Now Caitlin DeSilvey has written a book that can send all of our roots even deeper and more productively into the soil of this place. It is a modest little book in terms of length, and it is an easy and altogether delightful read. I hope hundreds of Missoulians will treat themselves to "Butterflies and Railroad Ties" because the more people read it, the more good it will do our community.

The book's subject is captured in its subtitle: "The History of a Homestead in Missoula's North Hills." The Randolph Homestead, tucked away behind Waterworks Hill, is a community treasure now owned by the City of Missoula as part of its open space preservation program. What this book invites us to do is to open this treasure gently, attentively, creatively ... and in the process, enrich our community in ways that will last for generations.

DeSilvey tells the story of the place from the times when an Indian trail crossed it, carrying mountain tribes back and forth to the buffalo grounds east of the mountains. She anchors its transformation into a homestead in America's pioneering history, and she brings the nearby town of Missoula to life as town and homestead go through the changes of the 20th Century together.

The book is well worth reading for the history alone, and for the sparkling prose in which it is presented. But there is more to this book than good scholarship and good writing. It is an invitation for Missoula to "get its hands on" the Randolph Homestead, not just in terms of buying it (which we've already done) but in terms of touching it, learning it, knowing it, walking (carefully and respectfully) on it, visiting its still-standing buildings, fingering the tools and toys that made it a Missoula family's home, and in that way learning something endless and endlessly rewarding about our own inhabiting of this remarkable place.

What we as a community will make of this treasure remains to be seen. Caitlin DeSilvey and her colleagues in the Hill and Homestead Preservation Coalition have begun to sketch out some possibilities of "a center for education and reflection" but their real aim is to get the community at large involved in thinking about how best to relate to the homestead. The book is an invitation for all of us to imagine this landscape with a productive garden and orchard, an interactive historical museum, participatory building-restoration projects, a small retreat center, partnerships with local schools and artists, and other, as yet unrealized or yet to be imagined, community programs.

Just buying the book is a step in this direction, since the proceeds all go to benefit the Hill and Homestead Preservation Coalition's work at the farm. But the real benefit will come from letting this well-told story become part of the unfolding of our own individual stories and our families' stories into the ongoing story of this community.

Former Missoula Mayor Daniel Kemmis, now director of the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West, is author of "Community and the Politics of Place" and "The Good City and the Good Life."

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