Bigfork folks share history tales

Bigfork residents are giving shape to the history of their town in a series of presentations titled Village by the Bay.

Hosted by the Bigfork Area Senior Citizen Association, the four-part series kicked off this month and is scheduled to have meetings through the first week in May.

The next session is Friday.

On April 8, the Bigfork Community Center was packed with people, many from the town’s founding families.

Tom Sliter talked about growing up in Bigfork in the 1940s as a descendant of Bigfork pioneer Everit Sliter.

“We all represent this place,” Sliter said. “We know what it’s like to live here, but it’s nice to talk about where it started. This really was the ideal place to grow up,” he said.

He talked about how his great-grandfather, Everit Sliter, was one of the founders of the town when he moved to the Flathead in 1892. Everit started his life in Bigfork by creating an orchard and planting 500 trees, including apples, cherries, plums and pears. Eventually, the orchard grew to 4,000 trees.

Everit Sliter also operated the first hotel and general store and served as the first postmaster in the lakeside village.

Chuck Harris, who was born and raised in Bigfork, also talked at the April 8 event.

He told stories of sliding down the power house in inner tubes, jumping into the Swan River off the one-lane steel bridge and watching his dad — the town’s power lineman — leave the house at all hours to restore power when something went wrong.

As Harris tried to remember which shop had a mountain lion caged in its parking lot, audience members filled in the gap: It was the Texaco gas station.

“I also remember Ernie the Finn, who I assume was from Finland, who had a shed on the edge of the bridge and was known as the best fisherman in town,” he said. “He would always give us quarters for ice cream.”

The free presentations are open to the public and take place every Friday until May 6 from 11 a.m. to 11:45 a.m.at the Bigfork Community Center. Lunch is scheduled after the event for a suggested donation of $4 for seniors and $6 for others, with the money going toward the Flathead County Agency on Aging. An RSVP must be made by 1 p.m. the Wednesday before.

The presentation this Friday will focus on Woods Bay by presenter Donna Childers Gainer plus Holt and Kehoe’s Agate Shop by Leslie Kehoe.

For more information, call 837-4157.