Lots of history comes alive in Havre

Never before have people so enjoyed being in jail.

A half-dozen children were "incarcerated" Saturday in an old cell on display in the building that was once the jail at Fort Assinniboine.

The children were part of a tour on the Blackjack, a travel wagon that took interested people on tours of the fort as part of Living History Day. Similar programs took place at Havre Beneath the Streets

A larger-than-usual crowd was on hand for the festivities that included the firing of an old cannon by volunteers from the Bullhook Bottoms Black Powder Club.

Visitors on the Blackjack were shown the various parts of the fort, including the places where troops in the 1881-1911 era worked, paraded, worshiped and ate.

But for the children, the best part was seeing the place where the troops were jailed.

While Army officials in the early 20th century aimed to make life unpleasant for inmates, children thought it was the highlight of the tour.

They crowded inside the tiny cells and cheered as people took pictures of them climbing the cell walls and trying to "escape."

Ron Vandenboom, the president of the Fort Assinniboine Preservation Association and the tour guide, said the association is pleased to be able to open the jail to the public. It has not had access to the building until this year.

Troops were locked up in the jail for a variety of reasons, he said, but most often it was because of desertion.

When soldiers arrived at the fort, one of the first things they noticed was "there wasn't a single thing to do," Vandenboom said.

“They didn’t appreciate the 20-below-zero weather either, surprisingly,” Vandemboom said.

Often they deserted, he said. But they then found out that in the vast, uninhabited plains of the north-central Montana, there was no place to dessert to.

They were soon rounded up, taken back to the fort and sentenced to jail.

The fort was built, Vandenboom said, because Congress was fearful in the wake of the stunning defeat of Gen. George Custer by the forces of Sitting Bull at the Battle of Little Bighorn.

“Sitting Bull won the battle,” Vandenboom said. “Unfortunately, winning the battle meant losing the war.”

The Army defeated the Natives at the Battle of the Bear Paws a few years later, he said.

And Congress spent $10 million to build the fort in what today is Hill County.

By 1883, 104 buildings had been constructed.

The fort was decommissioned in 1911, he said. In the intervening years, none of the soldiers were ever deployed into a battle with the Natives, he said.

Visitors from all over, including a contingent from Canada, were on hand for the Living History festivities.

Among them was Omar Murray, whose job during the week is a guide at Fort Walsh, a national historic site in Saskatchewan. Fort Walsh was in use during the same period as Fort Assinniboine and faced some of the same problems.

Sitting Bull had fled to Canada by this time, and the Canadians tried hard to convince him to return to Montana.

On his motorcycle, Murray took three hours to get from Fort Walsh to Fort Assinniboine. He hopes more people — Americans and Canadians — visit the two forts.

Unlike Fort Assinniboine, Fort Walsh has none of the original buildings still standing, but after the Canadian government declared it a national historic site in 1966, old log buildings were built.

“Today it looks like 1880,” he said.

Fort Walsh has an advantage, he said. The federal government provides funds for the restoration.

Fort Assinniboine is run by volunteers, though the land is owned by Montana State University.

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In 1902, John Mathews and his wife, Catherine, bought the large home at 124 3rd St., Havre.

It was believed to be about 4 years old and had had two owners during that time,

But the Mathews family owned the building for nearly three decades, and raised their children there. When Catherine Mathews died, John Mathews’ new wife, Rena Mathews, lived there several years longer.

John Mathews was active in the Eagles and the Masons, and played an active part in planning the construction of Masonic Temple. He was active in many aspects of the community

Today, Emily Mayer, who built a house museum in the home next door, has opened a museum in the old Mathews home.

It was open to the public for the first time Saturday, and visitors walked through the first story of the home, looking at some of the artifacts from that era.

Mayer said she hopes to slowly rehabilitate the home that has fallen into disrepair under the roughly 10 people who owned it after the Mathews family.

First comes improvements to the foundation, she said. Then it needs a new roof. And then to show the community that progress is being made, she wants to add a new coat of paint to the outside.

Eventually, the inside will be renovated. In the long run, she said, she would like to open the house as a bed and breakfast.

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The North Central Montana Everything Antique Show on the Great Northern Fairgrounds Sunday was full of items that dated back 100 years old or more.

Friday through Sunday, dozens of antique tractors and other antiques were on display, prompting old-timers to recall the good old days.

The oldest dated back to 1912, a 1 3/4-horsepower Stickney.

But for young people, the military display put on by the First U.S. Volunteers was a hit.

Periodically, Ryan Juers, a Havre native and Helena resident, would fire off the replica of the three-inch Civil War ordnance rifle he had on display in his exhibit of what a Civil War Union encampment would have looked like.

The First U.S. Volunteers includes about a dozen history buffs from throughout Montana that spend their summers traveling from town to town putting on the display. On June 25, they will be in Fort Benton for the Annaul Summer Celebration.

Next to the rifle was a tent with a bed, table and armaments similar to what would have been used by a sergeant during the Civil War.

The members pay their own way and buy their own equipment, he said, But they enjoy the work because it helps tell the history that many people are unaware of.

“There is a lot of history in Montana,” Juers said.

“We just do this because we want people to know about Montana history,” he said. “Especially the kids. They can read about it in the textbooks, but they don’t really know it until they see it.

The First U.S. Volunteers is a group named after an outfit that was stationed at Fort Benton during the Civil War, he said.

Confederate soldiers had an opportunity to get out of POW camps by signing their allegiance to the union, he said, and signing up for the Union Army.

But Union officials were reluctant to put the ex-Confederate soldiers in battle with Confederate soldiers, so they First U.S. Army Volunteers was assigned to Fort Benton.

Officials were pretty certain that the Confederates were unlikely to launch an attack on Montana, and the First U.S. Volunteers never saw combat. The unit was disbanded shortly after the war’s end.

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People visiting Havre Beneath the Streets enjoyed the same tour that they usually get — except at discounted rates and with a bit more liveliness.

Dozens of local residents dressed up in era costumes to play the role of Havre residents during the late 1890s and early 1900s in many of the displays.

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A healthy turnout was on hand at the Wahpka Chu’gn Buffalo Jump as people took the tour of the jump itself and young people using the stone boil process boiled buffalo meat.

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The H. Earl Clack Memorial Museum had the quietest Living History Day.

Anne Foster of Gardiner was going to give a talk on Prohibition and women’s suffrage, but she was sick and couldn’t make it.