April 28, 1920The country is “reeking and seething with the machinations of disloyalty, sedition and Bolshevism,” Henry Myers of Montana told his fellow senators in Washington, D.C.
Myers allowed that government troops kept temporary order during the recent miners' strike in Butte. But he said he didn't know what would be done about getting “to the bottom of this nest of anarchy and rooting out the moving force.”
But it should be, he maintained. “We whipped the redskins to obtain possession of this country. We whipped the Red Coats to achieve its independence, and we must not let the red-hearted and red-handed overthrow it. ‘Down the reds' has been our practice. It should now be our motto.”
Myers was a second-term senator from Hamilton, where he moved from his home state of Missouri in 1893.
May 2, 1858
The Treasure State began yielding her booty - in spades.
Four men, rerouted north to Montana on their return from the California gold fields because of the Mormon War, found gold in what they called Benetsee Creek. It was soon renamed Gold Creek.
“Near the bank of the creek at the foot of the mountain we sunk a hole about five feet deep and found ten cents in fine gold to the pan of sand and gravel,” one of the four, Granville Stuart, wrote later. “This convinced us that there were rich gold mines in this vicinity Š”
Stuart dubbed it “the first prospecting for gold done in what is now Montana” and “the first real discovery of gold within the state.”
Stuart was joined in the party by brother James Stuart, Reece Anderson and Tom Adams. He acknowledged they were drawn to the creek between Deer Lodge and Drummond by stories of a discovery there six years earlier, by Francois Finley, who was half French and also known as Pinetzi or Benetsee.
The party had spent the previous weeks hunting near Philipsburg and Hall. They needed meat enough to make it to Fort Bridger, in southwest Wyoming. Lacking prospecting equipment, the four determined to continue to the fort and return with the supplies they needed. They were back by December of 1859 to set up mining operations.
May 2, 1803
“We have lived long but this is the noblest work of our whole lives ... the United States take rank this day among the first powers of the world.”
America's minister to France, Robert Livingston, was so moved to mark the signing of the Louisiana Purchase in Paris. Livingston, James Monroe and Barbe Marbois, a French senator, signed their names on the agreement, which was dated April 30 but consummated three days later.
It doubled the size of the U.S., adding everything from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains, including present-day eastern Montana. Total cost, including debt relief and interest, came to $23 million. President Thomas Jefferson announced the deal in July.
General Napoleon Bonaparte felt France needed the money to fight his battles in Europe. “This accession of territory affirms forever the power of the United States,” he said, “and I have given England a maritime rival who sooner or later will humble her pride.”
The purchase opened the door to the exploration by Lewis and Clark, who left St. Louis for the west the following year.
Kim Briggeman can be reached at 523-5266 or at kbriggeman@missoulian.com.
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