About Mike Berne

We have Berne Park in Bad Rock Canyon and Mel Ruder used to do stories about this interesting Flathead pioneer. Mike Berne was interviewed by Agnes Cada when he was 87 years old and his recollections should be of interest to anyone curious about the Flathead’s “early days.”

When he was 21 in 1890, Mike and his Irish parents were in Butte and Mike recalled, “There were two trappers by the name of Emerson who came to Butte telling of the wonderful valley north of a big lake.” Mike came here and homesteaded near LaSalle.

Coal veins in the North Fork led Pat Welch and six other men to file squatters rights up there. In 1891 the Great Northern Railway was building into the Flathead via the “Old Tote Road” through Bad Rock Canyon, planning on obtaining the coal up the North Fork. According to Mike, “Frank Langford, a clerk working in a Great Northern office learned of this fact, so along with A. G. Davis and Mr. Talbott, organized the Northwest International Improvement Company and bought the seven squatters out for $7,000 each.”

“...to retain rights with the least amount of work or investment, Langford and company induced one old prospector who was partially blind to pan for gold. As he panned, some of the members of the company carefully ‘salted’ the prospector’s pan with gold nuggets imported from the Helena diggings and the old gent ‘swore evidence’ so the claims were listed as ‘placers.’ Incidentally, a nugget was lost in the process.”

“Langford’s dealings so enraged the Great Northern Railroad that they built a one man depot at Brent, about one and one half miles east of the Columbia Falls townsite and by-passed the town on their way to Kalispell.”

Mike also told of the ill-fated project wherein Talbott’s townsite company built a steamboat to haul coal out of the North Fork. On its first trip, “It turned over and sank. Present day fisherman may still see the boiler...”

Another story from the Berne/Cada papers:

“Interesting neighbors of Mr. Berne’s in the early days included Jack Reddon and Charlie Batchman who both homesteaded near his preemption claim. Jack Reddon was a large hot-tempered man who had a woman named Bronco Liz living with him. One season Jack went back to Butte to work in the Silverbow Mine leaving Liz on this homestead. During his absence Liz and neighbor Charlie Batchman sold both homesteads and were busy celebrating at Ashley when Jack came home. Batchman took his pistol  and ‘bored’ Jack, but a soldier stuffed cotton into the holes and Jack was all right in two weeks.”

Jack and Liz led exciting lives: “Bronco Liz had earned her name through her efficiency in riding broncos and shooting. ... another time Jack was winding the clock instead of listening to her so she shot the ‘winding hole’ right out of the clock. Jack had philosophical comment, ‘One less job for me.’”

Liz eventually married “the ranger at Fortine Creek” but she was killed by a train while walking the tracks to get the mail. Mike met Liz’s husband at Ashley and he was crying because he didn’t have enough money for a funeral. Berne loaned him $50 then said he ... “rounded up some pall bearers; but one, a real estate dealer, had to be ‘gently’ persuaded.’”

(This information is all from “Sagas of Our Pioneers,” a fascinating collection compiled by the Flathead County Superintendent of School’s Office with over 30 volunteers in 1956.)

(George’s 2016 editorial note: Ron Beard, a successful engineer/architect with his career in Washington D.C. but now an active hiking member of the Over the Hill Gang and avid local historian, asked me recently about early pioneers in the Bad Rock Canyon area. Luckily found the above column done in February of 2002. This reprint is for Ron ... and whoever.)

G. George Ostrom is a national award-winning columnist for Hungry Horse News. He lives in Kalispell.