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Teacher Leona Harrington admires the girls at a square dance at Apgar School in Glacier National Park on Jan. 16, 1950. From left is Donna Brewster, Djaron Davis, Elaine Anderson and Susan Davis. The school had an enrollment of 10 students. Today it is a gift shop. (Mel Ruder photo)
70 years ago
Jan. 20, 1950
Doris Huffine, star subject of the recent biography “A Woman’s Way West” by local author John Fraley, wrote a column for the Hungry Horse News in which, this week 70 years ago, she focused on the extreme winter weather. “Trouble, trouble. Those are the only words to describe the Middle Fork country this past week,” she wrote from Essex. “Have had lower temperatures, but 24 to 30 below is cold enough.”
60 years ago
Jan. 22, 1960
The Glacier Boat Co. started construction of Chief Two Guns II, a 45-foot long, 60-passenger vessel they hoped to set sail on Lake Josephine in Many Glacier that upcoming June. The boat was crafted in Evergreen by owner and son, A.J. Burch and A.M. Burch, and boatbuilder Merlin Young. The watercraft ended up being launched on the lower elevation Swiftcurrent Lake, where it remains in use today.
50 years ago
Jan. 23, 1970
“Botanist Emphasizes Trees Destroyed by Flourides” read a headline. In a meeting held at Columbia Falls High School, a University of Montana botany professor raised concerns about the impact of gaseous hydrogen fluoride, a component of aluminum smelter emissions, affecting photosynthetic processes in conifers.
40 years ago
Jan. 17, 1980
A four-passenger plane headed to Calgary crashed into Blaine Mountain in the Swan Range. Members of the Flathead Search and Rescue; Al Kale, Chuck Rhodes, Ted Gilbertson, Don Scharfe, Glen Monahan and Keith Hannon, conducted the recovery effort. The cause of the crash was undetermined.
30 years ago
Jan. 18, 1990
Great Northern Brewing, a tiny brewery located on Larch Lane in Columbia Falls, went from a hobby to a small business as it began distributing bottles to local bars, becoming one of the first microbreweries in the state. Pioneering the industry brought its challenges when state inspection agencies, unfamiliar with reviewing beer brewing, tried to insist the company use chlorinated water, a stipulation that would have inevitably killed the fermenting yeast.
20 years ago
Jan. 20, 2000
An engineering firm that designed roads in Switzerland — MK Centennial, was awarded the contract of designing and planning the upcoming Going-to-the-Sun Road reconstruction. The firm was slated to present options to the soon-to-be selected Going-to-the-Sun Road Advisory Committee at their first meeting.
10 years ago
Jan. 21, 2010
The board of trustees for School District 6 held meetings in Hungry Horse and Columbia Falls to discuss the closure of Canyon Elementary due to projected budget shortfalls.
Park biologists projected that grizzly bears would be delisted as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in the next few years.