Distinctly Montana Magazine

42 D I S T I N C T LY M O N TA N A M A G A Z I N E • W I N T E R 2 0 2 5 - 2 0 2 6 O LD MONTANA FAMI- LIES REMEMBER THE WINTER OF 1886, when the cattle herds in eastern Mon- tana were nearly wiped out, as memorialized by Wal- lace Stegner in his book Wolf Willow, and most everyone has heard about the record-break- ing cold atop Rogers Pass in 1954, when the thermometer maxed out at -70 degrees. Journals from the 19th century make clear that winter isn't what it used to be. Accounts of the Mullan Road con- struction crew tell of unimaginable hardships due to extreme negative temperatures, snow, ice, and relent- less wind. Conditions around Can- tonment Jordan, now De Borgia, Montana, were especially harsh. On December 5, 1859, the temperature plunged to -42 degrees. The snow was five feet deep in December, and two feet deeper in January. Men suffered the consequences of frost- bite, even the loss of limbs. The next winter, at Cantonment Wright, built at the confluence of the Clark Fork and Blackfoot rivers—now Bonner—snow began falling on November 1 and daytime tem- peratures rarely reached above 0°F. The cold was ex- acerbated by strong arctic winds drawn through the valleys from the east. In Missoula, these wintertime visitors are known as the dreaded Hellgate winds. The following win- ter was as bad or worse according to journal entries by John Owen, Bitter- root Valley trader, based at what is now Stevensville. On February 11, 1862, describing "unusually Sever & tedious" winter conditions, Owen wrote: "We are Nearly Surround- ed with the Water from Mill Creek caused by the in- tense Cold freez- ing the Creek Nearly to the bottom leaving No Channel for the Wa- ter to flow through." These conditions continued. A Long-Ago Winter in by SALLY THOMPSON THE SALISH HAD SUFFERED TERRIBLY WHILE HUNTING ACROSS THE MOUNTAINS. THEY LOST MOST OF THEIR HORSES AND WERE UNABLE TO KILL MANY BUFFALO, CONSEQUENTLY, THEY WERE WITHOUT MEAT AND WERE IN A STARVING CONDITION.

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