Distinctly Montana Magazine

47 w w w . d i s t i n c t l y m o n t a n a . c o m town of Bitter Root, Montana. The town, developers insisted, would someday soon rival or exceed Missoula in population and popularity. Montana's Bitter Root McIntoshes would be- come the principal agricultural product of the valley and the center of its social and cultural life. Ambitious as ever, perhaps buoyed by the persistent boost- ing of the land developers, Wright submitted an almost fantastical design with 54 constructions ranging from civic buildings like an opera house, museum, theater, and office blocks to residences, united by streets, walkways, and a de- pressed rail line. The Bitter Root Inn, a hotel, would lie just east. Meanwhile, he tried to engage in the pursuits that brought him peace: reading, listening to music, riding his black horse Kano (named for a school of Japanese painting) through the prairie. He turned, in desperation, to driving his mo- torcar around the roads, though, he wrote, the automobile "brought disturbance of all values, subtle or obvious, and it brought disturbance to me." In his autobiography, he outlined, in detail, a three-part phil- osophical proof that rationalized for the reader, and perhaps for himself, his blamelessness: "First: Legal marriage is but a civil contract between a man and woman to share proper- ty and together provide for children that may spring from that marriage. So, in this respect legal marriage is subject to the legal interpretations and enforcements of any other contract. But legal marriage should be regarded as no mere license for sexual relation." Second and Third proceeded logically therefrom. The promised year passed. When Catherine still refused the divorce the situation reached its head: "So, turning my clients' plans and draughtsmen over to a man whom I had but just met, a young Chicago architect, Von Holst, and making the best provision I could make for my family for one year, I broke with all family connections..." He made for Europe on a first class luxury liner with Mamah Borthwick. He left his wife and six children behind; she her husband and two children, John, 7, and Martha, 3. Wright's son David would much later recall how his father had left his family with an unpaid grocery bill for $900. In Montana, work had been completed on the Como Orchard Clubhouse by March of 1910, and as Wright and Borthwick sought their freedom, the future of the apple industry in the Bitter Root Valley seemed as solidly secure as the mountains in whose shade they grew. Only a handful of the Como Orchards Project buildings were actually built: the Clubhouse and twelve other cabins of ei- ther two or three bedrooms. Various deterrents conspired to squelch the unborn apple empire. The failure of the Chica- go intellectuals and professors to precipitate, and the un- 406.582.8700 40 Spanish Peak Drive Bozeman, montana Blacktimberfurniture.com custom murphy bed custom, solid wood pieces, built for generations montana made legacy furniture best custom furniture and best furniture store in montana modern craftsman bed custom vanity

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