Montana's Historic Treasures Get Their Due: From Century-Old Stores to Pioneer Bridges

Next week, Montana's preservation experts will gather in Big Timber to officially recognize six remarkable pieces of the state's past, each with a story worth telling and preserving.

The State Historic Preservation Review Board's September 18 meeting at the Big Timber Carnegie Library will consider National Register nominations for properties spanning from frontier churches to Depression-era warehouses, representing more than a century of Montana's evolution from territorial outpost to modern state.

Leading the nominations is the Shy Brothers Mercantile in Ashland, a modest 1910 building that has quietly achieved something remarkable: it's been serving the same community for 115 years. Through homesteading booms and busts, the Great Depression, two world wars, and countless economic shifts, this single business has remained Ashland's commercial constant. It's the kind of persistence that would make even Montana's famously stubborn winters seem brief by comparison.

In Livingston, the Goughnour Lumber Company Office is getting a second chance at recognition after bureaucratic oversight nearly four decades ago incorrectly deemed it ineligible. Built in 1891 by lumber businessman Emanuel Goughnour, the Western Commercial style brick building proves that sometimes historical significance just needs time and better documentation to be properly appreciated.

Billings claims two spots on the list, starting with the massive Carpenter Paper Company warehouse. Designed by prominent local architect Curtis Oehme in 1917, this industrial giant supplied paper products across Montana, northern Wyoming, and western North Dakota until 1994. The building represents an era when Billings served as the commercial hub for a region larger than many Eastern states.

The city's First Congregational Church tells an even older story, dating to 1882 when Billings was still more railroad camp than established city. As the community's first house of worship, the church helped transform what could have remained a rough frontier outpost into a thriving municipality through what the nomination describes as "community solidarity and social action" proving that Montana's civic spirit has deep roots.

The final two nominees span rivers instead of city blocks. The Musselshell River Bridge in Golden Valley County and the Milk River Bridge in Phillips County both represent Montana's early 20th-century infrastructure revolution. Built in 1916 and 1911 respectively, these steel truss bridges marked the state's transition from haphazard county road systems to organized state highway networks. The Milk River Bridge specifically served the Theodore Roosevelt International Highway, which later became U.S. Highway 2.

Both bridges facilitated the homestead boom that brought thousands of hopeful farmers to Montana's northern plains. While many of those farming dreams ultimately failed, the bridges remain as monuments to the engineering ambition and community determination that connected isolated settlements to the wider world.

The Board's decision to meet in Big Timber reflects the town's own commitment to historic preservation. The community has been working to establish a downtown National Register Historic District, joining the growing number of Montana communities recognizing that their built heritage represents both cultural treasure and economic opportunity.

These six nominations remind us that Montana's history isn't just written in its dramatic landscapes or famous personalities, but also in the everyday buildings and infrastructure that enabled communities to take root and flourish. From a country store that refused to quit to bridges that brought the outside world closer, each structure represents choices made by previous generations about what mattered enough to build and build to last.

The State Historic Preservation Review Board meeting is open to the public and begins at the Big Timber Carnegie Library on September 18. For more information, contact Melissa Munson at (406) 444-7715.