Choteau Cemetery is one of the oldest public spaces in Teton County as it dates to the platting of the town itself in 1883.
The beautiful, well manicured grounds of today did not always exist. For the first four decades the county “kept” the cemetery but merely as a burial ground for residents and the poor (the county bought 10 plots for indigent burials in 1895).
In 1927, during a decade of beautification efforts happening in towns, schools, and ranches across the country, city officials decided to introduce a levy to pay for the irrigation of the cemetery and the planting of a beautiful grove of trees to further dignify this community place.
In 1928 the city purchased lawn seed and acquired the first set of saplings to plant. Thoughtfully maintained ever since, even when with some controversy cemetery leaders removed 70 diseased trees in 2015, the Choteau Cemetery is an impressive sight, and worth a thorough investigation as it approaches its 100th year as an irrigated public property.
There is a range of fraternal markers from the early 20th century.
There are delicately carved stones in Victorian themes reflective of the Civil War era.
And as you expect there are veterans of the US Army from the Civil War and all subsequent wars buried here.
Then there are those markers that hint at a bigger story and you miss you knew more, such as this blending of the pillow and heart motifs for Mary McDonough and erected by Minnie Reese.
The cemetery is large but not overwhelming. Its straight forward linear design and rectangular shape are common. But the evident care and commitment of today’s residents to the past is commendable and worthy of note.
One of my favorite county seats is Choteau, where U.S. Highways 89 and 287 meet. Both of those roads were and are among my favorite to take in the state, and Choteau I quickly found had one of my favorite local dives the Wagon Wheel. Back in the day, however, I did not appreciate how the town’s history and built environment was shaped by the Sun River Irrigation project and the overall growth in the county during the first two decades of the 20th century and later a second boom in the 1940s.
Choteau has a different look than most towns from this era of Montana history. The centerpiece of the towns plan is not a railroad depot but the magnificent Teton County Courthouse (1906), which occupies a spot where the two federal highways junction. Designed by architects Joseph B. Gibson and George H. Shanley, the National Register-listed courthouse is made of locally quarried stone in a late interpretation of Richardsonian Romanesque style, similar to, but to a much lesser scale and detail, than H. H. Richardson’s own Allegheny County Courthouse (c. 1886) in Pittsburgh.
This historic neoclassical-styled bank building is now home to a coffee shop but other commercial buildings have changed very little, except for the mix of retail business. This is not a dying business district but one with a good bit of jump, of vitality.
where the historic Bella Vista Motel–a perfect example of a 1950s motel with separate units like tiny Ranch-styled houses–has given way to a c. 2015 conversion into apartments.
Montana's Historic Landscapes 