Joe & Wilma's Excellent Adventures

 Saturday, June 15, 2024

Today, we got up with the intention of picking up where we left off yesterday -- in other words, going to the "Beneath the Streets of Havre" "museum. Because of our poor planning yesterday, we had to drive 10 miles west this morning back to Havre to go through the underground museum, and then 10 miles east of the campground to Chinook to go to the Chief Joseph Museum. After our McDonald's stop, where we saw this strange-looking rabbit, we got our day started.

 The history here is that there was a fire, started by a couple of drunks who got thrown out of a bar and went outside and started a fire.  That fire destroyed 6 blocks of the town of Havre.  There were underground steam tunnels under the town, and a lot of the businesses had basements.  So, in order to get their businesses back up and running, they rebuilt "Beneath the Streets."  So this is now a museum, some of the artifacts are original, many have been donated and added over time.  This tour lasted about an hour and actually took us into the tunnels and through some of the businesses, and other businesses that were added later.  Some of the timber still remains.

These operated between 1904 and 1920-1930.  This town has a rough history, Milk River flooded the town in 1938 and 1952, but it seems to be thriving today.  Although we did notice that there were probably more casinos than any other business.

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Complete model railroad.  Havre is very big on railroad history.

The Sporting Eagle Saloon (there were many, back in the day) with poker tables.  This was a turn-of-the-century honky tonk where cowboys gambled, kicked up their heels and drank good old-fashioned frontier rot-gut.  Beer was 30 cents.

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A brothel.  This brothel had 20 "cribs, and a bouncer kept things under control.  The "ladies" were known by number, not name.

Some of their dresses.

This is a "wheel barrow" made out of a barrel.  Probably how it gots its name, but the spelling was changed?

A photo of Havre after it was rebuilt.  The stores are now made of brick, although the floors are still wood.

The furniture has been moved around and stuffed in different rooms, but there were many businesses represented.  

Of course, there was also an opium den, and a bed to lie in until they recovered from their high.  There was also a gurney in here.

And a Chinese laundry.

These were called "First Call Transfer Baskets," not coffins, and were used to transfer the body to the funeral home.

 

I think this was at the blacksmith shop.

Well, it turned out. The Buffalo jump wasn’t in Chinook. It was back in Havre, but we did do the Blaine County Museum, and watched the video "Forty Miles from Freedom," a documentary film about the Battle of Bear Paw and the Nez Perce Flight of 1877.  This museum had other sections, including a dinosaur exhibit, some Indian stuff, some church stuff.  

This is a woman's sidesaddle.  I don't know if I had ever seen one of these before, even a modern one.

These are the original furnishings from the Fairview Catholic Mission Church

We had to wait a few minutes for the 20-minute video (which wasn't exactly right).  The video had blank spaces, where the picture below would like up depicting the battle.  That was a little disappointing.  But this very nice bronze exhibit of the battle was outside the theater.  

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 We went back to the RV and had a little rain storm with lots of wind so we had to bring the slides in on the camper. We took a little break but the wind was so bad I couldn't sleep. The awning covers were flapping so badly it was like something was pounding on the side of the rv.  We drove back to town and out to the Buffalo Jump, but it was closed. 

We didn't realize there is actually a tour.

This is the cliff behind the building.  The person at the Museum in Chinook said there was a better buffalo jump in Great Falls, so we will try to check that out.

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We had dinner at the Mexican restaurant, Guadalajara, again and then went back out on our evening drive to see if there were animals hiding in that brush we saw yesterday. We left town about 6:45 and saw a coyote (could have been a wolf) before we actually got into the park. 

It started drizzling on us again. The temperature had dropped about 11° after our afternoon thunderstorm. 

This is a really pretty drive.  The mountains are green-covered slopes, occasionally a grove of trees, the pretty Beaver Creek tumbling alongside the road, and wildflowers.

This drive was more productive that the one we went on yesterday afternoon.  We saw: 

10 deer

4 turkeys (one was a big, old Tom)

and the coyote (wolf)

Of course, we didn't stick to the pavement.  Joe found a few more dirt roads to check out.  After the rain, we were slipping and sliding on this wet dirt road.

Joe spotted some trees that looked like beavers had been chewing on, but we did not ever see any evidence of beaver huts, and these trees were a little ways from the creek.  Would have loved to see a beaver in action here.

We got back to town about 9:30, not quite dark.  But it was soooo windy -- 20mph with wind gusts up to 37.  We are in for a rough night.

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Beaver Creek..

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