11. Phillips County

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Phillips County, named for area rancher and state senator Benjamin D. Phillips, was created out of Blaine County (number 24) on February 15, 1915. It covers 5,140 square miles in north central Montana, and stretches from the Canadian border (province of Saskatchewan) to the Missouri River. The 2010 U.S. Census counted 4,253 residents, down 7.6% from the 2000 census number of 4,601, and the 1990 census count of 5,163. If the county numbers were assigned based on the 2010 population, Phillips County would be number 37 (of 56). A small portion of western Phillips County is part of the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation, most of which is in neighboring Blaine County. As is the case throughout Montana, the population base is predominately white (89%), with a 10% Native American component. Twenty-five percent of the population traces its ancestry to Germany (or other German-speaking countries), and another 19% are of Norwegian stock while only 6.5% claim an English heritage.

The Phillips County Court House, Malta, Montana
Note the Canadian Flag flying to the right of the US Flag
Taken 10/8/2009

The region Montanans call the High Line is that portion of the state adjacent to US Highway 2 and the former Great Northern Railway line (now the Burlington Northern Santa Fe) that crosses the state from North Dakota to Idaho roughly half-way between the 48th and 49th parallel. Many place names along the High Line were chosen by Great Northern officials who wanted to attract settlers and customers for their company, and the lands given them by the Federal Government when the railroad was built. Many of the names came from an official spinning a globe and putting his finger down at random. This is the case with the Phillips County seat of Malta. There is nothing remotely like the Mediterranean island in this neck of the woods

The post office in Malta was established in 1890. In 1903, Kid Curry, part of Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch, robbed the Great Northern, getting away with over $40,000. The city is on the Milk River, which caused one Montana sports writer to suggest that the high school's teams should be christened the Malta Milks. (Actually, they're the Mustangs.) This is dinosaur country, and the Phillips County Museum is a great place to learn more about these early county residents. The Malta Chamber of Commerce's web site is a font of information about this fascinating part of Montana.

A Phillips County Stream (near Dodson, Montana)
Taken 10/8/2009

Malta is not the only community in Phillips County. On the eastern edge of the county, sitting alongside US Highway 2, is the small town of Saco. Saco has a personal meaning to me in that I first visited the place when I was seven or eight years old. My mother's cousin, Floyd Stephens, had followed my folks to Montana from West Virginia, and was living in Saco at the time. While he lived in several other Montana towns as well (like my father, he was a Methodist minister), he and his wife chose to be buried in the Saco cemetery. For those of you old enough to remember the NBC news team of Huntley and Brinkley, Saco is the home town of Chet Huntley. Saco's web site gives quite a good history and overview of this community of some 200 souls, and quotes Chet's final broadcast with words that we would all do well to take to heart. I've copied the quote at the bottom of this post.

West of Malta, also on Highway 2, is Dodson. Dodson is the home of the Phillips County Fair, originally established in 1915. It claims to be "the longest continuous running fair held in the state of Montana." Right on the Fort Belknap Reservation boundary, Dodson is fifty percent white and 45% Native American.

Phillips County rangeland, looking toward the Missouri Breaks and the Judith Mountains
Taken 4/22/2011

The land of Phillips County, like most places, is partly private, partly government owned. Fifty-one percent of the land is in private hands, while the federal government holds 43% and the state of Montana the remaining 6%. Most of the private land is agricultural, with 83% used for rangeland. Fourteen percent is dry cropland and only one percent is irrigated. This is a very arid region. Today deer, elk and antelope play on the range, but as noted above, once upon a time dinosaurs roamed the region. Archeological digs have turned up numerous dino remains, including some fully fossilized. If you subscribe to Science News, you can read their account here.

Giving lie to the notion that eastern Montana is flat, the Little Rocky Mountains rise in the southern portion of Phillips County, with Mount Antoine climbing to 5,722 feet. (Malta, by contrast, sits at an elevation of 2,254 feet.) The Little Rockies were named by the Corps of Discovery (Lewis and Clark) and are considered an outlying mountain range, separated from any other ranges. As is the case so often, the discovery of gold brought a rush, and mining camps sprung up around the peaks. Two towns still surviving (if just barely) are Zortman and Landusky. Driving up the dirt road toward Landusky, you can easily see the devastation caused by modern day mining methods. It seems as if half of one mountain has been removed. Back in the early 1980s, on a drive around Fort Peck Reservoir on the Missouri River, I tried to follow a road clearly marked on my map that ran from Hays to Landusky. The road was little more than a wagon track, and my faithful Ford had to live up to its name and literally ford a creek that kept crossing the road. After what seemed like hours of driving, we emerged near the top of the mountain and found ourselves at a locked gate signed "No Trespassing." We had arrived at one of the mine boundaries and obviously weren't welcome.

A home in Landusky, Montana. Butch and Sundance may have slept here.
Taken 4/22/2011

Today, Landusky is little more than a ghost town, and while most of the dozen buildings we found were in better shape than the one pictured here, we saw more four-footed animals than humans. That is to say we saw two deer and two horses, no humans at all. The road was dirt, the snow was falling, and we had been driving through ground blizzards for most of the day. We decided against trying to reach Hays from this side, so I have no idea if the gates are still locked (although I suspect they are).

From Chet Huntley's final broadcast on the NBC News:

Be patient and have courage—there will be better and happier news some day, if we work at it