Distinctly Montana Magazine

79 w w w. d i s t i n c t l y m o n t a n a . c o m WHO THE HELL IS MONTANA FRANK? The first time I saw posters for his Wild West show, tucked away in the Montana Room of the Bozeman Public Library, I wondered, "Who the hell is Montana Frank?" The images revealed little. Only the words "Montana Frank's Shows," or "Montana Frank's Wild West" and Nor was Montana Frank pictured on the post- ers. There were comely cowgirls, covered wagons, Indians, even a cowboy or two. But there are no dates on the show post- ers. No cities. No inkling of where on the vast continent of North America some- one might have been able to see Montana Frank. Nor was Montana Frank pictured on the posters. Only scenes sufficiently lacking in specificity to stand for almost anything broadly "Western." So I began searching for him, curious. Eventual- ly I succeeded in finding two or three photographs of the man, all taken in the late 1930s when he was an older man. As the world inched toward a second World War, Montana Frank launched a last effort at fame, ap- pearing in a series of interviews and curiosity pieces in Idaho newspapers. In both, he wears an instantly recogniz- able Western goatee and long white hair. He resembles someone out of central casting for the oaters of the day. As a matter of fact, he looked just a little like Buffalo Bill. The Helena Daily Independent reported on April 11, 1938, that "Montana Frank McCray, Last of Buffalo Bill Scouts, Is Found Living in Salmon River Wilds." The article describes its subject. "He is Frank McCray, 73, better known to pioneers as Mon- tana Frank, a true frontiersman who is said to be among the last of the Buffalo Bill scouts and rough rid- er. He was associated with Buffalo Bill as a scout and a hunter for a number of years and helped to make history in the days when Montana was still a frontier... His life for many years was intimately entwined with the growth and development of Montana." He was born in Butte in 1864, the ar- ticle says. By Frank's own reckoning, that made him the "second white child" born in the town. Elsewhere, and more often, he would make the claim that he was indeed the first white child born there. His father, he said, would later become a major and the commanding officer at Fort Shaw, where he would meet his demise at the hands of Indi- ans. Frank said that he, too, bore the scars of many a tomahawk. He also rode through the Lolo Pass to "gather horses and mules for the government" and was mustered by Fort Shaw to provide game for those who lived there. In 1937, the Idaho Statesman ran a con- test for the best article written by a newspaper delivery boy. The winner was Arther Troutner, route 43, who interviewed Mon- tana Frank and reported that he was not just the first or second white child born in Butte, but the first white child born in the whole state. He is also described as a member of seven Indian tribes, includ- ing the Blackfoot, although a Blackfoot brave was the one re- sponsible for at least one of his scars. It says that he was also a miner, plying that trade in Africa for six years. He was also, naturally, a friend of Charlie Russell and Buffalo Bill Cody. He had known the latter since the 1880s and had performed with his Wild West show at the Chicago World's Fair, Madison Square Gardens, and on two tours of Europe. He also had, ominously, ten notches on his pistol. Now, the article reported, the septuagenarian kept to his ranch at the foot of the Lemhi Trail on the Salmon River. That is, except for when he was composing "songs and melodies of by JOSEPH SHELTON Photo of himself included by a 90-year-old Montana Frank inside his letter to The Madisonian, 1955

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