Marcus Daly Company Bank Building

By editor

Anaconda, Deer Lodge County, Montana

If you ever find yourself wandering the streets of Anaconda, Montana, and spot a grand Victorian-era building with granite trim, arched doorways, and frosted windows etched with floral patterns, you have stumbled upon the Marcus Daly Company Bank Building. It is one of those structures that, while not whispering sweet nothings about copper fortunes, certainly shouts about the ambitions of a man who tried to make this city the crown jewel of Montana. That man was Marcus Daly, a copper king with a vision so vast it could swallow the Big Sky itself.

Marcus Daly did not arrive in Anaconda by accident, nor did the town spring up like mushrooms after a rainy night. He founded Anaconda in 1883, after buying out a bank interest from W. L. Hoge, who was Anaconda’s first mayor and co-founder of the town’s first bank. Daly was not content with just digging holes in the ground and shipping out ore; he wanted a whole city wired, watered, lit, and running like clockwork. To that end, he platted the streets, provided the water supply, installed the lighting system, launched an electric streetcar service, and laid down a sewer system. He even threw up public buildings to make the place look respectable. His idea was to crown Anaconda the capital of the new state of Montana when statehood came in 1889. That honor instead went to Helena, and Daly, though stung, didn’t pack up and leave. He stayed, poured more copper and money into the town, and kept his smelter humming.

The bank building itself came about in 1895, during a period when the Washoe Smelter was expanding to handle an increasing tide of copper ore from the Butte mines Daly’s company controlled. It was a time when the Anaconda Copper Mining Company was the economic juggernaut of Montana, and possibly the West. The company owned not just the mines but the smelter in Anaconda, the railroad line connecting Butte to Anaconda, timber lands in the Bitterroot Valley, and even the local newspaper. It was a whole copper empire, and the Marcus Daly Company Bank was its financial heart.

The bank building’s architecture is something to behold, too. It’s built in the Romanesque style popular in the late 19th century, featuring granite trim and engaged columns that give it a solid, fortress-like appearance. The windows are frosted and sandblasted, with bronze door hardware and terra cotta tiles decorated with floral motifs. The building’s rear was added in 1914 by Fred Willson, a Bozeman architect of some renown. It was designed to blend seamlessly with the original structure, which is no small feat when adding onto a building that’s already impressive.

One might think a bank operating under the thumb of a copper magnate would have a quiet and uneventful history, but the Marcus Daly Company Bank had its moments. Shortly after the grand opening of the bank block in 1895 came a bungled nighttime robbery. Two gentlemen of the criminal persuasion attempted to blow up the safe but were so clumsy they ended up waking the entire neighborhood instead. The would-be robbers were caught without much fuss, proving that sometimes ineptitude is the bank’s best defense.

Marcus Daly himself never saw the Washoe Smelter fully completed. He died in November 1900, just before the grand opening of the smelter that would process the mountains of copper ore flowing out of Butte. His death was a quiet affair for a man whose life was anything but. The company he founded lived on under the name Anaconda Copper Mining Company, which eventually shortened to the Anaconda Company. It remained a dominant force in Montana until the 1970s and beyond. In 1977, the Atlantic Richfield Corporation, better known as ARCO, acquired the company. Three years later, in 1980, the Washoe Smelter was shut down, marking the end of nearly a century of copper smelting in Anaconda.

The bank itself continued to serve the community long after Marcus Daly’s death. The bank moved out in 1969, and the building passed through the hands of various tenants. It wasn’t until 2002 that the older portion of the building underwent extensive rehabilitation to restore much of its original grandeur. Today, the building houses the First National Bank of Montana, a fitting continuation of its financial legacy.

There is also a human story woven into the stone and mortar of this building, one told by the Ancient Order of Hibernians, Division No. 1, Anaconda-Deer Lodge County. This division is the longest continuous AOH division west of the Mississippi River, and they dedicated a marker to honor “our Irish Ancestors, who gave their lives to the smelter and this community.” Many of the workers who powered the copper industry here were Irish immigrants who endured dangerous conditions to feed the insatiable appetite of the copper boom.

To grasp the scale of the enterprise Daly built, consider this: the Anaconda Copper Mining Company controlled approximately 85,000 acres of timber land in the Bitterroot Valley by the early 20th century. This timber was essential to support the mining operations, providing everything from mine timbers to fuel. The railroad connecting Butte and Anaconda, constructed under Daly’s direction, was critical for moving ore and supplies--a 26-mile stretch that linked the mines to the smelter.

Marcus Daly once said, “Copper is King,” a phrase that became a rallying cry for the industry and the towns it shaped. It was not hyperbole. At its peak, Anaconda Copper Mining Company was one of the largest producers of copper in the world, and the bank building was the place where the fortunes were counted and managed. But the copper king’s vision was never just about money. It was about building a community, a city that could rival any other in the West.

So, the Marcus Daly Company Bank Building is more than a pretty set of walls and pretty windows. It is a solid piece of Montana’s history, forged in copper, sweat, and dreams -- the kind of place where the ambitions of a single man could shape the fate of a whole region. And if those ambitions were sometimes larger than life, well, that is the way of all great enterprises, as any seasoned riverboat gambler or copper king would tell you.

See also

• Marcus Daly Company Bank Building at Anaconda, Deer Lodge County
• Marcus Daly: An Irishman with Vision at Anaconda, Deer Lodge County
• Contributions of the Washoe Smelter at Anaconda, Deer Lodge County