Transcript Slide 1

Montana Nicknames: Shining
Mountains to Big Sky
Linda Wostrel
Historian, S&D of MT Pioneers
112th Annual Convention – Virginia City MT
August 04, 2007
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Presentation Overview
Motto vs. Nickname
1740’s: Northern Rockies: Shining Mountains
1894: The Shining
1922: Stubbed-Toe State
1935: Life in Butte was High, Wide and Occasionally Handsome
1940: High, Wide and Handsome
1950 – 1966: The Treasure State
1961: Big Sky Country
1985: Montana: Naturally Inviting
1988: Montana – Unspoiled, Unforgettable
1995: EZ 2 LUV
2007: Big Sky Country ??
Other Names: The Bonanza State, The Mountain State, The
Headwaters State
• Closing Thoughts
Motto vs. Nickname
• Motto decided when conceiving the
official Seal for MT Territory
• 1865 Territorial Governor Sidney
Edgerton signed bill that state motto
would be Oro y Plata (Gold and
Silver)
• Incorporated essential elements of
Montana’s economy and its future
• Every US state has a nickname (or
two, or more) but not all state
nicknames are “official” – can
become nickname by common use
1740’s: Northern Rockies: Shining Mountains,
the Shining
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French went west in quest for a Northwest
Passage, need to expand the fur trade and the
urge to beat the British
January 1743 – Brothers Louis Joseph and
Francois Verendre, crossed the Dakota plains and
with a war party (Cheyenne or Crow) and saw
what they called the “Shining Mountains – “were
for the most part well wooded and with all kinds
of timber and appeared very high”
It is believed they were the Big Horn Range of
Wyoming and if so, they may have been the first
white men to enter Montana
According to historian, Joaquin Miller, Native
tribes also referred to the Rockies as “the
Shining” because of their glittering snow
Source: Malone & Roeder, Montana: A History of
Two Centuries (Seattle, 1976), 19-20.
Source: Joaquin Miller, An Illustrated History of
the State of Montana (Chicago, 1894), 9-10.
All photos courtesy of Travel Montana, Montana
Photo Gallery http://mt.gov/PhotoGallery/
Stubbed-Toe State
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First found in 1922 edition of the World Almanac
Dictionary of Americanisms’s – refers to
mountainous region of western Montana where
rocks might pose a hazard to novice hiker
Montana boosters distanced themselves from this
nickname
Source: Walter, “Chronological List”’ Mitford Mathews, A
Dictionary of Americanisms on Historical Principles
(Chicago, IL, 1951), 1667
1935: Life in Butte was High, Wide and
Occasionally Handsome 1940: Montana: High,
Wide and Handsome
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Per Glasscock’s book War of the Copper
Kings, life in Butte was high, wide and
occasionally handsome - may be
connected to the next way of describing
Montana
Montana: High, Wide and Handsome was
on the cover of a Montana Highway
Department publicity brochure in 1940 –
3 years prior to the publication of Joseph
Kinsey Howards’s book by the same name
Source: Brian Shovers From Treasure
State to Big Sky, Montana The Magazine
of Western History (Spring, 2003), 58-61.
Source: Butte photo from Big Sky
Fishing.com website
The Treasure State
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The Treasure State refers to the rich
gold and silver deposits mined in
Montana
The Treasure State nickname was first
used in an 1895 guidebook and
remained popular for several decades
Every Montana license plate made
between 1950 and 1966 included the
nickname The Treasure State
Big Sky Country
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In 1961, Jack Hallowell secured
permission from A. B. “Bud” Guthrie
to use “Big Sky” to promote tourism.
The Big Sky, title of Guthrie’s classic
novel of the America Fur Trade
originated with his editor Bill Sloane
Guthrie included in his biographical
notes a comment his father made
during his first day in Montana
“Standing under the big sky I feel
free”
Source: Hallowell to Shirley,
October 25, 1989, Charles Hood,
“Hard Work and Tough Dreaming:
A Biography of A. B. Guthrie, Jr.
(Master’s thesis, University of
Montana, 1969), 51
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1985: Montana: Naturally Inviting
1988: Montana: Unspoiled, Unforgettable
1995: EZ 2 LUV
In 1970’s Chet Huntley obtained
permission from the State of Montana to
name his new ski area near Bozeman Big
Sky Resort
Fearing the Montana nickname may be
confused with advertising for the popular
resort, state promoters sought a new
slogan
1985: Montana: Naturally Inviting
1988: Montana: Unspoiled,
Unforgettable
1995: EZ 2 LUV – derived from a
Montana State University student’s vanity
plate
Montana’s Nickname .. All of This and More!
Closing Thoughts
•I am in love with Montana For other
states I have admiration, respect,
recognition, even some affection but
with Montana it is love, and it is
difficult to analyze love when you are in
it – John Steinbeck Travels with Charley