Oldest History

Long ago . . .

…the Blackfoot River served as a transportation corridor for Nez Perce, Flathead and Blackfeet Indians; then later on fur trappers, miners and loggers. The Indians called the river “Cokalahishkit” which means “the river of the road to the buffalo.”

Captain Meriwether Lewis, the first celebrity known to follow the well-worn Indian trail along the Big Blackfoot, arrived in July of 1806, on his return trip of the famed Lewis & Clark Expedition. It is believed that he climbed a tall, craggy rock formation in the rushing waters at the confluence of the Blackfoot and Clearwater rivers. From that vantage point, he would have looked up the trail that would take him onward to the next leg of his memorable trek.

The following is from their logs for Saturday July 5th, 1806.

By Lewis:

By Gass:

We had another beautiful morning, set out early and proceeded on the same course as yesterday through a rough country, with a number of branches or small streams flowing from the hills. We killed one deer, and about 11 o’clock came to a valley three quarters of a mile wide, all plains, where we halted to dine and to let our horses feed. The hills upon each side are handsomely covered with timber of the fir kind. While we rested here one of hunters killed a cabre or antelope. At 1 o’clock we proceeded on again up the valley. When we had gone about nine miles we came to and crossed a river, (currently named Clearwater River) about 35 yards wide, which flows in with a rapid current from some snow topped mountains on the north.

Source for these quotes: lewisandclarkjournals.unl.edu/item/lc.jrn.1806-07-05#lc.jrn.1806-07-05.01 and lewisandclarkjournals.unl.edu/item/lc.jrn.1806-07-05#lc.jrn.1806-07-05.04

Nearly 75 years after Lewis’s historic journey, miners and loggers became prevalent in the area and the town of Sunset (near current town of
Greenough) materialized. Placer mines were active in the area as early as the 1860s producing gold, silver and copper.

In 1885, the Big Blackfoot Milling Company started the first large-scale timber cutting operation at Sunset. The mill’s primary customers were the rapidly expanding mines that created an almost insatiable appetite for lumber. In 1898, the Anaconda Copper Mining Company took over the mill and formed the Big Blackfoot Railway to move timber from the outlying areas to the Blackfoot River.

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In 1917, a new, one-room Sunset School was built and welcomed a grand total of six inquiring minds that year. (Marvin attended this school.) The original “schoolhouse” was a log cabin constructed on the Martin Homestead. The new school was located nearby on Morris Ranch property and was later moved the short distance down Sunset Hill Road to its present location just outside Paws Up headquarters. The Anaconda Copper Mining Company returned to Sunset in 1926 and twelve logging camps swung back into action, producing millions of feet of lumber over the next eight years. (Olga’s father Oscar, worked at logging Camp Six —  xx miles up Blanchard Creek Road.) Albert and Frances supplied beef for the logging camps.  By the end of that year, 20 railway cars of logs were being loaded daily at Sunset. Evidence of the ACM headquarters is still visible in the pastures behind the old working facility.
(Source: http://www.pawsup.com/montana-luxury-ranch/ranch-history.html)

The first people who are known to have ranched along the Clearwater River and also near Placid Lake were Hiram and Libbie Blanchard. They took out Water Rights on the Big Blackfoot, Blanchard Creek, the Clearwater River and various springs in the late summer of 1884.  Hiram was from New York, and apparently named Placid Lake after “Lake Placid” in the East.  
(Source: Suzanne Vernon ,   http://www.seeleyswanpathfinder.com/history.html)