Description and history
Fort Benton was founded in 1846–1848 by Alexander Culbertson, a fur trader working for the Chouteau brothers firm. It was named for Senator Thomas Hart Benton, and was originally little more than a palisaded fort, with the facilities of the trading firm within. At first goods were moved up and down the river by keelboats and other human or animal-powered watercraft. In 1859 the Chouteaus acquired a steamboat, and began service from St. Louis, Missouri. At more than 3000 river miles from the sea, it has been described as "the world's innermost port". From 1860 to 1890 it was one of the principal points of embarkation for supplies and good that drove the development of the American West. Its proximity to Canada meant that goods and supplies also traveled north, helping fuel the growth of cities such as Edmonton, Alberta. Goods were loaded and unloaded on the levee, and merchants managing the trade had their business on Front Street, with homes nearby. The river trade declined in the late 19th century after railroads became a more reliable means of transportation in the region. [2]
The historic district extends along Front Street, from the 1200 to 1900 blocks, and includes the levee along the river bank, and the 1888 Fort Benton Bridge, built in an attempt by the local merchants to maintain the city's influence as the steamboat trade declined. The district includes the site of Fort Benton, which has a surviving element an 1856 blockhouse, the levee, built in 1860, the 1882 Grand Union Hotel, and the Fort Benton Engine House, a fire station that also served as city hall for many years. The 1867 I.G. Baker House is the oldest surviving residence in the district. [2]
Chouteau County is a county located in the North-Central region of the U.S. state of Montana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 5,895. Its county seat is Fort Benton. The county was established in 1865 as one of the original nine counties of Montana, and named in 1882 after Pierre Chouteau Jr., a fur trader who established a trading post that became Fort Benton, which was once an important port on the Missouri River.
Fort Benton is a city in and the county seat of Chouteau County, Montana, United States. Established in 1846, Fort Benton is the oldest continuously occupied settlement in Montana. Fort Benton was the most upstream navigable port on the Mississippi River System, and is considered "the world’s innermost port".
The Santa Fe Trail was a 19th-century route through central North America that connected Franklin, Missouri, with Santa Fe, New Mexico. Pioneered in 1821 by William Becknell, who departed from the Boonslick region along the Missouri River, the trail served as a vital commercial highway until 1880, when the railroad arrived in Santa Fe. Santa Fe was near the end of El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro which carried trade from Mexico City. The trail was later incorporated into parts of the National Old Trails Road and U.S. Route 66.
Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site is a partial reconstruction of the most important fur trading post on the upper Missouri River from 1829 to 1867. The fort site is about two miles from the confluence of the Missouri River and its tributary, the Yellowstone River, on the Dakota side of the North Dakota/Montana border, 25 miles from Williston, North Dakota.
The National Register of Historic Places in the United States is a register including buildings, sites, structures, districts, and objects. The Register automatically includes all National Historic Landmarks as well as all historic areas administered by the U.S. National Park Service. Since its introduction in 1966, more than 90,000 separate listings have been added to the register.
This is a list of properties and historic districts in Montana that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The state's more than 1,100 listings are distributed across all of its 56 counties.
Fort Osage was an early 19th-century factory trading post run by the United States Government in western Missouri on the American frontier; it was located in present-day Sibley, Missouri. The Treaty of Fort Clark, signed with certain members of the Osage Nation in 1808, called for the United States to establish Fort Osage as a trading post and to protect the Osage from tribal enemies.
Jean-Pierre Chouteau was a French Creole fur trader, merchant, politician, and slaveholder. An early settler of St. Louis from New Orleans, he became one of its most prominent citizens. He and his family were prominent in establishing the fur trade in the city, which became the early source of its wealth.
Pierre Chouteau Jr., also referred to as Pierre Cadet Chouteau, was an American merchant and a member of the wealthy Chouteau fur-trading family of Saint Louis, Missouri.
Fort Pierre Chouteau, also just Fort Pierre, was a major trading post and military outpost in the mid-19th century on the west bank of the Missouri River in what is now central South Dakota. Established in 1832 by Pierre Chouteau, Jr. of St. Louis, Missouri, whose family were major fur traders, this facility operated through the 1850s.
The Bertrand was a steamboat which sank on April 1, 1865, while carrying cargo up the Missouri River to Virginia City, Montana Territory, after hitting a snag in the river north of Omaha, Nebraska. Half of its cargo was recovered during an excavation in 1968, more than 100 years later. Today, the artifacts are displayed in a museum at the DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge near Missouri Valley, Iowa. The display makes up the largest intact collection of Civil War-era artifacts in the United States, and are an invaluable time capsule of everyday life during that period.
The Montana Trail was a wagon road that served gold rush towns such as Bannack, Virginia City and later Helena during the Montana gold rush era of the 1860s and 1870s. Miners and settlers all traveled the trail to try to find better lives in Montana. The trail was also utilized for freighting and shipping supplies and food goods to Montana from Utah. American Indians, as well as the weather, were major risks to traveling on the Montana Trail.
The Missouri Fur Company was one of the earliest fur trading companies in St. Louis, Missouri. Dissolved and reorganized several times, it operated under various names from 1809 until its final dissolution in 1830. It was created by a group of fur traders and merchants from St. Louis and Kaskaskia, Illinois, including Manuel Lisa and members of the Chouteau family. Its expeditions explored the upper Missouri River and traded with a variety of Native American tribes, and it acted as the prototype for fur trading companies along the Missouri River until the 1820s.
The history of St. Louis, Missouri from 1804 to 1865 included the creation of St. Louis as the territorial capital of the Louisiana Territory, a brief period of growth until the Panic of 1819 and subsequent depression, rapid diversification of industry after the introduction of the steamboat and the return of prosperity, and rising tensions about the issues of immigration and slavery. St. Louis also played a role in the American Civil War.
The historic town of Rocky Point was on the south side of the Missouri River in Fergus County, Montana, in the Missouri Breaks. Rocky Point was located at a natural ford on the Missouri River.
This is a timeline of pre-statehood Montana history comprising substantial events in the history of the area that would become the State of Montana prior to November 8, 1889. This area existed as Montana Territory from May 28, 1864, until November 8, 1889, when it was admitted to the Union as the State of Montana.
The Judith Landing Historic District is a historic district near Winifred, Montana which was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975. It is large, 9,555 acres (38.67 km2) in size, spanning parts of Choteau and Fergus counties, including the confluences of the Judith River and Dog Creek into the Missouri River.
Alexander Culbertson (1809–1879), was an American fur trader who founded Fort Benton, Montana, and was a special government agent who played an important role in the negotiations leading to the 1851 treaty of Fort Laramie. Later, Culbertson and his wife Natawista Iksina negotiated with the Blackfoot Confederacy to let the northern Pacific railroad survey of 1853 continue unharmed.
Joseph Marie LaBarge was an American steamboat captain, most notably of the steamboats Yellowstone, and Emilie, that saw service on the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, bringing fur traders, miners, goods and supplies up and down these rivers to their destinations. During much of his career LaBarge was in the employ of the American Fur Company, a giant in the fur trading business, before building his own steamboat, the Emilie, to become an independent riverman. During his career he exceeded several existing speed and distance records for steamboats on the Missouri River. Passengers aboard his vessels sometimes included notable people, including Abraham Lincoln. LaBarge routinely offered his steamboat services gratis to Jesuit missionaries throughout his career.
The Emilie was a sidewheel steamer, designed, built and owned by the famed riverboat captain Joseph LaBarge, and used for trade and transporting people and supplies to various points along the Missouri River in the mid nineteenth century. The Emilie was built in Saint Louis in 1859, was 225 feet in length with a 32 foot beam and had a draft of six feet. Larger than the average riverboat at the time, she could carry 500 tons of cargo. During her extended service on the Missouri River she also fell into the hands of both Union and Confederate soldiers during the Civil War. As a result of her numerous exploits, Emilie was among the most famous boats on the river and was widely considered a first rate and an exceptionally beautiful riverboat. After some nine years of service the Emilie was caught in and destroyed by a tornado on June 4, 1868.
