Bozeman Magazine

Bozeman - The Sweet Pea City

revised from August 2014 article

Angie Ripple

Bozeman and the Gallatin Valley have been known as the valley of the flowers since only native Americans roamed the area. In the early 1900’s over 17,000 acres of the valley were planted in edible peas harvested both for canning and seed. In…

Legendary Locals of Bozeman’s Past

Rachel Phillips

From its inception as a supply town during Montana’s gold rush in the 1860s, Bozeman has attracted visionaries, leaders, and pioneering thinkers. Now one of Montana’s fastest growing cities, Bozeman still retains elements of the past…

German Time Traveler

Merging Past & Present pt.2

Julia Strehlau-Jacobs

We all know the expression “to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes”. While it can mean to question someone being judgmental, it can also refer to actually experiencing what someone else has experienced. Now, Otto Dahl’s shoes…

The Dahl Family’s World War II Experience

Patriotism, Sacrifice, & Victory

Rachel Phillips

When the United States entered World War II in December 1941, young and old from across America rose to the challenge and did what they could to serve their country. Sentiment was no different in Bozeman, where groups of Red Cross volunteers rolled…

German Time Traveler

An Adventure Through Time

Julia Strehlau-Jacobs

Do you sometimes think back to the times when Grandparents had the most interesting stories to tell, or even the boring ones? Stories that usually start with… ‘When I was your age’ or ‘back in the day’? Those anecdotes…

Bozeman’s Historic Trolley Car System

and Montana’s First Interurban Electric Railway

Cindy Shearer

With the arrival of the Northern Pacific Railroad in 1883 progressive Bozemanites began to cast off what they considered rural or uncultured in favor of more urban and upscale living. Log cabins were torn down and were replaced with architecturally…

Put A Little Gravel in Your Travel

Day Trips Steeped in History

Cindy Shearer

Did you know the little Montana town of Ringling was named after the world-famous circus family, the Ringling Brothers? Or that one of the brothers, John, who was one of the richest men in America in the early 1900s, started a ranching empire there…

Red Lodge Road Trip

Sarah Cairoli

Maybe you think of it as the gateway to the Beartooth Highway. Maybe it is one of your favorite skiing destinations. Maybe you like to wager a little money on the pigs. Maybe you first heard of Red Lodge, Montana, when you read Hemingway’s For…

Bicycles & Taxidermy

Rachel Phillips

In a century-old photograph, William Ginn proudly poses with six gigantic trout, a hint of a smile on his lips and a sparkle in his eyes. In another image, he is propped up on a bicycle in front of a curtained backdrop, muscles straining for the…

Bozeman Women that Made a Difference

Politics, Poultry N’ Pottery

Cindy Shearer

Mabel Van Meter Cruickshank and her carpenter husband Pete settled in Bozeman in 1899; Mabel was 27. In Bozeman she reared their two sons, James and John, and found time to go back to school at Montana State College subsidizing their family income by…

History of Gallatin County Jails Revealed

Cindy Shearer

Bozeman was not the original county seat for Gallatin County. In 1865, the first Montana Territorial Legislature established counties and designated Gallatin City, located near modern-day Three Forks, as the county seat. Gallatin City held that…

Bozeman's Choice is the People's Choice

Angie Ripple

On Oct. 16 our first-ever Bozeman’s Choice Reader’s Poll went live and our readers responded immediately. The big, giant, massive poll covered everything from local restaurants to local media, to arts and entertainment and everything in…

The Rialto Remembered

Bozeman’s Choice Business or Structure You Wish Was STILL Here But Is Gone

Rachel Phillips

In 1922, the Rialto Theater opened for business in downtown Bozeman while the Roaring Twenties pop culture spread across America. In national entertainment news, Italian-born heartthrob Rudolph Valentino starred in the silent film Beyond the Rocks…

Live up to your license plate Bozeman

Courtney Kramer

October 15 was my last day as Historic Preservation Officer for the City of Bozeman. Rather than the usual article about a place or person important in our community’s history, this article is a soliloquy on the state of cultural resource…

Days In The Hood

Sledding Bear Canyon

Fritz Shallah

Bozeman has long been a snow dog’s paradise. Winter, the reigning season in this mountain country, has produced a love of the frozen outdoors for generations. Long before “Cold Smoke” drifted its white foam behind the trails of…

Fort Parker and the Bozeman Economy

The first Crow Indian Agency, or Fort Parker as it is commonly known, was established in 1869 to distribute the annuity goods promised to the Crow tribe in the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. Superintendent of Indians for Montana Territory, Alfred…

A Haunted Hotel Over The Hill

Pat Hill, photos by Zach Hoffman

The Murray Hotel in Livingston has had many guests since it was first constructed over a century ago, and if the stories are to be believed, it could be that some of them have never left.Originally called the Elite Hotel when it was first constructed…

Buildings That HAUNT Bozeman Construction Sites

Courtney Kramer

Bozeman generally prioritizes preservation of our historic buildings. Two demolitions, however, will haunt Bozeman contractors in the next year. Workers demolishing the existing bank building on the North West corner of West Mendenhall and North…

Mediums in Montana

Spiritualism in The Old West

Ramona Mead

Not all the stories in Bozeman’s past are those of triumph and positivity. There have been scandals, murders, and unsolved mysteries. This is the side of history often swept under the rug, but there is a group in town, comprised of history…

The Montana of Andrew Garcia

Pat Hill

Tales of trappers and traders on the Montana frontier often involve names like Jim Bridger or John Colter, but those early mountain men didn’t have a corner on the story-telling market. A man named Andrew Garcia, whom most people have never…

Historic Spotlight: The Main Street Historic District

Courtney Kramer

The City recently reviewed plans to modify the retail storefronts in the Hathorn Building, at 29-43 West Main Street, vacated by the Leaf and Bean and Poor Richards after the sale of those businesses. Continued investment in the Hathorn Building by…

Who Is That? A Look at Bozeman Statues

Ramona Mead

Regardless of how long you’ve been in Bozeman, be it a decade, a year, or a week, chances are you’ve noticed one or more of the interesting pieces of artwork located throughout town. If you’re like me, you’ve driven by a…

Sink or Swim: The History of Bogert Pool

Courtney Kramer

Bogert Park is a summertime oasis from the City’s downtown street grid. The pool, tennis courts, band shell and pavilion that shelters a vibrant Farmer’s Market all offer outdoor community gathering spaces. Built in 1938, Bogert Pool at…

Historic Spotlight: The Gallatin County Fairgrounds

Courtney Kramer

The Gallatin County Fairgrounds, located 10 blocks north of Main Street, are the northern boundary of the street grid that characterizes Bozeman’s historic core area. The Fairgrounds are an accessible connection to Montana’s…

A Walk Back in Time: Explore Montana’s Gold Rush Towns

Sarah Cairoli

When the residents of Bannack elected Henry Plummer to the position of Sheriff in May 1863, they knew virtually nothing about him. They did not know that he had been convicted of murder and done time in San Quentin prison. They did not know that he…

The Lindley Concrete Block Factory

Building Blocks for Bozeman

Courtney Kramer

The storage warehouse at 412 East Olive Street, at the north end of Bogert Park, is an anomaly in the neighborhood’s predominantly residential development pattern. Built as a concrete block factory in 1908, the building is an overlooked…

Evaluating Bozeman's NCOD

Courtney Kramer

The City of Bozeman is evaluating the regulatory component of our community’s historic preservation program. Established in 1991, the City’s Neighborhood Conservation Overlay District (NCOD) is a locally- adopted zoning district that…

Bozeman’s Historic Street Trees

Courtney Kramer

April 24, 2015 is Arbor Day. What began as an initiative to plant soil-conserving windbreaks in Nebraska in 1872 has grown into an international effort to plant and maintain trees. The City’s Forestry Department is an important partner in…

Topography and the Evolution of Bozeman’s Sewerage, Part II

Courtney Kramer

  This article tells the story of the second phase of the City of Bozeman’s sewerage development. Part one was published in the February 2015 Bozeman Magazine. As noted in Part I of this article, of the many tax-payer funded public works…

Preservation Retrospective

Courtney Kramer

At the end of 2014, I’d like to take a moment to celebrate the productivity and quiet successes of Bozeman’s historic preservation program over the last year. After years of work, a number of projects finally came to fruition which will…

Interview with Ken Egan Jr. Montana 1864: Indians, Emigrants, and Gold in the Territorial Year

Jean Conover

As I tiptoed up the stairs at the Country Bookshelf to hear Ken Egan Jr. talk I could hear his friendly voice wafting down answering a question from the audience about his new book, Montana 1864, which chronicles the year Montana became a U.S…

Historic District Spotlight:

Topography and the Evolution of Bozeman’s Sewerage, Part I

Courtney Kramer

Of the many tax payer funded public works projects built by the City of Bozeman, none is more integral to protecting the public’s health, safety and welfare than the sanitary sewer system. As growth continues to the west, the Public Works…

The Real John Bozeman With sneaky ways and low morals

Kent Goodman

Nelson Story erected a monument to Bozeman at Sunset Hills Cemetery, where it can still be seen next to the Story plot.

Hibernate with the Animals in Yellowstone This Winter

You're Invited

Bev Hosford

Yin and Yang. Pleasure and Pain. Hot and Cold. Contrast makes the world go-round. In Yellowstone National Park, the thermogenic effects beneath the earth, mix with the cold wintry air and create quite the concoction. In his book, Grizzlies on my…

Historic District Spotlight:

Main Street Hospitality

Courtney Kramer

A handful of new hotels are under construction in downtown Bozeman, three of which directly impact a historic structure. Kenyon Noble, built in 1957 on Mendenhall Street, has been demolished to make way for an Element by Westin. Across Mendenhall…

An Early Bozeman Christmas

Kent Goodman

Probably the first group to celebrate Christmas in Montana were in the Bitterroot Mountains, where a group of rugged trappers had gathered in Fort McMillan.