36. Judith Basin County

While traveling through the area in 1805, Captain William Clark saw a northward flowing river, so clean and beautiful, that he named it for his fiancée, calling it the Judith.  The river's source is in the Little Belt Mountains, and its mouth is at its confluence with the Missouri, some 124 miles northeast of the source.  The area drained by the Judith and its tributaries, bounded on three sides by the Highwood, Little Belt, Big Snowy, and Judith mountains, with the Missouri River on the north, bears the name Judith Basin, and on December 10, 1920, the Montana Legislature took land from Cascade (#2) and Fergus (#7) Counties to form Judith Basin County, after what historian Donald Spritzer calls "one of Montana's longest, most expensive, most bitter county division fights." (Roadside History of Montana, p. 289.)  Five communities vied for the title of County Seat, with Hobson and Stanford each putting $25,000 into the fight, but in the end, Stanford became the seat of government for the newly formed county. The county covers 1,870 square miles and as of the 2012 U.S. Census estimate, it held 2,024 residents.  The 1930 U.S. Census was the first to be held after the county's formation, and it counted 5,238 people.  The county's population has declined with every subsequent enumeration.

The Judith Basin County Courthouse

Stanford, Montana

Named in honor of Stanfordville, NY by Calvin and Edward Bower, ranchers who brought 100,000 sheep to the area in 1880,  Stanford today is a small town with less than 400 people counted in the 2010 U.S. Census.  The largest building in town is the county courthouse, and it was this structure that started me on the journey that has led to the current Glory of the West project.  Tax revenues from the iron ore and coal that was mined nearby paid for the courthouse, and this gives Judith Basin County the distinction of being the only Montana county to build their house of government without floating a bond issue.  The town itself got its start in 1875 as a stage station on the route between Billings and Fort Benton. The arrival of the Great Northern Railroad forced the town to relocate two miles, but brought many new settlers to the area.

Next door to the courthouse stands the Judith Basin County Museum.  Open from June through August, the Museum charges no entrance fee, but does accept free-will offerings.  It also has a variety of gifts for sale, not including any of the 2,000 sets of salt and pepper shakers or 5,000 buttons in the museum's collection.  I can only note that that's a salt and pepper shaker set for every man, woman and child in the county.

Hobson is the only other incorporated town in Judith Basin County, but other communities include Benchland, Geyser, Moccasin, Raynesford, Windham and Utica.  There is the wonderfully named ghost town, Ubet, which also started as a stage stop and got its name from the answer folks received when they asked about the possibility of overnight lodging.  "You bet!" was the constant answer.

The people of Judith Basin County continue to have a friendly and warm sense of humor.  On the Sunday after Labor Day, they celebrate What The Hay! on the Montana Bale Trail.  From its beginning in 1990 as a friendly rivalry between two neighboring ranchers, What The Hay! has grown into a major community attraction involving  Hobson, Utica and Windham, as well as the various ranches between the three towns. In 2011, the Travelocity gnome was one of the attendees.

The TravHAYlocity Gnome

On the Montana Bale Trail

Hobson, Montana

This is definitely a rural county, with a long history of animal husbandry and agriculture.  Prior to white settlement, the Judith Basin held hundreds of thousands of bison, and Native American tribes came from all directions to hunt in the area.  The first settlers brought sheep and cattle.  By the 1880s, the Judith Basin roundup saw some 500 cowboys converge on the area to make sure the locally raised cattle made it overland to the nearest rail depot, Casper, Wyoming, over 400 miles away.  One of the cowboys to work these roundups was a youngster from St. Louis, Missouri, a privileged youth whose father gave in to the teenager's desire.  Charles Marion Russell came to Montana in 1880, not yet 16 years old, and in 1882 he ended up in the Judith Basin.  As Spritzer says, "if Montana has a patron saint, it is probably Charlie Russell." (p. 278)  Some of Russell's earliest and most iconic paintings deal with ranch life in the Judith Basin.

Today, agriculture dwarfs all other occupations in the county.  Fifty-seven percent of working males and sixteen percent of working females are farmers, ranchers, or agricultural workers.  Construction work comes in second at eight percent.  According to city-data.com, the average size farm in the county covers 2,626 acres and brings in $102,031 on average per farm.  This sounds fine until we look at the average cost per farm which totals $102,571 per year.  The average age for principal farm operators is 54, which, combined with the continual loss of population does not bode well for the future of farming.

Grain Elevator at Raynesford, Montana

And yet it is a beautiful land.  Bordered on three sides by mountain ranges, some with peaks over 8,000 feet high, the rolling hills of the Judith Basin continue to entrance travelers, as they have from the beginning. Spritzer opens his section on the Central Valleys with a quote from Mrs. Clemence Gurneau Berger, wife of the leader of one of the first group of settlers in the region, a band of métis (people of mixed French Canadian and Native American blood).  It seems fitting to let Mrs. Berger have the last word:

We came in by way of the gap to the famous Judith Basin which was, indeed, a paradise land of plenty, game of all kinds, lots of good water and timber. What more could we want? After finding what we had searched for, our journey ended right here.

The rolling hills and farm land of Judith Basin County