Distinctly Montana Magazine

36 D I S T I N C T LY M O N TA N A M A G A Z I N E • S P R I N G 2 0 2 6 Care With Heart... Care With Heart... Precision With Purpose. Advanced robotic surgery, guided by experienced surgeons. Learn more about our ROSA and da Vinci surgical options today. Dr. Paige Brainard, OB/GYN Dr. M. Benjamin Farr Orthopedics Dr. Toby Marshall Family Medicine Dr. Sara Wilcox General Surgery Dr. Damian Ymzon General Surgery Havre, MT (406) 265-2211 During its heyday, the warehouse had been run by Gilman Norris, and Power teamed up with Norris to build a ferry across the river in 1880, known as the PN Ferry. It operat- ed until 1908. In 1883 the pair expanded their world dom- ination plans and formed the Judith Mercantile and Cattle Company, establishing the Power-Norris Ranch, known as simply the PN Ranch. The enterprise soon became one of the largest in central Montana. Judith Landing grew along with it, soon boasting a saloon, a hotel, a store, a mail sta- tion, stables and sheep sheds. A few years later Power would make an unsuccessful run for governor of the new state of Montana, and went on to become one of our first two U.S. senators. The remnants of the warehouse are still there, along with a blacksmith shop and a few other bits and pieces of the old Fort Clagett compound. And of course there's the crown jew- el of the PN Ranch, the Norris Ranch House, nestled among a copse of towering cottonwoods where it was built by Nor- ris in 1901 for $6,000. The spacious, Craftsman-style house features a wraparound porch, second-story balcony and a three-story stone fireplace. Sadly, Norris's wife Pauline didn't live to enjoy their beautiful home. She succumbed to typhoid in 1903 and Norris was left to raise their three children alone. He remarried in 1908, sold his cattle, and left Judith Landing to manage a hotel in Seattle. The PN Ranch, all 47,000 acres of it, continued as a work- ing cattle ranch well into the 21st century. In 2016 it was purchased for an undisclosed sum by the American Prairie Foundation, a Bozeman-based enterprise that's piecing to- gether large parcels of land in central Montana to establish

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