Rediscovering home: Cedar Creek gold rush

Wouldn’t you know it, with the dearth of women living in the gold rush that rushed up Cedar Creek two would get in a fight over one man.

Unfortunately for the rest of the men in one Cedar Creek gold rush community, that is exactly what happened. The fight was reported by the Missoula and Cedar Creek Pioneer as occurring in Forest City. The newspaper was started one year after Louis A. Barrette discovered gold in Cedar Creek in 1869. 

I studied the coverage of the gold rush by the Pioneer and other newspapers for a paper I had to write for a class during my senior year in journalism school at the University of Montana. I was interested in the gold rush after growing up on our family ranch at the mouth of Cedar Creek. My siblings and I spent many a day either fishing at the mouth or swimming at the sandbar. (During my high school tenure dad sold five acres to Dick Wadsworth and bought a sprinkler system that I did not enjoy waking each summer morning to change!). 

For the same reason, I am keen to join the tour of the Cedar Creek Historic Mining District hosted by the Mineral County Museum and Historical Society on Saturday, Sept. 7. Call the museum at 406 822-3543 to sign up. They need you to do so to determine the transportation required. 

The Cedar Creek gold rush was credited by the Rocky Mountain Gazette for much of the early development of Missoula County, which included Mineral at the time: 

“The rapid development of Missoula County, in consequence of the Cedar Creek, and other mines in the area, have been great.”

The Pioneer boasted that “it is a conceded fact that Cedar Creek is today the richest gold producing region in Montana,” but then let its enthusiasm get the best of it, and inaccurately predicted that “when the deep ground has been fairly opened, and the mines can go steadily to work on the ‘pay streak’ which is believed to exist in these placers, Cedar will be the largest, richest and most enumerative gold field yet discovered in the territory.” Instead, the rush flared out rather quickly by historical standards. 

The Pioneer reported on five gold rush communities:  Mouth of Cedar Creek, Louisville (named after Barrette), Forest City, Cedar Creek Junction, and Superior City.  There was also one mention of a Lincoln City. According to the paper, Mouth of Cedar Creek and Superior City were located at the mouth, the latter on the north side. Cedar Junction was five miles up the creek, while Louisville and Forest City were reported as being 15 and 17 miles, respectively, from the mouth. Cedar Junction appeared to be more of stopping point, rather than a thriving community. 

The Mouth of Cedar Creek received little attention in the news columns, but the Mouth of Cedar Creek Hotel was a frequent advertiser. One article mentioned the town had a race track owned by a Mr. Booth.  In addition to horse racing, the newspaper reported a 60-yard foot race between a “Frenchman” named Louie and a fella named Guy Morrison.  Louie won by 10 yards, and collected $824 from Morrison.  

Superior City was reported to have one hotel, and a resort called the “Snug.”  The resort is only mentioned in small advertisements by the newspaper editors.  In one, the editors thank the proprietor, John Parker, for a string of speckled trout he sent them. They praised the place as “a cozy little retreat for wearied humanity,” and expressed the hope that Parker’s “shadow never grow less.” The paper never says what the Snug had to offer specifically, but says only the resort was adding “attractions” all  the time. The editors end by advising readers to: “Call, smile and be happy.” 

The newspaper’s primary correspondent, identified only as Snowball, reported one of the women in the above-mentioned fight “got three black eyes and came near to losing her mess.”  Let me know if you can figure that out. 

Snowball appeared to favor Forest City, predicting in 1870 it would be declared the “capital of Cedar Creek,” and reporting it had three restaurants, seven saloons, a billiard hall and several other “business houses.”  Louisville was reported in 1870 to have at least one grocery store that doubled as a bank, one restaurant, four saloons and a shoe shop.  Forest City had two doctors, while Louisville had none. Both towns had post offices.  

One day a man from Cedar Creek brought in a large yellow object to a county office. The clerk assumed it was a large gold nugget. Instead, the Pioneer reported, the object was a piece of the man’s ear that had been bit off during a fight. 

The Pioneer reflected the local prejudice against Chinese miners that it reported were flocking to the gold rush, and opposed Chinese immigration. The paper proclaimed the Chinese as being without any “good traits,” and of being “an inferior and idolatrous race.” 

The newspaper published a story about the killing of foreigners in China and then warned: “The fiendish murderers who perpetrated this horrible butchery; are the wretches with whom grasping capitalists and radical politicians would overrun our county, to the starvation and impoverishment of all classes of our laboring population.” 

The Pioneer was incensed about the arrival female Chinese immigrants, writing in an editorial titled, “Advent of Celestrial Cyprians (China was called the celestrial empire and cyprians are prostitutes): 

“Several almond-eyed damsels of the Chinese persuasion” passed through Missoula on their way to Cedar Creek. “They were, we believe, the First Johnesses who have yet made their unwelcome appearance on this side of the range, and it were a consummation devoutly to be wished to be the last.” 

The newspaper dropped “Cedar Creek” after only four months and continued to publish for a time as the Missoula Pioneer.  I understand the rush continued for a time after the name was dropped, so I am not sure why the newspaper dropped it. Maybe I will get a clue why after listening to the speakers talk about this fascinating time in our local history.