Western Heritage Center
I was in Billings yesterday when I realized that I was nearing this building. I parked right in front. Now, that is something that someone familiar with driving in NYC can appreciate. With the history lesson from the post on the postcard, I thought that a recent photograph was in order. I wasn’t able to shoot from the same vantage point as the 1907 photographer, but except for the stairs - the building looks the same. I still haven’t found the time to actually go in the building.
There are more photos on my flickr stream.
November 21st, 2006 at 1:51 pm
Karen, Do take the time it is actually really neat inside and time well spent….
November 21st, 2006 at 4:13 pm
Great building.. I’d love to see the inside
November 21st, 2006 at 5:17 pm
When I went there several annums ago (it was my first time, and I had lived in Billings the first 22 years of my taking up space on the planet), there were exhibits on irrigation, a mockup of a post office fronm the early 1900s, a Crow teepee, or tipi, depending on who’s spelling one uses (there’s a photo of it on my flickr site), and down in the basement there was a display of a dude ranch house. Since then, they’ve moved J.K. Ralston’s log cabin studio onto the property (old J.K. was a regular customer that the Buttrey’s store I worked at on Grand and 13th West in the mid-70s).
Other interesting places to go in Billings (if you’re a history buff) are the County Historical Museum (the log building at the airport next to the steam locomotive — what a locomotive is doing next to an airport puzzles me — and the staute of The Range Rider — modeled by silent film star William S. Hart), Yellowstone Kelly’s grave on Black Otter Trail just east of the airport (which has the best view of the entire Yellowstone valley), and the Moss Mansion on Division Street, between Clark and Yellowstone Avenues.
November 21st, 2006 at 7:05 pm
Nice picture Karen! Hope you are well.
November 21st, 2006 at 8:37 pm
I must be getting old–I still remember when it was the library. It was an impressive library to go into when I was in junior high.
November 22nd, 2006 at 7:58 am
Do you know what the original vantage point was, and is it still there?
November 22nd, 2006 at 9:47 am
My guess is that the old photo was taken from the roof of the Gruwell Building, which stood where the parking lot is today at the northwest corner lot of the intersection of Montana Ave. and N. 29. I had to do some Sanborn map research to get this information.
The Gruwell building was erected in 1899, and was still standing as of 1958; the digital Sanborn maps for Billings don’t go past that time, but I’ll be the Library has more information. The 1903 map shows a bowling alley in the back of the Building, which was split into 2821 and 2823. In later years, it was a hardware store, and a hotel. I think at some point, Chappel Drug was in the building, maybe on the corner.
I’m betting the building burnt sometime after 1958. I can’t remember what was on the lot when I went to the library as a child.
What fun history is!
November 23rd, 2006 at 7:44 pm
I want to go visit this library!