Peanut Butte and Helena Handbasket

Pork Chop John's

Original Pork Chop Sandwiches

On Sunday, August 19th, we drove back to Butte to see the rest of the attractions we had not seen on Saturday. We began with lunch at the world famous (ok...maybe only Montana famous) John's Original Pork Chop Sandwich restaurant. We ordered the...you guessed it...pork chop sandwich. Ken's came 'loaded' while mine came 'loaded deluxe'. These tasty treats are greasy, self-indulgent hunks of bland deep-fried meat with a variety of heart attack inducing toppings. We totally enjoyed them.

Hell Roarin' Gulch fake mining town

Milliner's shop

After lunch we headed to the World Museum of Mining, a conglom-eration of 50 little historic buildings procured from now defunct mining towns around the state and assembled into a fake mining town called Hell Roarin' Gulch on the site of an actual mine. We began with the little town's buildings, taking in the exhibits offered through the windows of each historic structure. The creaky wooden sidewalks offered both atmosphere and a sense of impending danger as they noisily flexed under our footsteps. We peeked in the windows of the milliner's shop, the drugstore, and the offices of a dentist, a lawyer and a tobacconist.

Watch repair shop

The other end of the little town offers a veritable dumping ground of old mining equipment and parts, scattered about the lawn in the shadow of the huge headframe of the former Orphan Girl Mine. The 'miners dry' is a building housing an enormous compressor in one room, an elaborate winch system in another, and, oddly, the payroll office and changing room/shower in another. We spent a great deal of time reading all the little plaques about each different piece of equipment and though it was all in English, much of it made no sense.

Orphan Girl Mine headframe

In any case, we read about the mining accidents that claimed the life of a miner on average every other day for a period of 40 years or so until labor unions and the government instituted more safety standards. And, despite significant technological improvements in the mining industry, many of those innovations took a decade or more to reach Montana's mines, further needlessly imperiling the workers.

After our standard two hour maximum museum time had been reached, our tired feet led us back to the car. As required, we stopped by a Goodwill on our way out of town. And when we returned to the RV and settled in for happy hour and dinner, we skyped a bit with Janine and Joel on the computer. Nice. With the hot and hazy day (but, unlike at home, not at all humid), we were exhausted and fell into bed early.

Montana State Capitol building

On Monday, we awoke to sunny skies and warm tempera- tures and headed into Helena, the state capital. Our first order of business was to find the capitol building, a beautiful structure originally built beginning in 1899. Our trusty tour guide, Dallas, led us on an extensive tour of the capitol and regaled us with a tale of a very public snafu from the building's construction. Apparently in 1902 the son of the stained glass artist, Francis Pedretti from New York, assigned to paint the four oval depictions of the state's representative citizens only consulted a book instead of investigating the landscape of Montana for himself. The pioneer, gold miner, Indian chief (in an eastern tribe's headdress and western tribe's clothing) and cowboy all appear to be in an Arizona desert landscape instead of in either Montana's heavily forested or predominantly prairie grass regions.

In any case, the interior of the building is stunning, painted in a red and green color scheme with elaborate stenciling, trim, rosettes, ribbons and other details painted throughout, complete with shadowing. We toured the Senate Chamber where we saw a beautiful bronze mural of the Lewis and Clark expedition as they prepared to leave from the Missouri Breaks of Montana. The mural 'We Proceeded On', by Eugene Daub, was commissioned and installed in 2006 for the bicentennial of the Corps of Discovery's trip. Our guide mentioned that it required 20 men to lift the hollow 1800 pound bronze mural into place. Too bad I couldn't get a decent picture of it in the dark room.

Charles M. Russell's
'Lewis & Clark Meeting Indians at Ross Hole'

We also toured the House Chamber where the priceless 1912 Charles M. Russell painting titled 'Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole' hangs. According to our guide, the painting is over 12 feet tall and 25 feet long and the roof on the artist's studio had to be raised in order for him to complete it. The scene is especially unique in that Russell chose to portray the Indians as the focal point of the painting instead of Lewis and Clark who appear on the far right in the background. This work is considered Russell's masterpiece. We thoroughly enjoyed the personal tour of the capitol.

Reeder's Alley

From there, we headed over to the walking mall on Last Chance Gulch, a street of shops, businesses and restaurants in the downtown area of Helena. We found the Taco del Sol, a popular place for lunch today, and ordered the fish supreme burritos. They were superb.

Pioneer Cabin

After lunch, we strolled to the end of the walking mall and into Reeder's Alley, a small enclave of original brick buildings from Helena's beginning. The little row of miners' apartments were constructed between 1873 and 1884 by Louis Reeder, a stonemason from Pennsylvania. Nearby, stands the only unaltered original pioneer log cabin in Helena. The little cabin was built in 1864 by Wilson Butts. After several owners, it was acquired by the Last Chance Restoration Association in 1939 to preserve as part of Helena's legacy.

With still more of the afternoon left, we found the Montana Historical Society Museum. Outside a giant metal bison skull met us at the entrance. This huge piece of art, created in 1990 by Sioux artist Benji Daniels, was constructed of recycled sheet metal. At over 24 feet wide and 7 feet high, the skull weighs about 2 and a half tons. Nice.

Diorama of a Buffalo Jump

Inside, we found no sheet metal skulls. Instead we wandered through a gallery of Montana's cultural history. The exhibits began with a description of the lifestyles of the ancestors of the Native tribes that still call the state home. A diorama depicted a buffalo jump where Indians would run the bison off a cliff to their deaths. This was apparently a common method of killing the bison for 6000 years (there are buffalo jump sites all over southern Alberta and thousands in Montana). Next we learned about Montana's pioneers and miners of the late 1800s and finally about the rural electrification program that belatedly brought Montana into the 20th century.

Myrah mural

Newman Myrah painted this during a
Quick Draw event in Helena in 2001

In the main hall we perused the masterful paintings of Newman Myrah, a prolific painter of a variety of subjects in his lifetime. The exhibit of his work showcased his paintings of horses and cattle, but also some of his early cartoons and tongue-in-cheek pieces, like the one of himself painting a mural on a wall. I was especially impressed with his painting of a horse for a Quick Draw event in Helena in 2001. Participants have only a few hours to create a work of art while onlookers watch. Apparently, Myrah won the event 3 times.

'When the Land Belonged to God'

In another hall we found more paintings of Charles Russell, whose masterpiece we had just seen in the House Chamber of the state capitol. The Mackay Collection of Charles M. Russell's paintings include elaborate scenes of the west with riders on horseback and cattle resisting the branding iron with the gorgeous Montana sky prominent in the background. Another was of a huge herd of bison charging through a river and up the embankment toward the onlooker, their hair still dripping from the crossing.

'Men of the Open Range'

Others were silly letters he wrote to friends with a small color painting at the top of the page to illustrate his point. One letter described his hike to a glacier and complaint that the path needed work, but the drawing was of a mountain goat staring down at him dangling inside a deep, dark crevasse. Another letter offered his apologies for not coming to the fair with a drawing of him standing outside his dentist's office.

Self-portrait titled
'Charles M. Russell and His Friends'

We could see a bit of Mr. Russell's personality in the collection and in the quotes on the walls, and we really enjoyed seeing his and Newman Myrah's work.

After all the touring we were ready for happy hour and dinner, so we returned to the RV. Ken cooked us a fantastic salmon burger dinner and I knitted. What a great day!