Search Our Web Site



Advanced Search

Please Note:
If you are looking for a Montana business or service, click on the MT Web Directory button above (this will take you to a index page for the Directory) or click on the Search by Name button above (this will take you to a search page for the Directory).


Belt

Travel Montana

Belt Directory Listings

A view from 1939:

BELT, (3,574 alt., 810 pop.), formerly called Castner, was founded by John Castner, whose coal mine, the first in Montana, supplied fuel to Fort Benton. In 1893 the Boston and Montana Mining Company began operation in the Belt cod field and was soon supplying all fuel for the smelter at Great Falls. Finns and Slavs settled the town. In 1930 the smelters at Anaconda and Great Falls began using natural gas piped in from the Cut Bank field (see Tour 2, Sec. b), decreasing the market for coal for the Belt mines, though they continue to produce for the region surrounding them.

Source: Montana: A State Guide Book; Compiled and Written by the Federal Writers' Project of the Work Projects Administration for the State of Montana; September, 1939.

Visit the Gallery of Outstanding Montanans at the Montana State Capitol and read about John and Mattie Bost Bell Castner, booster of community spirit (1848–1920). Read gallery text for Mattie Bost Bell Castner.