Livingston

Travel Montana

Livingston Directory Listings

A view from 1939:

LIVINGSTON, (4,490 alt., 6,391 pop.), lies near the point where the Yellowstone, flowing northward from its source in Wyoming, makes a great bend eastward. As a railroad and trade center in a farming and stockraising county, the town has an air of bustle and enterprise. Stockmen and farmers in work clothes walk its streets; many trucks and trailers loaded with pigs, sheep, calves, or horses are seen in the streets, on their way to market or from one ranch to another.

Livingston is also the outfitting point in a large recreational area and its citizens try to keep alive the spirit of the old West for visitors. Its hotels and cafes display copies of the paintings of Russell and other western artists, and photographs of ranch life, rodeos, and Indians in parade dress. The automobiles on its streets bear license plates from half the Union. In January when herds of elk come down from the snow-bound high country to the south, the town is filled with hunters.

Like all Montana cities founded during the frantic boom days of the 1870's and 1880's, Livingston has its share of old houses with Gothic and Romanesque windows and gingerbread ornamentation.

At the annual Frontier Celebration, held early in July, riders from every part of the stock country compete in bronco-busting and other rodeo activities, and Indians stage the "celebration of the conqueror," which consists largely of dances and races. In keeping with the city's consciousness of its position as host and entertainer to easterners, a touch of Hollywood is usually present in the atmosphere of the Wild West show.

The history of Livingston is studded with the names and deeds of such pioneers and pathfinders as John Bozeman and Jim Bridger. Many an old-timer has settled down here to pass his remaining days remembering the life that was. Such a veteran was the late Patrick T. (Tommy) Tucker, dean of cowpunchers and author of Riding the High Country. Tucker was an expert yarn spinner and sold many copies of his book by starting a tale of "way back when," and then producing the volume, with the explanation that the rest of the story could be found there.

Lieutenant Clark and his men came down Billman Creek and arrived at the Yellowstone, just south of town, on July 15, 1806. The first settlement in the vicinity was made about 1873, when Benson's Landing came into being at a ferry crossing 4 miles north of this place. Livingston began its existence on July 14, 1882, when railroad surveyors camped on its site and called it Clark City for William Clark. Late in the same year Northern Pacific rails reached the town. Throughout its development it has depended greatly upon the railroad. Even its name was changed to honor a director of the Northern Pacific, Crawford Livingston of St. Paul.

During the railroad strike of June and July 1894, when service was interrupted for two weeks, Federal troops were brought in to protect railroad property. A drunken captain stabbed a townsman with a sword, and President Cleveland declared martial law to maintain order. The strike was unsuccessful.

Miles and Sacajawea Parks are on islands in the Yellowstone River. A third park, Sterling Plaza, is near the river on S. Main St. Band concerts are given here in summer. On McLEOD ISLAND, opposite Sacajawea Park, is a 9-hole golf course (open).

The Harding Collection of Indian Relics (open on request), 107 Eighth Ave. N., consists chiefly of objects recovered from burial places and from piskuns.

The old Bucket of Blood, 113 Park St., one of many old-time Montana saloons so named, was probably a little rougher than most. It was not only a tough place in its own right but was the center of a group of resorts of the same kind including a gambling dive run by Tex Rickard, Kid Brown, and Soapy Smith until the Klondike rush took them off to the Yukon. Madame Bulldog, once Kitty O'Leary, ran what was euphemistically known as a dance hall. Her joint, she said, was a decent one. Announcing that she would stand for no damfoolishness, she saved the wages of a bouncer by polishing off roughnecks herself. Her dimensions, like her sensibilities, were pachydermal; she tipped the scales at 190, stripped. And stripped she was most of the time. Calamity Jane was one of her associates for a time, but legend has it that they fell out, whereupon Madame Bulldog tossed Calamity into the street, "as easy as licking three men." When asked whether Calamity Jane really tried to fight back, one who knew both women replied succinctly, "Calamity was tougher'n hell, but she wasn't crazy!"

The Site of Calamity Jane's Cabin, 213 Main St., is in a weed-grown square called the Plaza, which contains a bandstand. She lived here several years, suffering increasing poverty and unhappiness with the years.

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.