The day dawned sunny as we prepared to leave Ennis Montana. Nice place to spend a few days—some here think it’s a nice place period. This year fishing is bad because the Madison River is high and muddy. The motel owner thinks that this is the natural cycle for those who depend on the weather for their livelihood. Who am I to argue? We followed the river past Ennis Lake and on until we turned toward Bozeman while the river continued toward Three Forks to meet up with Jefferson and Gallatin—hello Missouri.
First stop in Bozeman is the Pioneer Museum located in the old county jail—it features a gallows where a felon was hanged on day. There the gallows sits, the trap down, hanging noose at the ready—all they need to do is cock the trap door and find an unfortunate felon. Pret
ty grim, fortunately for me the museum also features many other unique displays. There is a room for Montana State where the freshman beanie has a prominent display. I remember wearing that as a frosh. Imagine me who was a veteran and world traveler being hazed by 18 year old sophomores. Ugh. I had to live in the frosh dorm also—that lasted only the first quarter. I claimed that I was getting married and moved out to an apartment on Babcock—we drove by today and it’s still there, 5 mailboxes now, used to be four.Enough. The Museum of the Rockies on the campus of Montana State University. Is next on our tour. The feature here is the dinosaur –the staff have practically invented the word, they caused a major rethinking of dinosaurs by the scientific community. It was due to their work that most of us now believe that diny was really a prototypical bird and some flavors of dinosaurs had feathers—brightly colored ones too. Don’t take my word for it—look on Wikipedia or the museum’s web site. Here are Steffen and Ethan with Big Bob. Fortunately it is not a working model or they would be toast.
Montanans seem bent on moving old houses around—they have a turn-of-the-century log house on display outside the museum. Tinsley House is a fully functional 2-story farmhouse that was moved to the campus from 40 miles away. Montana Power had to raise 30 sets of power lines so the house could travel under on it way to MSU and Museum of the Rockies. They were baking cookies in the kitchen while we were here and a woman was spinning hand dyed wool into yarn upstairs. She used madder for her red, just like the dyer that created the red coats for the British in revolutionary times.
There was a traveling exhibition of costumes used in movies like Star Wars and other action epics: Darth Vader, Capt. Kirk, Mr. Spock, Batman and many others. There is also an extensive exhibit of Montana History. The museum has something for everybody. We could spend a long time here, but it is time to head out for Billings, the final stop on this tour.On the way to Billings while riding along the Yellowstone River I saw an American eagle perched high on a snag. Traveling along the river I recalled that only a few days ago we were at the headwaters of the Yellowstone. And I rememberd the Upper and Lower Falls that get the river started downhill towards the Missouri.
We checked in at the Dude Rancher Motel and walked to dinner past the former Fox theater which is now an upscale traveling show venue—Lily Tomlin in playing tomorrow night. This beautiful, if somewhat fanciful, horse stands at the theater entrance.
The Fox Theater opened in 1931, built in glamorous Art Deco style by architect R. C. Reamer with the Janet Gaynor film, "Merely Mary Ann". There was also a parade down Third Avenue and live entertainment opening night. The theater was built on the site of the homestead of the Bair family. Eventually, the theater closed, was nearly raised and finally it was resurrected when the city bought the Fox, which it leased to the newly-formed Alberta Bair Theater Corporation. Alberta Bair, a daughter of the man who formerly owned the property the Fox was built on, gave a generous gift towards the theater's restoration, and the theater was afterwards renamed in her honor. The Alberta Bair Theater for the Performing Arts reopened in 1987, returned to its original 1930s beauty, with a concert by Burt Bacharach.
Seems appropriate to finish a tour of Montana with some history and a photo of a horse.
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