Traveling through southeastern Montana in 1883, naturalist, writer, and future United States President Theodore Roosevelt was struck by what he called the Medicine Buttes. He wrote, “Altogether it was as fantastically beautiful a place as I have ever seen: it seemed impossible that the hand of man should not have had something to do with its formation.” Indeed, mother nature spent millions of years crafting this landmark, but the hand of humans here cannot be ignored. Thousands of men and women recorded their history here, transforming the perforated sandstone monuments into a historical register with initials, names, dates, and images carved in soft stone. Petroglyphs of warriors and animals mark hundreds of years of use by indigenous people who harvested medicinal plants and performed ceremonies and religious rituals. The Lakota aptly named it “Inyan oka-lo-ka” or “Rock with a Hole in it.” European explorers, and later trappers and traders, passed through and left their marks in the early 1800s. Gold seekers came through after 1862, and then a steady influx of cowboys, ranchers, homesteaders, laborers, and tourists left basic but rich information that often connects them with pivotal state, national, and world events. County officials maintained the Medicine Rocks as a park beginning in the 1930s, and it became a Montana state park in 1957. The vast collection of inscriptions at Medicine Rocks serve as enticing clues about the history of human occupation here, and with more research can yield volumes about the cultural traditions and family histories of its visitors.
]]>In 1934, at the height of the Great Depression, fire destroyed four Main Street buildings, including the First National Bank. When the economy recovered, local contractor V. E. Figg designed and constructed this 1940 commercial structure. With contrasting white stucco, glass block, and black tile, the Streamline Moderne style building asserted Ekalaka’s modernity while signifying a belief in the town’s future. The building’s west half served as the offices of the First National Bank until 1970. Retail stores operated here during the 1970s. Then the bank used the building for storage. In 2011 Summit National Bank donated it to the Town of Ekalaka. Now the Town Office, the interior still boasts the original bank vaults and much of the original wood trim and paneling. Rickard Hardware, owned by C. G. Mac Rickard, originally occupied the east half of the building. After the hardware store closed, the building housed a furniture store before becoming a meat locker in 1945. The locker rented freezers and processed meat in the back of building and sold ice cream in the front. In 1954, Joe and Helen Blutt purchased the business. After electricity became locally available, the need for locker services declined so the Blutts expanded the front area into a teen hangout. For over twenty-five years, kids met at “The Locker” to listen to the juke box and play foosball, pinball, and pool while enjoying malts, burgers, and fries. The Locker closed in 1998 and remained vacant until the Ekalaka Public Library moved here in 2013.
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