Distinctly Montana Magazine

D I S T I N C T L Y M O N T A N A M A G A Z I N E • F A L L 2 0 2 2 36 THE ATTRACTIONS AND DIVERSIONS that enthrall millions of Montanans and visitors each year could fill a book. Several books. Among those places are nearly 200 museums of every variety—pioneer museums, art museums, tech museums, tractor museums, rock museums, car museums, even a seashell museum. It would take years to visit every single one of them. Believe me, I'm working on it. In the meantime, here are a few you might want to check out next time you're out on the road. Many Montana museums are seasonal, so it's always a good idea to call ahead and make sure they're open before you hit the highway. BUTTE PICCADILLY TRANSPORTATION MEMORABILIA MUSEUM To say that Nevadan Roy Alan Carson spent a lot of time on the road is like saying Michael Jackson liked to dance a little bit. Carson, who re- portedly made it to all 3,800 counties in the U.S. before he died in 2000, was a collector of all things automotive—not just cars, but road signs, license plates, gas station memorabilia, antique wagons, even a few garage doors. It's easy to while away an entire afternoon at the Piccadilly, taking in all the cultural and promotional examples that re- flect our love affair with the automobile. There are a couple of sweet vintage rides parked in here, in- cluding a seafoam-colored 1959 Edsel. Car buffs would see plenty more at the Deer Lodge car museum just a few miles down I-90, but for highway souvenirs and automotive paraphernalia, Butte's Piccadilly Museum can't be beat. The Piccadilly Transportation Memorabilia Museum is located uptown, at 20 West Broadway. They are typically open through the summer season, and admission is three bucks. More info at picmuseum.com. BOZEMAN AMERICAN COMPUTER AND ROBOTICS MUSEUM If you've seen The Imitation Game, you know the story of Alan Turing, and how he helped crack the Enigma code used by the Nazis in World War II. Turing is also con- sidered the father of theoretical computing. George Keremedjiev, the founder of the American Computer and Robotics Museum in Bozeman, was able to secure one of the original Enigma machines to display here in his fascinating museum. It's a complicated, somewhat sinister-looking device, and it's hard to overstate how important its solution was in our efforts to defeat the Axis powers. Other displays in the museum range from 4,000-year-old cuneiform tablets to a 2,000-year-old Antikythera, a Greek device that was used to perform calculations. And you thought your phone's OS was old? The American Computer and Robotics Museum is located at 2023 Stadium Drive, Ste. 1A. They're open Tues-Sun, 10-4. Admission is $8.50, $5 for 10-17. Kids under 10 are free. The Piccadilly Transportation Memorabilia Museum in Butte is all about the automobile culture, including this beautiful example of a perceived failure in automotive design, the Edsel. If think a guy named Ednor is going to dis something called the Edsel, you'd be wrong.

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