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Exceptionally Rare Bundy and Train Photograph of Montana Pio

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Historical Memorabilia Start Price:7,000.00 USD Estimated At:10,000.00 - 15,000.00 USD
Exceptionally Rare Bundy and Train Photograph of Montana Pio

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Auction Date:2009 Jun 24 @ 10:00 (UTC-04:00 : AST/EDT)
Location:6270 Este Ave., Cincinnati, Ohio, 45232, United States
albumen photograph, 8.75 x 6.75" on gilt ruled mount with imprint of Bundy and Train Helena Montana, 10 x 12" overall, ca 1879. With penciled identifications on recto and verso, and ink handstamp Marguerite Greenfield collection. Donor: Charles D. Greenfield. Standing from left to right: Granville Stuart, Conrad Kohrs, J.A. Brown, and Matt Carroll. Seated, Charles Rumley, James Fergus, Col. W.W. DeLacy, Homer Hewins, and S.J. Hauser.

A rare and important photograph of some of the men who made Montana, assembled for a group photograph some seven years before the official founding of the Society of Montana Pioneers. Most of the men pictured here would go on to become officers or members of that organization.

Stuart (1834-1918)came West from Iowa with the 49ers, and reached Montana in 1857-58 after hearing of gold near present-day Deer Lodge. By the mid 1870s he had become deeply involved in Montana politics, and in 1883 was president of the Territorial Council. After early ventures in mining and as a shopkeeper, Stuart became a rancher, settling in the Judith Basin. When rustling became a nuisance, Stuart became a leader of the local vigilante committee, and after a number of violent confrontations and lynchings, rustling was virtually eliminated. In his later years he was state land agent, and Ambassador to Uruguay and Paraguay. In 1904 Stuart was named librarian at the public library in Butte and spent the rest of his life writing about Montana.

Kohrs (1835-1920) came to Montana in 1862, and fairly quickly became involved in the cattle business, and soon had a virtual monopoly in the Territorial beef industry. Like Stuart, he was a member of the vigilance committees of 1863-64, and was present at a number of lynchings. By the early 1870s, his stranglehold on the beef was broken by Texas cattle being driven north. He remained, however, the largest rancher in the Territory.

Carroll (1837-1909) reached Ft. Benton in 1857. Along with two partners, Carroll established the E.G. Maclay and Company after purchasing the Overland Freight and Diamond D freight lines. During the 1876 Sioux war, the company carried most of the freight for Gibbon's command. Carroll was among the Terry-Gibbon party arriving at the Little Big Horn in the aftermath of the Custer massacre, and helped bury the dead and transport out many of Reno's wounded. He later opened a store at Fort Keogh, and after leaving the freighting business in 1879, lived the rest of his life as a "trader."

DeLacy (1818-1892), an engineer by profession, arrived in the territory after laying out the Mullan Road, between Fort Benton and Fort Walla Walla in 1859-60. He is credited with laying out the town of Fort Benton, produced one of the first maps of the Yellowstone country, and was influential in choosing the route of the Northern Pacific Railway through the Territory.

An important, and rare image. 

The Thomas Minckler Collection of Western Americana

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