat, The U.S. Grant, was carrying passengers and cargo up the Lake.
More boats were built and the wild town of Demersville was founded as steamboat docks were erected on the river just southeast of present Kalispell. Settlers began arriving in good numbers.
A primitive road around the west shore of the Lake was "usable" in 1890, the same year the Great Northern built McCarthyville on a beautiful meadow west of Marias Pass. It featured six saloons with "girls," one store and no law.
Dozens of people died from various causes during the next two years of its violent existence.
By 1891 railroad tracks had crossed Marias Pass and in January of 1892 the silver spike was driven in Kalispell. That town boomed and Demersville died with steamboats on the way out.
In 1905, the first automobile arrived in the Flathead. There was soon trouble between car owners and the majority of settlers still relying on horses.
A speed limit of 15 mph was declared in 1906 to control the few auto owners in Kalispell.
The Flathead Indian Reservation was opened to white homesteaders in 1910, which brought more people into the area. That was also the year a previous Forest Preserve along the continental divide was officially designated as Glacier National Park.
The first airplane flew to the valley in 1911, piloted by Eugene Ely. Two years later a seaplane landed on Flathead Lake.
Using convict labor from the state penitentiary, a road was completed along the east shore of Flathead Lake from Polson to Bigfork in 1914.
In 1928, a baby boy was born who one day in the 1950s would dig toilet holes at Graves Creek Campground on the reservoir behind the "Highest Dam in the World," Hungry Horse.