Bannack, Montana
Bannack was the original capital of the Montana Territory, before that function was moved to Virginia City in 1864. Founded as a mining camp in 1862 it grew rapidly despite lacking the support of a railroad, and was reached via the Montana Trail, a wagon road fraught with danger from hostile Indians, highwaymen, the rugged terrain, and the changeable weather. Despite the remote nature of the town it grew to a population of nearly ten thousand people at one point. Most of them were miners, but there were also several other businesses including hotels, restaurants, and bakeries.
There was also a brewery, its products dispensed in at least five saloons. The town was built of lumber harvested locally, most of the buildings were essentially log cabins, with several of the businesses presenting facades of sawn wood. The difficulty of freighting in other types of construction materials made the use of logs essential due to the speed with which Bannack expanded. During the winter months the Montana Trail was effectively closed by the weather, and Bannack was completely isolated from the outside world.
The goods being freighted into Bannack, and the gold being freighted out, made the region a target for the types of robberies featured in old western movies, and vigilantism was its inevitable consequence. The trappings of civilization came slowly to the town, but they came. In 1874 the local Masonic Lodge built a school house and lodge building, but by that time the mines were petering out and the population was dwindling as the miners left the town. Less than one thousand residents were in the town by the 1880.
In the 1890s electric dredging of Grasshopper Creek, where most of the gold had been mined in the past, brought a short-lived revival to Bannack. By the time the dredging began the town’s population was down to just a few hundred, and the former county seat was using its old courthouse as a hotel, but it was only able to stay open when there was sufficient mining activity to support its operation. In the 1940s there were no longer sufficient students to keep the school open. By the end of the decade Bannack was abandoned.
The more than sixty buildings which have survived and are today stabilized have not been restored, though they have been preserved in the condition they were in when the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks created Bannack State Park out of the town in 1954. It is still relatively remote, and has been a National Historic Landmark since 1961. Most of the buildings in the park are open for public exploration.