Railway's historical impact on Glacier Park

Louis W. Hill was a major force behind the establishment and development of Glacier National Park. Yet his legacy is often largely overshadowed by his father, James J. Hill.

“Louis lived in the shadow of his father,” Bill Schustrom told listeners in a recent presentation at the Whitefish Community Center. “His dad had made his mark in the world with the Great Northern Railway, and Louis was looking for his own way.”

Schustrom works summers as an interpreter in Glacier Park. He has researched the role Louis Hill played in the establishment of the Park’s lodges and other infrastructure that eventually brought visitors to the Park.  

James Hill is known for running the Great Northern Railway from Chicago to the West Coast. His son Louis became president of Great Northern in 1907.

Glacier Park was established in 1910. James Hill pushed the railway west, running the tracks along the Park’s southern boundary.

“James J. Hill could have cared less that his tracks bordered some of the most beautiful mountains in the world,” Schustrom said.  

But as a young man, Louis had toured Yellowstone National Park and part of what became Grand Canyon National Park and saw the lodges constructed there. At the same time, the Department of Interior wanted to see Glacier Park’s east side developed.

Hill responded by constructing the Glacier Park Lodge in East Glacier. From 1910 to 1914, he also commissioned the construction of nine chalets, the Many Glacier Hotel and the Prince of Wales Hotel in Waterton Lakes National Park. He also constructed the Belton Chalet at West Glacier.

“He spent $10 for every dollar the Park Service spent in those early years of the Park,” Schustrom said.

Glacier Park Lodge sits at the foot of Dancing Lady Mountain. Guests arrived at the train station and were led through flower gardens to the tall lodge where they were treated in the grandest fashion, Schustrom said.

“Think of the impact that Louis had on people coming in on the train, with those great views of the Rockies, and then being able to settle in at the lodge,” he said.

Hill didn’t always get along well with Glacier Park officials. He called for constructing roads in the Park, and the Park Service responded by building two miles of road in one year.

“He said that’s not going to work, and the next year he brought in his own crew and built 50 miles of roads in seven weeks on the east side of the Park,” Schustrom said.

Hill had a sawmill constructed to provide lumber for construction of the Many Glacier Hotel.

“He picked out all these places himself, that he wanted to build these lodges,” Schustrom said. “He wanted it to be alpine architecture all the way through.”

Once the chalets were in place, Hill started an advertising campaign to promote Glacier Park. One slogan was “Let’s See America First,” as opposed to visiting the mountains of Europe.

Louis Hill acquired the Lake McDonald Lodge from John Lewis, who built the lodge, in 1930. The Park Service later took possession of the lodge and surrounding land.

The completion of the Going-to-the-Sun Road in 1933 opened the Park to motor vehicles. The chalets were shut down during World War II, and many were torn down. Only the Granite Park and Sperry chalets remain today.

“But Louis Hill made his mark in the world with Glacier,” Schustrom said.