A combination of color and content that outlines the early labor and political movements in Butte and Western Montana.

A Marshall is riding through town on a stagecoach and just happens to stop in a small town that has a big secret. As the townspeople become more and more nervous, he realizes that they are hiding something. A secret that could cost him his life. This was the first Lewis B. Patten book I read and it is excellent. If you like Louis L'Amour you will like Patten. His characters are believable. Great book.

Crested Butte Singletrack by Holly Annala is the authoritative guide to mountain biking throughout the Gunnison Valley. I highly recommend owning this guide before setting out on your next ride, whether a visitor to the area or a local.
As a Crested Butte resident, Holly provides a detailed local's perspective to the best riding opportunities in this breathtaking region. I found each trail to be well documented with directions to the trailhead, detailed mileage logs and topographic maps.
As an added bonus, the guidebook was smartly designed to fit nicely into waterpacks.

Good Research, valuable information. This book combines fascinating folk stories with impressive facts. Genealogists say it doesn't matter how well the stories are told, the important thing is to tell them. Lois barton not only told them, but told them well. Dan Sellard, The Eugene Register-Guard

Spirit Tailings recounts tales of hauntings in three of Montana's mining towns. The author, a historical researcher, has done considerable investigation into the background of the hauntings. Not content with legend, she has sought out present-day witnesses wherever possible, and also recounts her own eerie experiences in some of the buildings. Well-written and at times absolutely chilling!

Butte, Montana, has a rich history with stories that just seem too preposterous to be true! ("Copper Camp" written in 1930's is good example).

Michael Malone, a historian at Montana State in Bozeman, must have felt the same way. He did some good, scholarly research, and found out that many of the wild tales WERE true!

The book is VERY readable, almost like a novel, filled with some wild stories about how the three "Copper Kings" (Butte's version of "Robber Barons") worked, wheeled, dealed, cheated, competed and conspired to make as much money as they could from "the richest hill on earth."

In the mix are many stories about the everyday Butte residents, who, to this day, are actually friendly, big-hearted people...who put their hearts and backs into the building of the town.

Butte, Montana truly is "as ugly as sin" (quickly verified by any who has been there), "and just as fascinating."

This is a highly readable and well-researched account of what must be one of the most fascinating towns in the United States. As anyone who has visited Butte can attest, the town possesses a cultural richness and idiosyncratic character unmatched anywhere in the US west, maybe the whole country, and Malone's book captures this nicely. I particularly enjoyed the discussion of political machinations in Montana around the turn of the century, which make today's politics look anemic by comparison. If you have any interest at all in Montana/western history, political economy, mining or politics, I couldn't recommend this book more highly.

Probably no book can do full justice to Butte, Montana which, for 50 years up to the start of World War II, was the most interesting city in America. While Butte was a wide open, boisterous mining town with illegal gambling and prostitution operating openly and unabashedly, it had vast flocks of fervent church goers and it managed to nourish its small pockets of refined culture and art. Butte had its millionaires, its poor, its highly diversified foreign cultures yet proudly asserting it Grand Americanism.

With all of that, Butte was ugly, seared grey by acid fumes from smelters; it perched on a hillside spiked by mines gallows and blemished by countless yellowish mounds of ore tailings as if the earth had spilled out its guts like vomit.

Mary Murphy's book, Mining Cultures; Men, Women and Leisure in Butte, 1914-41 does an admirable job of touring around the edges of what was Butte during those years. She got at only the edges for those are the limits she set for herself. Well researched and documented, she was careful not to report her numbers in boring, mind-numbing detail and she served them up garnished by an assortment of interesting and revealing anecdotes.

Ms. Murphy's book is a valuable addition to a pitifully small collection of works on a city which deserves greater study.

This is a fascinating look at changing manners and mores in a major industrial community during the two decades between the two World Wars. The city which Murphy dissects, Butte (Mt.), adds its own quirky character to this study. But you don't need to know much about Butte or mining to enjoy Murphy's engaging style, entertaining anecdotes, and keen insights about a turbulent period of social and economic change in urban America.

Set in Butte, Montana during the depression, this story is still VERY different from Dallas' Persian Pickle Club of the same era. Whippy Bird and Effa Commander and their friend May Anna meet as childhood friends, and quickly become the Unholy Three. The story revolves around the successful careers of May Anna and Buster, and all of their life journeys of the Unholy ones as they continue down many forks in the road. Whippy and Effa are two unforgettable, completely distinctive characters that the reader just can't help but loving and feeling almost like they are eccentric family members. Perseverence of the spirit and the triumph of friendship (as well as the betrayal) shine through in this very unconventional tale.

Sandra Dallas does a wonderful job of engaging the reader in this work, keeps the pace lively yet does not invite you to jump ahead. Set in Butte, MT, the story is about three girls (The Unholy Three) growing up in the hell-roaring days of mining in Montana. The relationships forged become life long friendships, strained and estranged by hard life, war, and death. One of the three becomes a teen prostitute and goes on to movie stardom. The touching account of the lives and relationships between these girls will make you laugh and make you cry. Anyone from Montana or familiar with Butte should enjoy this book. An excellent use of the language from Butte and accurate depictions of the characters. Native to Montana and married to a daughter of the Anaconda company, I gotta say both my wife and I loved this book!

I have read The Persian Pickle Club, The Diary of Mattie Spencer and finally Buster Midnight's Cafe. They were all terrific but Buster Midnight's Cafe is my favorite. I laughed and cried and hated for the book to end. Sandra Dallas has written a wonderful book about life-long friendships that grow stonger despite life's hardships. The character Effa Commander writes and reflects back on growing up in the small town of Butte and the different paths taken by those in her group of friends. The support and love they have for one another is unconditional and never ending. A truly enjoyable read!

A well-organized and informative record of West River South Dakota pioneer families and events. Easy reading with plenty of information, yet condensed enough to really enjoy. If your family roots are in Butte/Harding County, you'll find them here! What a treat!

Having grown up in Butte Montana and being very familiar with Ms. Finns work, I cannot say enough about how valuable this book is in terms of telling the long-untold story of women in the mining community.

Her intense and thorough research is extraordinary and her heartfelt personal connection to the subjects she deals with make it an engrossing book. I recommend it to all who would understand the universal plight of women creating culture in a society which chose to largely ignore them - a society that could not have existed without them and their heroic efforts.