Lolo National Forest
There are many great Montana history books out there to choose from, perhaps too many.
If you go to Amazon and type in ‘Montana history’ you’ll come up with more than 100 pages of books.
Each of those pages has 12 books listed on it, so that means there are at least 1,200 Montana history books selling on that one site alone.
Of course, some of the books are going to be better than others. And only a few can really be considered the best.
Here are 5 great Montana history books that I’ve read over the years and which still have resonance today.
If you go to Amazon and type in ‘Montana history’ you’ll come up with more than 100 pages of books.
Each of those pages has 12 books listed on it, so that means there are at least 1,200 Montana history books selling on that one site alone.
Of course, some of the books are going to be better than others. And only a few can really be considered the best.
Here are 5 great Montana history books that I’ve read over the years and which still have resonance today.
Montana: High, Wide, and Handsome
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By far one of the best books is this classic by Joseph Kinsey Howard. I read it only after it was recommended to me by one of my professors at the University of Montana. It wasn’t required reading but I felt it did a much better job telling the state’s history than the books we’d been assigned.
Many people feel the book is dated and that it may have some factual errors. It still does a great job of telling a narrative history of Montana that’s interesting and enjoyable. The subject matter certainly isn’t dry and you’ll probably find yourself coming back to it from time to time. |
Montana: A History of Two Centuries
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This is another great book on Montana history, and one that is much more recent. It’s got three authors, two of which served as history professors at Montana State University in Bozeman. One of them, Michael P. Malone, would eventually go on to serve as the school’s president.
The book is primarily written as a textbook for university students taking a Montana State history course, so it can be rather dry at times. Still, it does a good job of detailing what happened in the state over the two centuries it covers, which end around the 1970s, as do most Montana history books. You’ll get thousands of years covered in the introduction before settling into the State’s story with Lewis & Clark. |
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The Last Best Place: A Montana Anthology
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This book is certainly not for the faint of heart, coming in at more than 1,000 pages. It was put together primarily by William Kittredge and Annick Smith, the two main editors out of a much larger group. The book profiles stories from the state’s earliest beginnings to its more modern times.
You’ll get Indian accounts right next to early settlers. Stories from Lewis & Clark are right up there with more contemporary authors who know the state today. Kittredge spent a great deal of his time teaching creative writing at the University of Montana, and anyone who’s taken one of his classes knows that he cares deeply for the state. |
Montana: An Uncommon Land
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Many who went to the University of Montana in the 80s and 90s took their Montana history class from K. Ross Toole. His book on the state’s history was still required reading when I went there, and I have to say that I enjoyed it. I read many of the chapters several times, as anyone taking liberal arts classes in college can attest to, and I still remember that they were quite good.
Like the other books in the list this cover all the big areas of the state’s history, focusing primarily on the Lewis & Clark Expedition, Native American interactions, cattle and mining interests, and right up to when the state was beginning to become what it is today in the mid-1980s. It’s just another great perspective on the Big Sky state. |
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Young Men and Fire
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On August 5th, 1949, the Mann Gulch forest fire around the Gates of the Mountains just outside of Helena claimed the lives of 13 of the 16 smokejumpers who leaped in to fight it. Norman Maclean, the author of A River Runs Through It, began studying the fire seriously in 1976 and released this great book in 1992.
It’s an enjoyable book for anyone interested in one of the defining forest fires in Montana history and one that we’re still learning from today. My Helena High School senior class did a two year project working on getting a memorial set up for the men who died in the Mann Gulch Fire at the Missoula Smokejumper’s Center and it left an impression on me. |
