blackfoot-valley

Downtown Helmville took shape slowly during the 1880s and 1890s, and well into the twentieth century. It came to support a post office, two general stores, a livery stable, two hotels, three to five saloons, a blacksmith shop, butcher shop, bakery, drugstore, a bank, a dancehall, schoolhouse, and two churches. The local ranchers could buy on credit and pay their bills once a year after their crops and livestock products had been sold. The town was thriving, and when Anaconda broke off to form its own county (as Deer Lodge County without Deer Lodge!) with the remaining area soon to be designated as Powell County, centrally located Helmville was con- sidered as the county seat. But Deer Lodge, with its much larger population (although near the new county southern edge), won out. Many buildings from the early Helmville businesses are still standing, either abandoned or now used for other purposes. Some were destroyed, including the Geary Mercantile, which burned. The first hotel still stands, a two-story log structure lived in as the home of Sonny Geary until his death in 1998. It’s located next door to Helmville’s only remaining retail business, the Copper Queen Saloon with its old-time bar evoking a bygone era. “Early Helmville” 139