Glimmers of History
Select prints available at Park Photo, downtown Livingston, 223-5546. Ask for print number at end of description.
An impressive scene from the 1931 Livingston Roundup Association’s children’s parade. Nelle Jean Maxey (Durgan) faithfully practiced this feat of balance so that, for several years, she rode the entire parade standing on a horse led by her father, Dave Maxey. Her mother, Eva Maxey Garnier, managed the children's parade during the 1920s and 30s. (Isn’t that a lovely idea?)
This group of men and boys (and three dogs) pose in front of the coking plant at Cokedale. They are the baseball team for the small mining community located west of Livingston. A June 24, 1905 article in the Livingston Enterprise states: “Cokedale has organized a ball team and will arrange for a game with Livingston. During the days when Cokedale enjoyed its first existence, the ball games between Livingston and that city created more excitement than any other form of sport, and with a good nine
Here’s a photo from June 6, 1938 to refresh you. Yellowstone National Park road foreman, Pete Rorick, stands on top of his vehicle next to snow 1.25 miles from the summit of Mt. Washburn where snow depth in the drift measured 18 feet on this day. The road over Dunraven Pass, between Tower and Canyon, is the last of the Upper Loop to be cleared of snow each season. This year, the road is closed because of road construction.
Two men stand in front of Billy Miles Feed Stables at the lower end of Main Street, Livingston, Montana, ca. 1900. Established with his brothers Tommy and Boyd in fall 1882 with reportedly $75 cash, a bale of hay and a sack of oats, the trio began their business that provided services to the Northern Pacific Railroad, Yellowstone National Park, and area residents. In June 1901 they shipped 125 horses to British buyers with a promise of 150 more horses by July 1.
This group of swimming pals are definitely having a good time but the only thing we know is that the photograph was taken in 1903. But we’d love to know their names and where they were swimming. Hunters Hot Springs east of Livingston, Montana? Or Chico Hot Springs south of Livingston in Paradise Valley?
Don Fraser (far right, back row) and the Bold Venture III plane served with the heavy bomb group shown here near Kings Lynn, England. After five missions, the group was deactivated because of heavy losses. Of 64 men sent out, only 12 returned. Don served as bombardier, though training in four southern states had prepared each of the men for any position on B-29s, which as yet were not ready for service in World War II.
In May 1904 this group of people drove from Aldridge, a mining community north of Gardiner, to Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park. Visitors climbed down a wooden ladder to explore the 35’ by 75’ underground cavern called the Devil's Kitchen until 1939 when officials removed the ladder. People were then forbidden to visit the interior of this extinct hot spring because it wasn’t safe to breathe the carbon dioxide-rich air below.
On May 19, 1958, a crew working on the Yellowstone River Bridge near Point of Rocks north of Tom Miner Basin. It was completed before high water in June 1958. In 1963, after Highway 89 crossed to the west side of the Yellowstone River, Max and Carleen Chase, members of the D'Ewart family who had purchased ranch land in that area sixty years earlier, built the Point of Rocks Lodge.
Clark City is revealed in the far background of this 1883 photo, a collection of small buildings along the Yellowstone River. This is a cropped portion of a photograph taken by photographers for the "Worcester Excursion Car Co., Worcester, Mass." Northern Pacific Railroad tracks bisect the photograph and beyond, part of the developing downtown can be seen. The original photo shows more of Livingston, including the original depot.
An 1882 photo of Clark City, the predecessor settlement of Livingston, Montana, consisting of ramshackle buildings. Built ahead of the railroad tracks, early-day entrepreneurs moved their businesses from Benson’s Landing, east of present-day Livingston, to where they thought the Northern Pacific Railroad would establish the town. Surely the town would be built near and along the Yellowstone River! But, that was not to be and eventually Clark City residents and business owners moved to present-da
Photo of Livingston, Montana taken from the north-side hill during summer 1887. Caption reveals businesses in the photo: a skating rink, built fall 1883; a furniture factory; Major Pease building; Billy Mitchell's Merchant Hotel; Orschel & Bro. on Park St., Geo. Carver Gen. Mercantile (today’s Livingston Bar and Grille) built in 1883-84; First National Park Bank (short lived), which became Park Hotel, now Masonic Temple; North Main Street; and of course, the Northern Pacific Railroad Track.
A party of horseback riders pose in Cooke City, Montana. While we don’t know who the people are, a close inspection reveals that at least five are women, while two additional women are peering down from the second-story window. Two of the women must have shed their coats before taking the photograph as they are piled up in the street behind them. We’re guessing that the date of the photo was taken in the 1920s.
Dave Condon, former Chief Naturalist of Yellowstone National Park, took this photograph of a SnoGo rotary snow plow blasting snow from the road while Old Faithful Geyser blew, clearing its pent-up steam and gases. Two auger SnoGo plows were purchased by the National Park Service in 1932, dramatically increasing the efficiency of plowing roads.
National Park Service employees used these chained-up, four-wheel drive vehicles for the first wheeled snow management in Yellowstone National Park. Apparently, the vehicles were tied together with a steel pole, driven as far as possible, and rammed the snow, clearing a path. Then, drivers backed them up and attacked the snow with another ramming motion. These Model B 3-ton trucks were manufactured by the All Wheel Drive Company and had originally served American, British, and Russian during WW1
Where was this photo taken? Ten girls and eleven boys are posing for a photo in March 1929, apparently outside their rural school in Park County, Montana. A swing set visible in the background and there is snow on the ground. I’m guessing that the weather was warm as some children are wearing coats and others are not.
Ninety-six years ago, the Park County sheriff poured all confiscated liquor into the gutter on CalIender Street in Livingston, MT at 10 a.m. on March 16, 1925. The District Court ordered that all moonshine captured via raids be dumped down the drain. The sheriff had also confiscated illicit stills, the parts of which were ordered to be sold or destroyed. Flint is the man wearing a dark coat and hat; he was the editor of the Livingston Enterprise. Jack Hinman, right, worked for Western Union.
The Cottage Hotel at Mammoth Hot Springs in Yellowstone, 1885. "An elk established itself on the front porch of the hotel. Many tried to dislodge it, including soldiers that fired blanks at him. The elk walked the porch all night, broke a window or two and with daylight he withdrew to the rear of the hotel. On the return journey he stepped in a small geyser hole and broke his leg. At 8:15 a soldier shot him, ending the reign of the tyrant.
Three horse-drawn carriages with passengers and drivers are parked in front of the first Canyon Hotel in Yellowstone National Park, perhaps arriving, or departing for another adventure in Wonderland. Built in 1886 as a temporary hotel, it was used through 1889. At least three people stand under the small covered porch. Lodgepole pines are in the middle ground and background, the dominant tree in the park.
The second Canyon Hotel (1890-1910) in Yellowstone National Park, nestled in drifts of snow that reach up to the second of its four stories. This hotel was incorporated into the Robert Reamer designed hotel built in 1911. Ski tracks are visible in the foreground and a pair of skis are visible in the background to the left.
In 1925 the Glengary Mining Co. of Cooke City used this vehicle, a FordSon Snow Machine, to navigate the road between Mammoth Hot Springs, WY, Yellowstone National Park and Cooke City, MT beyond the park’s northeast entrance. It wasn't a rotary type of motorized plow but is more like a snowmachine. The National Park Service now maintains this road, the only one in the park which is kept free of snow year 'round.
Taking a ride with family members and neighbors would be just the ticket to a lovely afternoon. Sometimes we can't identify the people in a photo, so this is a gentle reminder to label your photos while you still remember the details! But this is a nice photo of seemingly nice people bundled and dressed up for a destination unknown. Who are they? Where are they off to?
One hundred years ago on January 26, 1918, Livingston had snow! Two young children are posing no doubt to highlight the beauty of the trees on the snowy, wide boulevard of the 100 block of North Yellowstone Street. The Northern Pacific Railway water tower across Park Street, is visible in the background.
Advertising the mighty power of the REO automobile, Mertz and Blair sent this postal in December 1908. Ralph Bishir is behind the wheel of the car, which is pulling a snow plow, while Dick Mertz rides along. The previous year H. B. Blair and Mertz opened their automobile business in the 200 block of S. Callender Street in Livingston (formerly, the Home Automobile Co. owned by John J. Wiggins). In 1914 when Dodge cars first went into production, the Blair Motor Co. secured the franchise.
Sheep rancher Paul Harvat decided to go hunting on Buffalo Horn over the divide from Rock Creek in Paradise Valley. There was so much snow that he had to make a trail for his horse, Spider. The oldest son of John H. and Elizabeth (Haberstroh) Harvat, Paul grew up raising sheep. His father began the Harvat Sheep Company in 1900. After his father died in 1919, Paul, Edwin, and John expanded their holdings of deeded land to around 28,000 acres
A group of young ice skaters pose on the ice of Aldridge Lake near Aldridge, Montana, a short-lived mining town northwest of Gardiner. In 1909, an ice skating accident on this lake took the life of young John Brockman. Identified are Fannie Cheplak, Annie Planishek, Joe Cheplak, Ed Planishek, Rudy Planishek, Pete Cheplak, Alfred McDonald, Joe Planishek, Matt Cheplak, Don Fraser.
This unusual contraption is a diesel or gas-powered propeller-driven enclosed cab mounted on skis that is designed to skid across snowy, open spaces—a snowplane. A February 1949 Yellowstone National Park monthly superintendent report first mentions the use of private snowplanes in Yellowstone National Park but six years earlier District Park Ranger Hugh Ebert borrowed a “cockpit on skis” and drove it into the park via the South Gate to deliver rations to isolated interior locations.
Ten people, all but perhaps two, are preparing to ski in Jardine, Montana, a mining town north of Gardiner, Montana. The man on skis at far right is wearing what looks like an US Army hat; soldiers began protecting Yellowstone National Park in 1886. Thirteen years later, Harry Bush and his wife Ada arrived in Bear Gulch, Jardine’s early moniker.
Uncle John F. Yancey stands in front of his pioneer hotel in the Tower Fall area of Yellowstone National Park, in this 1894 F. J. Haynes photograph. Four guests and three dogs stand behind Yancey, with five pair of skis rest against the saloon building. Yancey erected his first building at this location in 1882. His hospitality and his hotel and saloon, shown here, were important shelters for early travelers in the park.
This is quite a cooperative scene, perhaps captured by photographer Harold McGee in 1954. What are these men doing? They are putting up holiday decorations in downtown Livingston. Apparently, this group of men assembled and routinely added holiday joy to the city streets in the 1940s and 1950s. Here, they pose on the corner of Second and Callender Streets, with the post office on the left, and the Murray Hotel and the Depot in the background. Love the vehicles!
Wouldn't you like to go back in time to this 1915 Thanksgiving: ride a special Northern Pacific Railway train to Chadborn for the biggest dance of the year, enjoy a five-course turkey and goose meal served by five bachelors (!), and dance the night away to the sounds of an orchestra? All of this happened at a small rural community in the Shields Valley northeast of Livingston, Montana.