Real Montana: Townsend

By Jim Holland, Jr.
Heritage Teacher, Townsend Public Schools

Modern travelers who want to take a break halfway between Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks along U.S. Highway 287 are likely to stop in Townsend. They might get out and stretch their legs, maybe pick up some snacks and top off their gas tanks. They may even check out postcards for sale at the new Town Pump gas station or stop into the new Lucky Lil's Casino next door.

If they have a little more time, they might drive down Broadway to the restored one-room school house from the Crow Creek valley that now houses Torie Jane's Antiques. Visitors will notice the wide main street that becomes tree lined beyond the courthouse and Veterans' Memorial Park with its large silver water tower, the largest physical landmark in Townsend. They might comment that this is a nice little town.

Townsend's location in the only true valley on the Missouri River is truly picturesque with the looming Mount Baldy of the Big Belt Range on the east and rapidly rising Elkhorns on the west. Canyon Ferry Lake provides recreation and fishing.

Many people who visit Townsend take advantage of its modern amenities, but those who take a little more time to learn Townsend's history will understand the transition it is going through. Not long ago Townsend was nearly non-existent; now it's a thriving community that provides modern services as well as homes for an increasing number of workers who commute to Helena each day to work.

So when did Townsend begin? The earliest history of the Missouri River Valley can be found in the tipi rings, vision quest sites, and chert quarries that dot the area. A crossroads for native peoples, Flathead, Shoshoni, Crow, and Blackfeet people passed through the area to and from the buffalo hunting grounds.

The first white visitors were members of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. On July 23, 1805, Lewis camped on an island under the south end of Canyon Ferry Lake north of Townsend. In his journal he wrote:

"Set out early as usual; Capt. Clark left us with his little party of 4 men and continued his rout on the Stard. side of the river.... .the river is still divided by a great number or islands, it channels sometimes seperating to the distance of 3 miles; the current very rapid with a number of riffles; the bed gravel and smooth stones: the banks low and of rich loam in the bottoms; some low bluffs of yellow and red clay with a hard red slate stone intermixed. the bottoms are wide and but scantily timbered; the underbrush very thick consisting of the narrow & broad leafed willow rose and Currant bushes principally. high plains succeeds the river bottoms and extend back on either side to the base of the mountains which are from 8 to 12 miles assunder, high, rocky, some small pine and Cedar on them and ly parallel with the river.""

After Lewis and Clark, the area's next wave of white visitors were the mountain men and fur traders. Though some trapping was done, this area was pretty much left alone because of fierce resistance from the Blackfeet. It would take something greater that beaver pelts to draw white settlers to the valley. That something was gold.

In 1863 and 1864 major gold discoveries at Bannack, Virginia City, Last Chance Gulch, and finally, Confederate Gulch in the Big Belt Mountains northeast of the valley, drew thousands of fortune seekers. Diamond City, located in Confederate Gulch, grew rapidly to more than 5,000 people and another 5,000 located in the surrounding gulches. As the gold started to play out, people started to settle the rich valley. Farming and ranching took hold in the 1870s.

The farming communities of Bedford and Canton sprang up on either side of the river. Continued hard rock mining in the Elkhorns fueled the growth of Radersburg and the smelting town of Toston. The community of Centerville was built along the Missouri River with hopes of becoming a trade center, the Fort Benton above the Great Falls of the Missouri.

By this time a new economic force was shaping the territory: the railroad. As the Northern Pacific Railroad Company moved westward across the territory, the company created towns that would be supply points for the trains as well as shipping depots for the agricultural areas around the stop. One of the last to be created was Townsend, Meagher [Gaelic: pronounced MAR] County, Montana Territory.

The latter part of November 1882 General Land Agent Stone laid out the new town-referred to as the metropolis of the Missouri Valley-embracing 160 acres, a half mile from the river.

When the Northern Pacific Railway Company completed its line from Minneapolis through the west to Seattle in 1883, Townsend became a reality. The first train came from St. Paul to meet another from the west coast at Gold Creek, near Missoula.

This was the moment for the town of Townsend to make itself known. Those early residents delegated a committee to meet the train headed by Attorney W. H. Parker who would go aboard and accompany former President U.S. Grant to the platform on the rear of the train as he greeted those at every stop along the route.

The Northern Pacific Railroad built a fine depot at main street, and platted Township No. 7 into streets and alleys. They set aside several lots on South Pine Street to be used as a city park and offered lots cheap enough to encourage rapid building of the main edifices needed to start a town. The lots began to sell. The Helena Herald reported that, for $300 each, it was understandable why the W.E. Tierney Co. grabbed the offer made by the Northern Pacific Railroad Company to build a $10,000 hotel and have it finished in five months. Townsend's population began to increase.

"When the Lewis and Clark expedition passed through the Missouri River valley and wrote their first history, Township No. 7 was not even mentioned that it might be a good trading post, much less a village or city.

When the early settlers came from various parts of the East and began to build homes within the rocky crests of our mountainous borders, Township No. 7 was 'passed up' for other points which seemed to possess better advantages for building a village.

But when the mightiest enterprise of the age came rumbling along-first with transit and rod, then with plow and scraper, and afterwards with town site locating engineers, a brilliant possibility evolved which gave birth to a lasting enterprise-Townsend, village, town, county seat.

Averill actually experienced firsthand the building in Townsend. He, with eighteen other carpenters, saw the first materials placed on the lots and witnessed them "architecturally placed" to make the first business and residence structures in the new town. Averill also selected lots in the north end of town on Oak Street for himself. At odd moments he finished a one-room abode for his wife who was to join him in 1884. In order to maintain a comfortable home, the house was enlarged throughout the years, room by room as each of his six children were born.

The new town developed almost overnight due in part to well-made plans by early settlers in area. They had watched the progress of the railroad for many months. The area residents were aware of the advantages such transportation would bring. Some local people obtained contracts to build the road bed, clearing the right-of-way, and even laying the rails. All the work was done with horse-drawn scrapers and manpower.