In 1864, the year of Helena’s founding, John B. Sanford and Christmas Gift Evans (named after his birth date) arrived in Montana from the East Coast, beginning a friendship on their cross-country journey. In 1865, they formed a business partnership,…

The Grand Lodge of Montana, headquarters for Montana Freemasons, was built in Helena in 1868. Freemasonry affected Montana’s history from its earliest beginnings, as Masonic lodges were among the first social organizations in the first Montana…

The land that became Montana was originally the territory of Native peoples. Its current Native tribes include the Blackfeet, Assiniboine, Cheyenne, Crow, Shoshoni, Sioux, Gros Ventre, Salish, and Kootenai. A limited number of white settlers and…

On the late summer evening of September 6, 1916, Montana’s capital city of Helena formally unveiled and dedicated its newest landmark: a $2,000 fountain gracing the highest hill of a city park. George H. Carsley, known as “the architect of Helena,”…