blackfoot-valley

In time, as in the other ghost towns, the diggings declined in Blackfoot City as well. Even while it lasted, Blackfoot City’s prosperity was seasonal since fresh water was available at the site only in spring. While water could be stored during the summer, by autumn the town lay almost abandoned. (One wonders how the founders thought those limitations could be overcome; no doubt the answer lies in the adage “optimism springs eternal,” realistic or not.) Fires and floods took a heavy toll. By the early 1880s, Blackfoot City was well on its way to becoming a ghost town; its decline was assured when the Northern Pacific bypassed it by laying tracks along an easier terrain fol- lowing the Little Blackfoot River some miles south and finding the town not worth building a spur to reach it. All in all, it’s surprising that its last lonely store, Quigley’s, didn’t close its doors until 1912. Today little is left of Black- foot City other than traces of the foundations of its wooden buildings. Another one-time town in the area that was planned during the same period was New Chicago, on Flint Creek in Granite County, three miles south of Drummond. On the old stage road between Deer Lodge and Missoula, it was established in 1872, and given that name because its founders had “Garnet Ghost Town” courtesy @ Shutterstock 101