Terry

These graves hold more than the remains of six men-they hold the power of symbol and stereotype. Like other remote graves overlooking prime waterways in the rural West, they have been kept well marked. Yet the identities of their occupants can no longer be verified and legend surrounding them conjure classic images of the "taming" of the West.

Here lie men from elsewhere, drawn to the fringes of America's western frontier, who ultimately lived and died right here. One is said to have been killed by Indians in 1878. Another is said to have been killed in a fight in 1880 at the Foley Roadhouse, a combination tavern and hotel that operated close to the present-day Interstate highway. A third grave is thought to hold another man who died at the Roadhouse, of natural causes in 1881.

For many years a handmade sign described three of the six as "buffalo hunters," evoking scenes that followed the Indian Wars, when huge bison herds were killed for their hides, for amusement, and to eliminate the core of western native cultures. Decades later, incidents continued occurring in this area reminiscent of other "Wild West" stereotypes-in 1917 the Terry newspaper reported that two inmates "were accidentally shot in the city jail by the town Marshall."

Erected by Undaunted Stewardship.

Erected 1908

Enrolled in the National Register of Historic Places, 1978

Dedicated in recognition of 40 years pioneering educational leadership in community, region and state as

Superintendent of the Terry Schools 1907-1947

Father DeSmet, accompanied by Trader Galpin and his wife traveled overland from thenMissouri River to meet the Hunkpapa Sioux at the Sitting Bull Council on June 20, 1868 for a peace conference.

Runners from Father DeSmet's were sent ahead to Chief Sitting Bull's cap and Sitting Bull sent his men back to let Father DeSmet know he would be welcomed.

Father DeSmet met at Sitting Bull's camp about 4 miles above the mouth of the Power River, near when Camp Creek empties into the Yellowstone.

The camp was made up of 500-600 tipis, 4,000-5,000 Sioux Indians, and thousands of horses.

DeSmet was not able to convince Sitting Bull to sign a peace treaty, but the council was considered a success because Sitting Bull did agree to allow some white travel and settlement.

Powder River Stage

The Powder River Stage station was one of the stops on the Fort Keogh-Bismarck stage coach route.

It operated from 1878 until 1883 when the railroad became the primary means of transportation to Miles City.

Erected by Yellowstone Trail, Terry Montana,

Montana History Foundation, Prairie County Museum.

Over the span of untold generations, rivers marked the primary travel routes used by nomadic tribes and the earliest explorers. The first steamboat to venture up the Yellowstone River to its confluence with the Powder River was the famed Far West, which accompanied the first survey team sent by the Northern Pacific Railroad in 1872. It carried supplies for the surveyors and for the soldiers who came along to provide a defense against the Sioux, who had become hostile because the encroachment violated the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie.

The railroad tracks that passed in front of you helped entice a figurative flood of immigration to this area. Later, a literal flood here precipitated one of the worst transportation disasters in American 20th Century history. Imagine the dead of night, in the wee hours of June 19, 1938, when a Milwaukee Railroad passenger train arrived at the Custer Creek Bridge crossing- just as a torrential flash-flood struck the same bridge from below.

The bridge collapsed, seven of the train's 11 cars falling into deep, rushing waters, killing 48 passengers and injuring 75. Another 43 survived unscathed-many of them discovered the perilous situation when they awoke in the train's rear cars to realize they were no longer moving. One car teetered for nearly an hour in the pitch-black darkness before it fell into the river and washed downstream. At the time, it was the second deadliest U.S. train wreck that ever had occurred, and few incidents have surpassed it since.

script letter at the bottom center:

"I awoke in the middle of the night to see all this wreckage across a roaring river, train cars flung at right angles to the way we were going. We were stuck on the east side, we couldn't get to it, we couldn't hear people on the other side of the river, we couldn't do anything to help. There were 48 people trapped and dead but we didn't know that at the time. They fished one body out as far away as Gelendive." Warren Jones, survivor

Erected by Undaunted Stewardship.

The military paved the way for the settlement of the West-and the lands in front of you played a central role. The first military encampment here occurred on July 30, 1805, when Captain William Clark and other members of the Corps of Discovery camped on the north bank of the Yellowstone River about a mile downstream from here. Heading home quickly, they were just days away from reuniting with Meriwether Lewis and his crew who traveled separately along the Missouri River.

The Corps' survival to this point had required the friendliness and help of numerous native tribes to the West. Clark and his men could scarcely have imagined that this place at the confluence of the Yellowstone and the Powder Rivers-just 70 years later-would become a staging ground for the U.S. governments war to subdue native cultures and transform the region.

The land downstream, to your right on both sides of the Powder River, served regularly as an organizing site for troops throughout the six-year war against the Sioux Nation in the 1870s. Tents housed battalions of soldiers, civilian support-teams camped on the fringes and steamboat docked to unload cargo.

Picture the nation's 99th Birthday-July 4, 1876-when hundreds of soldiers camped here with General Terry. Giant piles of wood were ready for the bonfires that night on the top of Sheridan Butte and on a hilltop to the south. But instead, that afternoon a steamboat, the Far West, arrived with shocking news of the Battle of Little Bighorn. Men they likely all knew, who had camped near here just days earlier-General Armstrong Custer and the entire Seventh Cavalry-were now dead.

On the morning of August 22 just as we were going into camp 20 or 30 Indians concealed themselves behind the rough hills...the Indianas hid themselves on a high and rugged promontory that over looked the valley of O'Fallon's Creek...During this skirmish an Indian calling himself 'Sitting Bull' stood behind a rock on the top of a precipice and addressed us at great length calling over the names of all the bands he would bring to our extermination, his list comprising all the Sioux, the Arapahoes and the Cheyennes. Stanley's report on the expedition, October 28, 1872

Erected by Undaunted Stewardship.

Work on the 225 mile Eastern Mountain scion of the Milwaukee Railroad took place 1907-1908

The Milwaukee ran through a region of river and creek valleys making for the building of many bridges. The Yellowstone was crossed three times between Terry and Miles City. The first is five miles west of Terry, the second 25 miles further at Tusler Creek, and the third 5 miles West of Miles City.

Supplies to build the Milwaukee Railroad first came by rail on the Northern Pacific tracks, then across the Yellowstone River by boat, ferry and cable.

The Old Milwaukee Railroad Bridge is about 3 miles West on Milwaukee Road.

Calypso was a stop on the Milwaukee Railroad. The community had a school and a ferry crossing in addition to the railroad section houses.

An interpretive sign reached by crossing the Old Milwaukee Railroad bridge marks the beginning of the Calypso Trail. The rustic 5 1/2 miles trail leads to the scenic Terry Badlands.

Erected by Montana History Foundation, Prairie County Economic Development Council, Prairie County Museum, Montana Historical Society.

In 1970, Congress enacted a Wilderness Act and designated 43,000 acres north of Terry in the badlands as a Wilderness Study Area. The Calypso Trail and Scenic View offer a grand look at the badlands area.

Father DeSmet met with the Hunkpapa Sioux at the Sitting Bull Council on June 20, 1868 for a peace conference. They met at Sitting Bull’s camp about 4 miles above the mouth of the Powder River. DeSmet was not able to convince Sitting Bull to sign a peace treaty, but the council was considered a success because Sitting Bull did agree to allow some white travel and settlement.

Terry was originally a firewood stop for steamboats. By 1876, the location at the mouth of the Powder River was known as the Powder River Depot because it was used as a military supply point prior to the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

The Yellowstone River served as the return route for Captain William Clark’s party of the Historic Lewis & Clark Expedition. On July 30, 1806, Clark and his party camped on the Yellowstone near the mouth of the Powder River.

When the Northern Pacific Railroad reached the area on October 8, 1881, company officials named the town for General Alfred H. Terry. Following the Civil War, Terry spent 18 years in this part of the country as commander of the Department of the Dakota and later as the commander of the Division of the Missouri. At the time, the Dakota Territory stretched from present day Minnesota to Montana.

Erected by Montana Department of Commerce; and Prairie County Economic Development Council.

This is the river that exuberant parties claim is a mile wide, an inch deep, and runs up hill. The statement is exaggerated. Captain Clark, of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, named it the Redstone in 1806 and afterwards found out that the Indians called it the same thing but they pronounced it “Wah-ha-sah.” Clark thought the river "disagreeably muddy," but observed "great numbers of Buffalo feeding on the plains, elk on the points, antilopes." He also "saw Some of the Bighorn animals at a distance on the hills." He camped just across the Yellowstone River from the mouth of the Powder on the night of July 30, 1806.

Generals Terry and Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, moving from the east to take part in a campaign against the Lakota and Northern Cheyenne Indians in the spring of 1876, camped on the Yellowstone about 25 miles west of here June 10th. From that point Terry and Custer ordered Major Marcus Reno with six troops of the 7th Cavalry to scout the Powder and Tongue valleys for signs of the Indians. During his reconnaissance, Remp and his command swung further west than ordered and picked up a fresh trail on Rosebud

Creek. It was this trail that led Custer to his fatal encounter with the tribes on the Little Big Horn River a few days later.

Erected by Montana Department of Transportation.

Surrounding you is northern mixed-grass prairie stretching further than the eye can see in all directions. This is a place where exceptionally clean air mixes freely with the lilting serenades of sparrows and western meadowlarks. Where people and animals, under the canopy of a giant sky, prevail over harsh, untamable conditions. To those who have built their lives here, these sweeping landscapes, despite their rigor. present a timeless permanence of beauty and unyielding power.

These rangelands have changed very little in the course of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years. Yet this area has seen and participated in a rich and transformational history with impacts far beyond what its remoteness might suggest. Here is the confluence of two rivers well-known to the aboriginals who followed the bison, their chief food source. Downstream and across the Yellowstone River sits a campsite used by the Corps of Discovery enlisted to explore, catalog and help open the region to development. And, next to the Powder River, military troops regularly camped during the government's conquest to subdue the natives and make settlement easier for others.

Here, too, is another of many locations in the West where riverboat traffic gave way to railroads and where irrigation greatly broadened the way people are able to survive on vast, dry landscapes.

Today, with the help of a program called Undaunted Stewardship, ranchers here preserve historic sites and take actions designed to maintain the landscape's body and soul. Welcome to a glimpse of the area's ghosts, its life and its future. Enjoy your visit!

Erected by Bureau of Land Management, Montana Stock Growers Assc., Montana State University.

• A conference of businessmen from South Dakota in 1912 met to build a better road between Ipswich and Aberdeen, SD. This led to the development of the Yellowstone Trail which stretched from "Plymouth Rock to Puget Sound".

• The Yellowstone Trail was the first transcontinental highway across the northern United States as transportation transitioned from railroad to auto travel.

• The Yellowstone Trail originally followed existing wagon roads, but changed over time as new roads were built.

• The Yellowstone Trail passes through Prairie County from Mildred to Fallon to Terry and westward to Miles City.

• Look for Yellowstone Trail markers to guide you through Prairie County and to visit some historic points of interest.

Erected by Montana History Foundation; Prairie County Economic Development Council; and Montana Historical Society.