The river is named for the Kootenai tribe that lived and hunted in this part of Montana and adjoining territory in Idaho and Canada. They were settled south of Flathead Lake in 1855 with the Salish on the Flathead Reservation.

They were friendly with neighboring mountain tribes but suffered frequently from the incursions of their bitter enemies the Blackfeet, who came across the Continental Divide from the plains on horse stealing and scalp raising expeditions.

First white men in here were trappers and traders for British fur companies as early as 1809. Placer discoveries were made and mining operations commenced about sixty years later.

Look and listen for the array of waterfowl who call Kootenai River their home and highway. Mallard ducks, Canadian geese, and common mergansers are year long residents, nesting along the water’s edge. Watch for waterfowl close to the rivers edge where food is abundant.

The arrival of cold weather in the fall brings hundreds of additional birds from Canada, including the common golden eye. One the lakes and streams freeze, many birds spend the winter feeding on the open waters of the Kootenai River

The land around Kootenai Falls has been explored and used for thousands of years by the Kootenai or Tunaxa People. The Kootenai tribe made up of seven bands, two in U.S. and five in Canada.

European traders and surveyors were lured to the region in the early 1800s by the land, abundant wildland and adventure. In 1808, during the fur trade period, David Thompson and four other men in a large canoe, put ashore in rains and high winds at the head of the falls Thompson described as “heavy, long falls between 2 steep hills.” Not able to run the falls they portaged or carried their canoes and loads across land which took approximately 15 trips of 1.5 hours each!

Father Pierre DeSmet, a Jesuit Missionary, explored the region between 1842 and 1847. His description of the surrounding area described it as “a smiling and accessible valley.” This positive opinion changed as he moved farther upstream and had to make an eight mile portage around the falls. He mentions making the crossing in a “quadrupedal position,” meaning that he was crawling on his hands and knees!

After the early explorers, the first development in the

Kootenai Valley began with the construction of the Great Northern Railroad. Several potential routes were surveyed to cross the Rocky and Cascade Mountains to the Pacific coast. The northern railroad route was selected and ran along the Kootenai River, from Flathead Lake, on to Spokane, Washington. Production of the ties alone, cut from larch and fir, created a new industry since untreated timber only lasted 5 to 10 years. The railroad line, following the south bank to the Kootenai River, reached Libby in April 1891.

The original highway, along the Kootenai River, was built between 1912 and 1915 and was called the Great Parks National Automobile Highway. It was envisioned, according to the Lincoln County Commissioners Proceedings, to “open a wagon highway between the east and the west, cutting the country through the center.” A Western News article announced the coming of a “magnificent automobile road.” The anticipated one year construction stretched into three, making this the most expensive stretch of highway built in the northwest! The two remaining segments of the old highway can still be accessed as a trail from Highway 2. The new highway was completed in 1934.

The highway and the railroad continue to bring travelers and explorers like you to enjoy the beautiful Kootenai River Valley.

“The whole twenty-five miles of railroad…between Avery and the Taft Tunnel was swept by a consuming blast of fire, so hot that pick handles lying in the open beside the track were utterly consumed.” - Elers Koch, Forest Supervisor

With fires raging in Idaho and Montana and seemingly closing in on all sides of numerous towns, the railroad was the lifeline for escape. Engineer John Mackedon and his fireman rode west toward Avery surrounded by fire and worried they would not make it out alive.

Suddenly the emergency call came in. More fires sent men, women and children fleeing from their homesteads and logging camps to huddle on the railroad platform in Falcon, 64 miles northeast of Avery. They were begging to be rescued.

Backing the train into Falcon, Mackedon discovered buildings and railcars already on fire. Everyone rushed toward the engine in a panic. Mackedon spotted a boxcar that was not completely ablaze and told the frightened crowd to douse the fire and quickly climb aboard. After escaping Falcon, he stopped twice more to put out fires on the bridges in his path. Mackedon and his fireman finally saved the stranded refugees by taking them into a tunnel to wait out the fire.

Erected 2010 by Lolo National Forest.

Imagine a world very different than we know today. About 1.5 billion years ago during the Precambrian Era, the earth's environment was desolate, with no trees, fish, animals or birds. Shallow seas with extensive near-shore flats were fed by streams that deposited great amounts of sand and mud. Rain frequently fell and pooled in vast shallow lakes and ponds in what would one day become northwest Montana.

Despite the hostile environment, blue-green algae mats often trapped fine particles of calcium carbonate to form structures called stromatolites, that grew in shallow near-shore environment. The surface of the rocks often display mud cracks, ripple marks, and, sometimes, the spatter marks of primeval raindrops.

The earth's crust slowly sank for about 100 million years forming a large geologic basin in which Belt Supergroup sediments accumulated as much as 10 miles thick! The rocks are common in northern and central Idaho and western Montana, and extend east to the Little Belt Mountains in central Montana. The sedimentary rocks along Interstate 90 between Lookout Pass and Alberton are almost entirely rocks of the Belt Supergroup.

These rocks are distinguished by brown, grey, red, green, purple, and yellow colors and locally form dramatic cliffs where resistant, well-cemented sandstones are exposed in the canyon.

Interstate 90 from near Lookout Pass through Missoula is located along the Lewis and Clark Fault Zone, a series of faults that stretch between northwest Washington State and the Helena area. The faults had significant movement about 70 million years ago when the Rocky Mountains were uplifting and were active until at least 25 million years ago. Interstate 90 and US Highway 10 in western Montana follow the trend of the faults along straight canyon that eroded along the fault zone.

Geo-facts

• Geologists map rocks as formations. The Belt rocks are so thick that similar formations have been combined into "groups," and the groups in turn are referred to as one very large unit called a "Supergroup."

• Ancient rocks indicate that oxygen was not abundant in Earth's atmosphere until about 2.2 billion years ago. An explosion of abundant and complex life forms, such as trilobites, did not occur until about 550 million years ago in the presence of abundant oxygen and protective ozone layer that filtered solar radiation.

• The lack of burrowing organisms during the Precambrian time allow excellent preservation of finely layered sedimentary rocks of the Belt Supergroup. Some of the thin beds in the Belt rocks can be traced for miles.

Geo-Activity:

• As you travel along I-90, keep in mind that you are also following the path of a fault. How many times can you count cliffs of brown, gray, red, green, purple and yellow colored rocks that have been eroded away along the fault lines?

Erected by Montana Department of Transportation.

Named in honor of surveyor and fur trader David Thompson (1770-1857), the first known explorer to reach Sanders County. Born in England, young David enrolled in a London charity school for orphan boys at age 7. Upon his 14th birthday he was sent across the Atlantic Ocean to the icy shores of Hudson Bay, Canada to begin 7 years indentured servitude as clerk for the Hudson's Bay Company. He soon learned to communicate in French & native languages, explore, navigate, make maps, build trading posts, and survive in the wilds of the New World. On many occasions he received critical assistance & cooperation from North American natives.

Between 1807-1812, Thompson successfully established trade among the tribes west of the Rocky Mountains. He and his men built the region's first 4 trading posts, including one near Thompson Falls he called Saleesh House. In 1811 he located and mapped the entire course of the Columbia River. By finding the source of this legendary River of the West and following it to the Pacific Ocean, Thompson solved the mystery of the Northwest Passage - an elusive coast to coast route explorers had sought for centuries.

He & his companions made this historic voyage of discovery in a large cedar plank canoe of his own invention.

By the time his career was over, the ambitious Thompson had mapped nearly 1.5 million square miles of uncharted territory of approximately 1/5th of North America. He was instrumental in establishing the first cross continental network of remote wilderness forts & trading posts and is credited with traveling over 65,000 miles by foot, horse & canoe. To this day, David Thompson is regarded as the greatest land geographer of all times.

Erected by Numerous donors listed on the marker.

Seeing the country being denuded of beaver, Thompson wrote: "Every intelligent man saw the poverty that would follow the destruction of the beaver, but there were no chiefs to control it; all was perfect liberty and equality." David Thompson's Narrative [1797]

"... at the Forks finding ourselves short of Provisions for the Voyage killed a Mare belonging to the Ind-for which we have to pay..." David Thompson - Journal, Feb 16 Sunday [1812]

American Beaver

Hats! Beaver hats that is. Had it not been for beaver, David Thompson and thousands of others would not have left Europe for the vast and largely unmapped expanses of Canada and the United States.

That was where the Hudson's Bay Company and the North West Company sent brigades of men to establish trading posts and to find and map canoe supply routes covering thousands of miles of rivers and streams.

The vast system of western waterways provided the brigades with access to hunt and trade for beaver pelts and other furs. The peltry was then hauled back to civilization for shipment to Europe.

It was the expansion of this fur trade that brought North West explorer and trader David Thompson to the west side of the Rocky Mountains and south of the 49th parallel where he established three trading posts: Kullyspel House, Saleesh House and Spokane House.

In 1809, David Thompson, an agent and explorer for the North West Company (NWCo), opened the first permanent trading post in western Montana and named it Saleesh House. He also claimed the region for the British Crown by proclamation. The area that became the Oregon Territory was the only region in the United States subject to such ownership.

Saleesh House was a busy, economically successful business. In 1821, the fur trade business in the region took a major turn. The NWCo and the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) merged their businesses and continued to operate under the HBC flag even thought (sic) most of the posts in the region had belonged to the NWCo.

The HBC changed the name of Saleesh House to Flathead House. In the mid-1820s, the operation was relocated to a site about 10 miles upstream.

In 1846, to be closer to Indian travel routes and winter camping grounds, the post was again relocated. This time to a spot on Post Creek near today's St. Ignatius. In 1847, post Factor Angus McDonald changed the name of the 3rd Flathead House to Fort Connah.

The fur trade operation started by David Thompson at Saleesh House in 1809 continued for another 50 years under the HBC flag. Fort Connah was permanently closed in 1871 by order of the US Government.

Erected by Hecla Charitable Foundation, Noxon Senior Citizens.

In November 1809, famed British North West Company agent and explorer David Thompson built a trading post about five miles east of here near the mouth of the Thompson River. Strategically located on a well-worn aboriginal trail, Saleesh House was the second trading post to be constructed in what is now Montana. In the early nineteenth century, the fur trade was literally a cut-throat business with competing companies vying to establish trade relations with the Indian tribes. In this case, the Nor’Westers successfully beat the rival Hudson's Bay Company by being the first to build a trading post in Salish territory. Saleesh House consisted of three simple log buildings with mud and grass roofs that leaked in rainy weather. The Salish were the post's primary customers, bartering beaver and muskrat pelts for weapons and other trade goods. The Salish trusted Thompson and called him Koo-Koo-Sint, Star Looker, because of his interest in astronomy. Saleesh House remained open until the 1820s after the North West and Hudson's Bay Companies merged. Blackfeet hostility forced the company to abandon the post. Saleesh House melted back into the forest and was lost to history until rediscovered several years ago by University of Montana archaeologists.

The nearby Bad Rock Trail was an important route for the aboriginal people who inhabited northwest Montana. The first documented account of the trail was by North West Company trader David Thompson in 1809. Located within sight of the company's trading post, Saleesh House, he reported that it was the scene of many battles between the Kootenai, Salish and the Blackfeet people. Over the ensuing years, the trail became a much cured obstacle on the rod that led up the Clark Fork. It was used by a parade of western notables, including explorers Issac Stevens and John Mullan and by copper-king William A. Clark. Shortly after crossing over Bad Rock in 1841 Father Pierre-Jean DeSmet wrote "I had before seen landscapes of awful grandeur, but this one supposed all others in horror. My courage failed at the first sight."

In 1883, the Northern Pacific Railway blasted away portions of the trail to complete its transcontinental line. The process was repeated in 1936 when the Montana Department of Transportation constructed this segment of the highway. Bad Rock Trail continues to be a commanding presence on Highway 200 in northwest Montana.

Erected by Montana Department of Transportation.

"... saw about a dozen of Sheep, sorely wounded one of them with Shot but the Rocks were too steep and the cold & the Snow too bad..."

Fur trader, explorer and geographer David Thompson was the first European visitor to the middle Clark Fork in 1810. He found mountain sheep a welcome sight on cold winter days when other game was scarce. A Christmas visitor to Thompson's Saleesh Trading Post near Thompson Falls feasted on "mountain sheep, rice, tea, coffee, arrowroot, and 15 gallons of prime rum."

Bighorns were also an important source of food for the Salish, Pend Orielle, and Kootenai Tribes. They left reminders in their drawings on stone, such as those shown here .

In frontier days bighorns were common from Alberta to Baja, Mexico. They found their way to the new world from eastern Siberia during the Ice Age, crossing the Bering Land Bridge about 500,000 years ago.

Glaciers separated the sheep into 2 species distinguished mostly by the size of their horns. Bighorns inhabit southern Canada and the United States, while the thin-horned Dall's and Stone's sheep live in northern Canada and Alaska. The scientific name of the bighorn sheep, Ovis, canadensis, means Canadian sheep.

Bighorn sheep are separated into three varieties, the California bighorn of the Sierra Nevada, the desert bighorn of the southwest, and the Rocky Mountain bighorn of the northwest, which has the largest horns of the three.

Once plentiful, bighorn populations declined quickly with the settling of the west. Starting in the late 1880s, competition with man and livestock for range, uncontrolled hunting, and introduced diseases and parasites decimated the population. Many herds were wiped out by the early 1900s. By the 1940s, bighorns were considered an endangered species in most western states.

The Thompson Herd

The same pressures wiped out the Thompson Falls herd. Disease caused a massive die-off in the early 1900s. The population declined steadily to about 50 sheep in 1942 and to about 10 sheep in 1947. By 1948 none remained.

In 1959, 19 bighorns were transplanted from two remaining herds at the Sun River Game Range in west-central Montana and Wildhorse Island on Flathead Lake. From this small beginning the population prospered until it reached about 600 sheep in the early 1980s. This large number of sheep overpopulated the range and led to an increased rate of parasite infection. Hunting began in 1968 and continues today to prevent overgrazing the range and protect local landowner's crops. The herd now numbers 300-359 at its low point each year (before the spring crop of lambs.). The sheep range throughout over 90 square miles of rugged National Forest and state lands. Because the sheep spend the winter in the valley bottom, each year many are killed in collisions with vehicles and trains.

For many thousands of years, this area has been a favorite hunting, fishing and food-gathering area for the Olispé (Pend d'Oreille) people, many of whom live today on the Flathead Reservation. The Salish-language name for the Thompson Falls area is Seqeylqm, which refers to the sound made by water go the Clark's Fork falling over the drop.

Oral history tells of a time long ago when the Salish-speaking people lived in one great tribe. When the people became too numerous for the available food supply, they split into many smaller bands and spread out across western Montana and then west into what is now Idaho and Washington. Since that time, the Seqeylqm or Thompson Falls area has been near the near of the Clark Fork Valley travel corridor for tribal people visiting relatives and friends from east of the Rocky Mountains to the Columbia Plateau in the west. People traveled by foot and birch-bark cancers, and in later yeas by horse, train and today by automobile.

Because of the tribal importance of this travel route, David Thompson and the Hudson's Bay Company decided to locate Saleesh House near here in 1809. The trading post operated until the 1820s when the Hudson's Bay Company closed it.

Erected by Montana Department of Transportation.

About 15,000 years ago, this area was covered by huge glaciers which formed unique geological formations throughout the valley called drumlins or hills composed of glacial till deposited beneath the glaciers. Ice periodically dammed up the Kootenai River creating a vast inland lake.

The Kutenai Indians inhabited the area for centuries, growing a form of tobacco on the plains near the river and giving the area its name.

Trade in this region was initially dominated by Canadian fur companies. The Kootenai River was first explored in 1808 by the great North West Company trader and geographer David Thompson. The Company carried on a lively trade with the Kutenai, Salish, and other tribes of the inland northwest for decades.

Rich gold strikes on Wild Horse Creek in southeastern British Columbia drew American prospectors to the area in the mid-1860s. Although the gold didn't pan out for many of them, their reports of abundant resources in the region drew miners, cattlemen, farmers and loggers to northwestern Montana. Steamboats plied the river in the 1890s, carrying mail and supplies to the region's inhabitants north of Jennings. The steamboats gave way to the Great Northern Railway in 1901.

By the second decade of the nineteenth century, the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) had become a dominant presence in northwestern Montana, bartering trade goods for furs with the Kootenai, Pend d'Oreille, and Salish People. In 1812, the company built a trading post on the Clark Fork River near the mouth of Thompson River.The HBC relocated the post to a more accessible site very near here by the early 1820s. The trading post consisted of two dwellings, a store, and a horse corral. For over twenty years, Flathead House was an important trading post along the lower Clark Fork River. The establishment of the 49th parallel as the international boundary between the United States and Great Britain in 1846 caused the British to close Flathead House in 1847.

Famed American mountain man Jedediah Smith and seven companions unexpectedly showed up at Flathead House in November 1824. Under the leadership of John McLoughlin had HBC had worked for years to keep American fur trappers out to the Oregon country west of the continental divide. Company manager Peter Skene Ogden called Smith's arrival "that damn'd all cursed day." His appearance at the remote trading post signaled the beginning of the end of an HBC policy that had stripped much of western Montana of its beaver in a effort to keep the Americans out of the territory.

Erected by Montana Department of Transportation.

"They go to Buffalo twice a year - first, 'to bulls' ... second 'for cows' ..." 1857, R.H. Lansdale, Indian Agent, Washington Territory

At Horse Plains "... a village of Indians collected here who never go for buffalo ..." 1833, W.A. Ferris - American Fur Company

U-Shaped Tread

Few areas of original tread remain. Years of foot and horse travel created the classic u-shaped roadbed like the one shown here.

Alexander Ross with the Hudson's Bay Company left Prairie de Cheveaux (Horse Plains) in February 1824, on his Snake River Expedition. He recorded the number in his party as 67 men with 20 lodges.

Women and children were seldom counted. But we can use David Thompson's estimate of 7 individuals to a lodge to figure the number of women and children who were with the party.

There were roughly 200 individuals in Ross' party. Plus there were more than 230 horses. This was a small group when compared with the combined tribes and horses traveling to the buffalo hunting grounds.

American Buffalo or Bison In 1809, North West Company explorer and agent David Thompson recorded that he was following the Saleesh Road to the Buffalo when he passed near here.

Thompson was returning to the Big Bend of McGillivray's River, today's Kootenai, to intercept his clerk, James McMillan. McMillan, in command of several men, was bringing canoes loaded with trade goods and supplies for Thompson's new trading posts.

This road along today's Clark Fork River was one of the wide-ranging, complex trail systems throughout the aboriginal territories. These routes crossed the Continental Divide to access the buffalo hunting grounds centered at the headwaters of the Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers.

This aboriginal trail followed water level making travel less difficult especially during the winter season when the mountain passes were filled with snow. Numerous tribes who often joined together used this travel route. Among them were the Salish, Coeur d'Alene, Pend d'Oreille, Kalispel, Kootenai, Spokane, Nez Perce and other Columbian Plateau groups.

Erected by Hecla Charitable Foundation, Noxon Senior Citizens.

Travelers along the Mullan Road and prosectors lured by the 1869 discovery of gold on Cedar Creek opened the way for settlement of this area. After the placer gold played out and other mining camps became ghost towns, the town of Superior continued to grow. In 1891 the community organized a school district and elementary classes were held in a small log cabin. By 1892, there were ninety school-age children in the vicinity. Into the 1900s, several rural schools accommodated local children but none offered a high school curriculum. Older students had to leave home to advance beyond the primary grades. Mineral County was organized in 1914 and a year later bonds for the construction of a high school passed. A secondary curriculum was offered for the first time that fall with classes held in the Methodist Church basement; students from all over the county attended. The new high school, constructed by local builder Charles Augustine at a cost of $10,000, was dedicated on January 28, 1916. Additions in 1925 and 1947 eased overcrowding and the school remained in use until June 1995. It is today one of Montana's few examples of Colonial Revival style school architecture. Along with the Mineral County courthouse, this impressive landmark with its three-stage bell tower, flanking dormers and strict classical symmetry has alway drawn visitors to the center of town. Despite its closure, the Superior School maintains a strong visual presence at the heart of the community where, for eighty years, it served the county and its children.

Erected by Montana Historical Society.

Wild Horse Plains is nestled in a circular valley at an elevation of 2,450 ft., drained by the Clark Fork River. Between 70,000 and 130,000 years ago the Bull Lake ice age glaciers dammed the Clark Fork River Valley creating Glacial Lake Missoula. All of the waters from the Clark Fork River drainage backed up to form a Lake. When the ice dam broke, the Clark Fork River carried more water than the combined flow of all the streams of the world.

In the early 1800's Native American tribes traveled through the area. The fertile valley was used for wintering their ponies, harvesting salmon, and holding great councils. Mountain men, trappers, surveyors, and map makers were soon to follow.

White settlers began their movement in the valley in the late 1860's. During the decades to follow farming, ranching, and lumbering would flourish in the valley.

The Northern Pacific Railway arrived in 1881-1883 and the town began to increase in size and importance. Businesses flourished and eventually the name was shortened to Horse Plains and finally to Plains

For thousands of years the Sqelixw—people of the Salish, Pend Oreille and Kalispel tribes—inhabited the valleys of the Clark Fork and other rivers of western Montana. They used their extensive knowledge of the natural world to create and maintain a comfortable lifeway. By preserving and enhancing the Earth Mother and her plants, animals and waterways, they were, in turn, sustained by them.

Today, the Sqelixw follow their belief that all waterways are arteries of the Earth Mother. The fast-flowing waters nourish plants, animals, fish, birds and humans. They continue to use, maintain and respect the natural world in the practice of their traditional lifeways.

Antoine Chief Eagle (1865-1936)

A member of the Pend Oreille tribe, Antoine was known for setting long, narrow, reed traps to harvest fish from the numerous rivers and streams in this area.

Erected by Lolo National Forest.

Native people hunted this area 9,000 years ago for bighorn sheep, elk and long-horned bison. Making “seasonal rounds” to specific locations, they maintained a comfortable lifeway by hunting, fishing and harvesting native plants.

Euro-Americans arrived around 1810. In 1855, Governor Isaac Stevens and leaders of the Salish and Kootenai tribes signed the Hellgate Treaty. Native peoples ceded much of western Montana while retaining the Flathead Reservation east of here. The tribes kept the right to hunt, gather and fish throughout their traditional homeland in perpetuity.

Today, the Confederated Salish and Kootenai tribes have over 6,500 enrolled members and maintain a sophisticated government with headquarters in Pablo, Montana.

Spearing Supper

A highly effective weapon, the atlatl (throwing stick) was used world-wide for over 39,000 years before the bow and arrow was developed.

Digging Delicacies

Native plants like camas, serviceberry and bitterroot have been harvested by native people in this area for thousands of years. The lily-like, blue-flowered camas produces bulbs that are sweet and nutritious when baked.

Erected by Lolo National Forest.

Imagine a rock so old and so deep, that in some places, the bottom has never been found! The mountains you have been driving through are made up of such a rock—the Prichard Formation. Dating back 1.5 billion years, it is one of the oldest exposed sedimentary rocks in western Montana. The Prichard is over 4 miles thick at the confluence of the Clark Fork and Flathead rivers and its base has yet to be discovered.

Across the river, the uplifting and shifting of the mountains has tilted the Prichard on its side. If you look closely at the large rocks at this turnoff, you may see ripple marks and mud cracks—evidence of their sedimentary origin.

Rock of Many Uses

Because the mudstone layers in the Prichard split apart to form flagstone, it has been quarried to provide colorful construction material for hearths, stone paths and facings for buildings. In addition, a slate-like rock found in the formation was used by early people to make tools and weapons.

Ancient Origins

The Prichard formed as layer upon layer of sand, silt and clay was deposited from a river delta into a sea covering parts of what is now Montana, Idaho, Washington and Canada. Over millions of years, heat and pressure turned the sediments into a hard, metamorphic rock, argillite.

Erected by Lolo National Forest.

David Thompson was the first Euro-American to record his travels along this stretch of the river. Early in 1809 he came through searching for an ideal site to establish a fur trading post. Later that fall he built the “Saleesh House” northwest of here near present day Thompson Falls.

For the next fifty years, miners, trappers, and traders passed through this canyon and settlers began homesteading the Wild Horse Plains Valley, twelve miles down river. In the late 1880’s a railroad was completed, linking Missoula with Lake Pend Oreille, Idaho. This connected the Puget Sound and Lake Michigan and the number of settlers moving west dramatically increased.

Paradise, Almost

Across the river rest the ruins of an old homestead established in the early 1900s. It seems ideally located, but no road led to the site. Instead, the residents had to ferry themselves across or follow the perilous railroad track.

Koo Koo Sint

David Thompson, trader and noted geographer, often looked at natural features through a telescope. The name Koo Koo Sint, or sxw cl xlkw ukw usm in the Salish language, was given him. It means “He Who Looks at Stars.”

Erected by Lolo National Forest.

More than 240 miles (456 km) east of here, Silver Bow Creek tumbles west from the Continental Divide above Butte, Montana. Thus begins the Clark Fork River, which drains more than 22,000 square miles of western Montana before it flows into Idaho. Shortly before leaving Montana, its average discharge is greater than any other of Montana's rivers. Eventually these waters join the mighty Columbia River that drains much of the Pacific Northwest.

The Clark Fork is harnessed to generate electricity by four dams located at Milltown, Thompson Falls, Noxon Rapids and Cabinet Gorge.

How Does It Look?

The Salish people had different names for different places along this river to reflect its changing character and terrain. Do you think “Shining Water” fits this stretch?

Where Does It Go?

Trappers and fur traders referred to this waterway as the Missoula River because they floated it from that upriver city to the trading post at Thompson Falls.

Who's Been Here Before?

Today the official name of the river is the Clark's Fork of the Columbia, but it is usually called the Clark Fork. It is named for William Clark, who explored the western United States in 1805 and 1806 with Meriwether Lewis.

Erected by Lolo National Forest.

Native peoples occupied the Little Bitterroot River Valley and enjoyed its healing hot springs long before European trappers and traders encroached upon local resources. In 1855, an 80-acre area around the hot springs was set aside as a government reserve. In 1910, the Flathead Reservation opened to homesteading and the sale of tribal allotments, along with the land of early settler Ed Lamereaux, became the townsite of Hot Springs. Originally platted as Pineville, the town lies astride Warm Springs Creek within the modern borders of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Indian Reservation. European-American settlers from the outset enjoyed the hot springs and residents catered to visitors seeking the curative mineral waters. Businessman Fred Symes purchased this property in 1929 and built a $50,000 Mission style hotel, completed in early 1930. Mission style features include the curvalinear roofline, quatrefoil windows, and stuccoed walls. The original hotel featured twenty baths, ivory enamel finishings, and doctors' services on the premises. The Symes proved a depression-proof business; expansion and improvements continued throughout the 1930s and into the mid-1940s. In the 1950s, the popularity of hot springs across Montana began to wane. Closing of the tribally owned Camas Hot Springs in 1973 was a blow and the local population, once 5,000, fell to 411 by 1990. Under new ownership and in partnership with the Hot Springs Artists Society, Inc., the Symes Hotel today has a new direction hosting local events. Once again it is a vital contributor to the community.

Erected by Montana Historical Society.

"Great Spirit: teach us to walk soft upon the mother earth with all the creatures we live with ... Mitakuye oyasin! We are all related!" "Eagle Man" Ed McGaa, Oglala Lakota Sioux

The Bald Eagle is the magnificent emblem of the United States of America. However, since the founding of our country, habitat reductions and human interaction have caused this beautiful high-flying raptor's population to decline drastically. Listed in Montana as a endangered species in 1978, the Bald Eagle is protected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Its recovery is a great national success story.

But it is also a great Montana success story. By 1980, Montana populations had dropped to 17 known nesting sites. In just 25 years, management of habitats turned the plummeting trend around. As a result, these raptors began to thrive, with nesting sites numbering approximately 300 in 2005.

Across the river, in the tallest tree a couple of hundred yards downstream from here, is a nesting site that has been in use for many years and has successfully produced many offspring. (Use the peephole in the post to the right of this exhibit for a better look.) (missing).

If delisted from the Endangered Species Act, Bald Eagles will continue to be protected by the Bald Eagle Protection Act which prohibits killing, selling, or otherwise harming eagles, their nests or eggs. Please remember that this great bird is still protected as a symbol of our nation's freedom and should not be harassed in any way.

Bald Eagles are primarily fish eaters, often stealing from the abundant osprey near the river. However they also eat duck, young geese and small mammals. In winter, they will eat carrion (recently killed animals). The Bald Eagle's lifespan in the wild is approximately 20 years.

Erected by Montana Department of Transportation.

The landscape around you has changed since Lewis and Clark first saw it in September 1805. Back then it was the aboriginal territory of the Nez Perce and Salish people. These Native Americans had less impact on natural ecological processes than did the European settlers who followed Lewis and Clark.

European settlers first tried, but failed to build a railroad across these mountains in 1854 (sic). Then, in 1908, the U.S. Government granted the Northern Pacific Railroad alternate sections of land along their proposed railroad route, resulting in a "checkerboard" ownership pattern along Lolo Creek. The railroad was never built, but the Northern Pacific kept the land. Over time, the railroad sold their holdings to various interests and eventually Plum Creek Timber Company came to own most of the private land in the Lolo Creek drainage. The privately owned alternate sections were logged by the timber companies.

In the early 1990's, a few visionaries began dreaming of putting Lolo Creek "back together" and restoring the landscape. When Plum Creek began a transition from logging to selling the land, the Nature Conservancy and Trust for

Public Land worked with Plum Creek and reached an agreement to purchase these and other lands in Montana. Known as the Montana Legacy Project, the Conservancy held these lands until they could be conveyed to public and private conservation owners. In 2010, 29,898 acres of former checkerboard land in the Lolo Creek drainage were conveyed to the Lolo National Forest. The Forest Service began a restoration program to manage these lands in a way more consistent with natural ecosystem processes.

In a sense, this land has come full circle. While it will never be as pristine as when it was the land of the Nez Perce and Salish people, through the Montana Legacy Project, restoration had begun that will restore and sustain this land for future generations.

As of August 2013, the Montana Legacy Project has added 132,699 acres of former Plum Creek Timber Company land in Montana to the National Forest System. About 29,900 acres or almost 47 square miles of those lands are in the Lolo Creek drainage.

Erected by U.S. Forest Service, Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, Nez Perce - Nee-Mee-Poo National Historic Trail.

This Whitefish landmark has a long and colorful history, centering around the Japanese immigrant, M.M. Hori, who had come to the Flathead Valley as a house-boy for the family of Charles Conrad, a major figure in the founding of Kalispell. Conrad gave Hori 10 acres of Whitefish land, and he soon became a successful truck farmer, Hori opened a cafe and bakery in the north part of this building in the early 20th Century, and in 1918, he bought what was then called the Northern Hotel just to the south.

Hori made extensive improvements to the buildings and operated the Hori Cafe and Hotel until his death in 1931; his wife continued operating it until it was leased to C.C.C. Smith in 1942. Smith's business closed after only a couple of months and the building remained empty until Jack Erinton bought it at a court sale in 1944 and reopened it as The Palm Hotel, leasing its operation to longtime residents Mr. and. Mrs. R.H. Mackey. In 1946, the cafe section was converted into a store, later occupied by several small, short-lived businesses.

Local businessman Jack Sesler and his family purchased the building in the late 1970's, cleaned it up and renamed it The Remington, with a fine-dining restaurant called Frederic's. The building has had a succession of owners since the Seslers sold it in the mid-80's. It entered the 21st Century under the ownership of Ted Sproul, featuring a casino and Italian restaurant.

Erected by Stumptown Historical Society and Whitefish Community Foundation.

Historical records on this building are incomplete, but (it) is believed that it has alway housed an alcohol-related business. From 1915 to 1919, it was the home of the Kalispell Malting and Brewing Co. For most of its existence since then, it has been known as the Palace Bar, a typical small-town, Western watering hole.

In its early days, according to local lore, the building featured a brothel on the top floor. That time is long gone, and the place has had a succession of respectable owners over the years, including one-time member of the Whitefish City Council and an attorney who eventually was to become a district judge and later a federal magistrate.

Although the decor, like the bar itself, has never been pretentious, the Palace features a beautiful old wood backbar, said to have come up the Missouri River by steamer to Fort Benton, overland by wagon to Flathead Lake and up the lake to old Demersville, the Flathead Valley's original settlement.

In more recent times, the Palace became known for its games of skill and chance, most notably the mouse races. Live mice were auctioned off to bar patrons and were sent scurrying along 1-inch ropes stretched side-by-side on an 8-foot course. The winning pair... mouse and owner... were placed in a winner's circle and photographed together for posterity. The Palace, not much changed in nearly a century, remains a spot for local residents and tourists alike.

Erected by Stumptown Historical Society and Whitefish Community Foundation.

Whitefish served as a division point for the Great Northern Railway from its founding in 1904 until 1955. In 1925, one railroader called it “the most distinctively railroad town on the whole Great Northern system.” The second floor of this 1928 Tudor style building, designed by railroad architect Thomas McMahon, housed the railway’s division offices. Serving as a hub for passenger and freight transportation, the first floor housed the yard office, freight and baggage rooms, warm room, ticket office, general waiting room, telegraph office, men’s smoking room, and ladies’ rest room. Competition from automobiles and trucks had already begun to decrease railroad traffic, so not many depots were built in the 1920s, the height of Tudor popularity; thus Tudor style depots are rare. This depot’s Tudor features include its high pointed roof, stucco and decorative half timbering above clapboard, and multiple groups of tall, narrow windows. Its decoratively carved brackets and rafter tails and second-floor balconies echo similar detailing at Glacier National Park chalets, visually connecting Whitefish to Glacier, a tourist destination widely promoted by the railroad. In the 1980s, Whitefish preservationists worked to preserve this magnificent building, which still serves as a passenger and freight depot. Railroad depots are one of the few types of buildings for which the back (facing the town) is as important as the front (facing the tracks). The stylish façades on both front and back of the Whitefish Depot continue to welcome travelers and reflect the town’s railroad history.

Erected by Montana Historical Society.

Carpenter Elmer Bader came to Kalispell from Wisconsin in 1891 to practice his trade. The energetic bachelor purchased two corner lots for $1,000 in 1895 and built two modest residences, one at 521 1st Street West and one at 36 5th Avenue West. In 1897, Bader married, and the couple lived in the 1st Street house and rented out the other. Bader opened his own lumberyard in 1899 on this northeast corner, where the present home is now. In addition to lumber, he sold windows, doors, moldings, building papers, lath, and shingles. By 1903, Bader had moved his business and was building this residence. According to the Flathead Herald-Journal, it was to be a “large and handsome house ... that anyone might be proud of.” Bader built many homes and buildings in early Kalispell, and his own exemplary residence reflects the stylistic details he favored. Shingles, clapboard, and a foundation of native rock provide the varied wall texture that is a hallmark of the Queen Anne style. A recessed second-story porch with curved arches and cutaway bay windows are typical Queen Anne features, while square fluted columns and stained and leaded glass add characteristic elegance. Egg-and-dart trim, wood floors, and a beautiful stairway grace the interior. When the Baders moved to Eureka in 1905, farmer Walter Jaquette bought this home and the 1st Street house. Jaquette rented out both houses during the next decades, then lived here from his retirement in 1934 until 1954. This historic residence with its companion rentals once shared the block with the Kalispell Malting and Brewing Company. The main house remains today a striking example of Elmer Bader’s craftsmanship.

Erected by Montana Historical Society.

A pattern book likely provided the plans for this charming American four-square cottage built by Great Northern Railroad employee Frederick Ferguson. A boilermaker by trade, Ferguson immigrated to Chicago from his native England and became a United States citizen in 1875. Ferguson built this residence before 1897 where he lived with his wife, Elsie, and her son. When the Great Northern Railroad moved to Whitefish in 1904, Ferguson also relocated there but retained this Kalispell property as a rental. When Ferguson died in 1925, the property remained a rental under family ownership until 1971. One early tenant was Civil War veteran captain James D. Eaton, who rented the home from Ferguson from 1905 until circa 1910. Eaton was organizer of the Montana National Guard’s Company H which served in the Philippines during the Spanish-American War. During that time Eaton was inspector general of Montana. Over the years other tenants included a saloon proprietor, a landscape gardener, a painter, and a sheet metal worker. This modest residence is exceptional for its excellent preservation and retention of original Queen Anne style details. Turned porch supports, a sun ray patterned pediment, decorative shinglework, and arched gable window are a delightful legacy of the Victorian era. These features along with original interior wood floors and woodwork reveal the extraordinary care of discerning landlords and tenants during its long use as a rental home.

Erected by Montana Historical Society.

Pioneer newspaperman George M. Houtz was the first owner of this stately Italianate style home, built in 1899. Houtz, who had learned the printing trade in Illinois and founded a newspaper in South Dakota, came to Montana in 1891. He and a partner established a newspaper in nearby Demersville. That town was soon abandoned in favor of the new town of Kalispell, and Houtz moved his paper here. Houtz and his wife, Irene, built their new home in 1899 on the very outskirts of town. Spring Creek ran through the back of the property and the neighborhood was sparsely populated. When stonemason Mike Greig finished laying the foundation of native rock, Houtz’s newspaper, the Flathead Herald-Journal, declared it a “splendid piece of work.” The low-pitched roof, gabled dormer, wide bracketed eaves, and arched window are hallmarks of the elegant Italianate style. Fancy wood shinglework complements the clapboard sheathing. The entry porch is remarkably intact with its Tuscan columns and denticulated cornice. Hardwood floors and much of the original woodwork preserve the home’s interior vintage appeal. During the 1930s, the city diverted Spring

Creek, and the spacious home, like many in Kalispell, was divided into apartments. Once again a single-family residence, this fine turn-of-the- twentieth-century home stands out among its more recent neighbors.

Erected by Montana Historical Society.