Montana (mŏntăn`ə), Rocky Mt. state in the NW United States. It is bounded by North Dakota and South Dakota (E), Wyoming (S), Idaho (W), and the Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and Saskatchewan (N).

Facts and Figures

Area, 147,138 sq mi (381,087 sq km). Pop. (2000) 902,195, a 12.9% increase since the 1990 census. Capital, Helena. Largest city, Billings. Statehood, Nov. 8, 1889 (41st state). Highest pt., Granite Peak, 12,799 ft (3,904 m); lowest pt., Kootenai River, 1,800 ft (549 m). Nickname, Treasure State. Motto, Oro y Plata [Gold and Silver]. State bird, Western meadowlark. State flower, bitterroot. State tree, Ponderosa pine. Abbr., Mont.; MT

Geography

Life in Montana's mountainous western area differs greatly from that on its eastern plains. Across the eastern half of the state stretch broad sections of the Great Plains, drained by the Missouri River, which originates in SW Montana, and by its tributaries, the Milk, the Marias, the Sun, and especially the Yellowstone. Much of Montana's western boundary is marked by the crest of the lofty Bitterroot Range, part of the Rocky Mts., which dominate the western section of the state and along which runs the Continental Divide Continental Divide, the "backbone" of a continent. In North America, from N Alaska to New Mexico, it moves along the crest of the Rocky Mts., which separates westward-flowing streams from eastward-flowing waters.
..... Click the link for more information. . Montana's very name is derived from the Spanish word montaña, meaning mountain country.

Much of the fourth largest U.S. state is still sparsely populated country dominated by spectacular nature. High granite peaks, forests, lakes, and such wonders as those of Glacier National Park Glacier National Park, 521 sq mi (1,349 sq km), SE British Columbia, Canada, in the Selkirk Mts.; est. 1886. It contains extensive glaciated areas including Illecilliwaet Glacier. Snowcapped peaks, with densely forested lower slopes include Mt.
..... Click the link for more information. attract many visitors to Montana. Other places of interest include Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument, Big Hole National Battlefield, and Grant-Kohrs Ranch National Historic Site (see National Parks and Monuments National Parks and Monuments

National Parks
Name Type¹ Location Year authorized Size

acres (hectares)

Description
Acadia NP SE Maine 1919 48,419 (19,603) Mountain and coast scenery.
..... Click the link for more information. , table) and the National Bison Range, near Ravalli, where herds of buffalo may be seen. Strips of Yellowstone National Park Yellowstone National Park, 2,219,791 acres (899,015 hectares), the world's first national park (est. 1872), NW Wyo., extending into Montana and Idaho. It lies mainly on a broad plateau in the Rocky Mts., on the Continental Divide, c.
..... Click the link for more information. , including the north and west entrances, are also in Montana, as are such Native American reservations as the Blackfoot, the Fort Belknap, the Fort Peck, and the Crow. Rushing mountain streams and numerous lakes bring fishing enthusiasts to the state, and the abundant wildlife—elk, deer, bear, moose, and waterfowl—attracts hunters. Mountain and ski resorts draw other vacationers. Helena Helena.

1 Town (1990 pop. 7,491), seat of Phillips co., E central Ark., on the Mississippi River and at the southern end of Crowley's Ridge; inc. 1833.
..... Click the link for more information. is the capital, Billings Billings, city (1990 pop. 81,151), seat of Yellowstone co., S Mont., on the Yellowstone River, in a valley surrounded by seven mountain ranges; inc. as a city 1885.
..... Click the link for more information. and Great Falls Great Falls, city (1990 pop. 55,097), seat of Cascade co., N central Mont., second largest city in the state, at the confluence of the Missouri and Sun rivers and near the falls that give the city its name; inc. 1888.
..... Click the link for more information. the largest cities; other important cities include Missoula Missoula (mĭz

`lə), city (1990 pop. 42,918), seat of Missoula co.
..... Click the link for more information. and Butte Butte (by

t), city (1990 pop. 33,336), seat of Silver Bow co., SW Mont.; inc.
..... Click the link for more information. .

Economy

In and around Montana's mountainous western region are the large mineral deposits for which the state is famous—copper, silver, gold, platinum, zinc, lead, and manganese. The eastern part of the state is noted for its petroleum and natural gas, and there are also vast subbituminous coal deposits, worked largely at the most extensive U.S. open-pit mines. Montana also mines vermiculite, chromite, tungsten, molybdenum, and palladium. Leading industries manufacture forest products, processed foods, and refined petroleum.

In E Montana the high grass of the Great Plains once nourished herds of buffalo and later sustained the cattle and sheep of huge ranches; much of the high grass is now gone, but the cattle and sheep remain. Periodic drought and severe weather have turned some farming communities into ghost towns, but agriculture, with the aid of irrigation, still provides the largest share of Montana's income. Wheat is the most valuable farm item, with cattle also of primary importance. Other principal crops include barley, sugar beets, and hay.

Government and Higher Education

In 1973 a new constitution took effect, replacing the one adopted in 1889. The governor is elected for a term of four years and may be reelected. The legislative assembly is made up of a senate with 50 members and a house of representatives with 100 members. Montana is represented in the U.S. Congress by one representative and two senators, and the state has three electoral votes in presidential elections. Republican Marc Racicot, narrowly elected governor in 1992, was reelected in 1996. Judy Martz, a Republican and lieutenant governor under Racicot, was elected to succeed him in 2000, becoming the first woman to be elected to the post. In 2004, Democrat Brian Schweitzer won the governorship.

The Univ. of Montana, at Missoula, and Montana State Univ., at Bozeman, are the state's major institutions of higher learning. Both these systems also have other campuses.

History

Early Inhabitants, Fur Trading, and Gold

Native Americans known to have inhabited Montana at the time Europeans first explored it included the Blackfoot, the Sioux, the Shoshone, the Arapaho, the Kootenai, the Cheyenne, the Salish, and others. Exploration of the region began in earnest after most of Montana had passed to the United States under the Louisiana Purchase Louisiana Purchase, 1803, American acquisition from France of the formerly Spanish region of Louisiana.

Reasons for the Purchase

The revelation in 1801 of the secret agreement of 1800, whereby Spain retroceded Louisiana to France, aroused uneasiness
..... Click the link for more information. (1803). The Lewis and Clark expedition Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail (see National Parks and Monuments , table).

The importance of the well-planned, well-executed expedition (only one person had been lost) was enormous.
..... Click the link for more information. traveled westward across Montana in 1805, and François Antoine Laroque, along with his North West Company 2)), was sold to the North West Company during the War of 1812 by Astor employees sympathetic to the British; however, it helped establish a U.S. claim to the Pacific Northwest.
..... Click the link for more information. of Canada, explored the Yellowstone River after 1805.

The area's rivers were important avenues of travel for the native inhabitants as well as the early explorers of the country; the first trading post in Montana was established at the mouth of the Bighorn in 1807 by a trading expedition that Manuel Lisa led up the Missouri from St. Louis. For some years thereafter both Canadian and American fur traders continued to open up the territory. David Thompson of the North West Company built several trading posts in NW Montana between 1807 and 1812, and beaver in the mountain streams and lakes attracted adventurous trappers, the so-called mountain men mountain men, fur trappers and traders in the Rocky Mts. during the 1820s and 30s. Their activities opened that region of the United States to general knowledge.
..... Click the link for more information. . The American Fur Company American Fur Company, chartered by John Jacob Astor (1763–1848) in 1808 to compete with the great fur-trading companies in Canada—the North West Company and the Hudson's Bay Company.
..... Click the link for more information. , with its posts on the Missouri and the Yellowstone, dominated the later years of the region's fur trade, which diminished in the 1840s.

The U.S. claim to NW Montana, the area between the Rockies and the N Idaho border, was validated in the Oregon Treaty of 1846 with the British. Montana was then still a wilderness of forest and grass, with a few trading posts and some missions. Montana's first period of growth was the rapid, boisterous, and unstable expansion brought on by a gold rush. The discovery of gold, made initially in 1852, brought many people to mushrooming mining camps such as those at Bannack (1862) and Virginia City (1864). Crude shantytowns were built, complete with saloons and dance halls—ephemeral settlements as colorful as the earlier gold-rush camps in California and perhaps even more lawless.

Territorial Status, Sioux Resistance, and Statehood

Previously part of, successively, the territories of Oregon, Washington, Nebraska, Dakota, and Idaho, Montana itself became a territory in 1864. It was still a rough frontier, however, and the first governor, Sidney Edgerton, was driven out of the region; later Thomas Francis Meagher, appointed temporary governor, died mysteriously. After the Civil War the grasslands attracted ranchers, and in 1866 the first cattle were brought in from Texas over the Bozeman Trail, to the area east of the Bighorn Mts.

Yet it was not until after wars with the Sioux that ranching was safe. The Sioux did not tamely submit to having their lands taken from them; in 1876 at the battle of the Little Bighorn Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument (formerly Custer Battlefield National Monument) occupies the site of the battle. The graves of those killed in the battle are located around a granite monument marking the spot of Custer's "last stand." See National Parks and Monuments (table).
..... Click the link for more information. , they defeated Col. George A. Custer Custer, George Armstrong, 1839–76, American army officer, b. New Rumley, Ohio, grad. West Point, 1861.

Civil War Service

Custer fought in the Civil War at the first battle of Bull Run , distinguished himself as a member of General McClellan's
..... Click the link for more information. and his force in one of the greatest of Native American victories. The Sioux were eventually subdued, and the gallant attempt of Chief Joseph of the Nez Percé to lead his people into Canada to escape pursuing U.S. troops had its pitiful end in Montana.

Great ranches spread out across the plains, and cow towns that were to grow into cities such as Billings and Missoula sprang up as the railroads were built in the West (c.1880–c.1910). Statehood was achieved in 1889, and the building of the railroads put an end to the era of the open range.

The Importance of Mining

Mining continued to dominate Montana's economy into the 20th cent. The discovery of silver at Butte (1875) was followed (c.1880) by discovery of copper at that same "richest hill on earth." The Amalgamated Copper Company (later renamed Anaconda Copper Mining Company) came to play a major role in Montana life. The titans of the mines, Marcus Daly Daly, Marcus, 1841–1900, American copper magnate, b. Ireland. He went to New York City at 15 and later moved to California, where he worked as a miner. He was employed by the "silver kings," J. G. Fair and J. W. Mackay, at the Comstock Lode.
..... Click the link for more information. and William A. Clark Clark, William Andrews, 1839–1925, U.S. Senator and copper magnate, b. Fayette co., Pa. He moved to Montana, where he amassed a large fortune from the development of copper mines.
..... Click the link for more information. , contended bitterly for ownership of the mineral deposits and for political control, and their rivalry was fought out physically by the miners. F. Augustus Heinze Heinze, Frederick Augustus (hīn`zē), 1869–1914, American copper magnate, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. He went in 1889 to Butte, Mont.
..... Click the link for more information. also entered the scramble for copper riches, challenging the claims of Amalgamated Copper. Amalgamated prevailed and exercised enormous control over state affairs.

Struggles between the company and the workers led to strikes, disorder, and bloodshed, but also to the enactment of some early measures for social security, important because over the years the livelihood of mining town residents has depended on the fluctuating market price of copper. By the 1990s, however, mining was producing less than 10% of Montana's revenues, and such centers as Butte and Anaconda, where operations had shut down, had become shells of their former selves.

The Expansion of Agriculture

After the coming of the railroads, farmers arrived by the trainload to develop the lands of E Montana. They planted their fields in the second decade of the 20th cent. The initial bounteous wheat yield did not last long; the calamitous drought of 1919 and the consequent dust storms seared the fields, and in the 1920s the farms began to disappear as rapidly as they had been established.

When the Great Depression began in 1929, Montana was already accustomed to depression. In subsequent years vigorous measures were taken to aid agriculture in the state, and by the late 1940s federal dam and irrigation projects—on the Missouri, the Yellowstone, the Marias, the Sun, and elsewhere—opened many acres to cultivation. Some of the vast grazing lands were brought under planned use, and the development of hydroelectric power continued. Major multipurpose dams in Montana producing power include Fort Peck, Hungry Horse, and Canyon Ferry.

Economic Diversification

The demand for copper in World War II and the E Montana oil boom of the early 1950s stimulated the economy, but the state still faces high transportation costs, a worker shortage, and slowness in regulating resources. A gradual trend toward a more diversified economy has seen manufacturing grow in importance; tourism is also on the rise. Coal exploitation increased dramatically in the 1970s, somewhat offsetting the decline of metals mining. In 1997 legislation was passed that aimed to attract foreign money by making the state an offshore banking haven.

Bibliography

See M. P. Malone, The Montana Past (1969); K. R. Toole, Twentieth-Century Montana (1972); M. P. Malone and R. B. Roeder, Montana, a History of Two Centuries (1976); C. C. Spence, Montana: A History (1978); W. L. Lang and R. C. Myers, Montana, Our Land and People (1979); J. A. Alwin, Eastern Montana (1982).

Montana

State (pop., 2000: 902,195), northwestern U.S. Bordered by Canada and the U.S. states of North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Idaho, it covers 147,046 sq mi (380,849 sq km); its capital is Helena. Montana straddles the Great Plains to the east and the Rocky Mountains to the west. Unique among the states, its rivers flow into three of the continent's primary watersheds: the Pacific, the Gulf of Mexico, and Hudson Bay. At the time of European settlement the region was inhabited by various Indian tribes, including the Cheyenne, Blackfoot, Nez Percé, and Crow. Most of Montana was obtained by the U.S. through the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. The western part was disputed until 1846, when Britain relinquished its claim to the area. The Lewis and Clark Expedition explored Montana in 1804–06. St. Mary's Mission, established in 1841 by Roman Catholic missionaries, became the first permanent town as Stevensville. Gold was discovered in the early 1860s; grazing of cattle and sheep was introduced later that decade, leading to bitter battles with the Indians, whose hunting grounds were destroyed. Montana Territory was established in 1864. Though the U.S. troops of George Armstrong Custer were defeated and slain at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876, the Indians ceased fighting in 1877 and were placed on reservations. Montana became the 41st state in 1889. Vast deposits of copper were found in the 1890s, and mining was the economic mainstay for almost a century. The state's economy now emphasizes tourism.

Montana¹

Joe. born 1958, American football quarterback

Montana²

a state of the western US: consists of the Great Plains in the east and the Rocky Mountains in the west. Capital: Helena. Pop.: 917 621 (2003 est.). Area: 377 070 sq. km (145 587 sq. miles)