Southern Flint Creek Valley

The Philipsburg the panel calls important by the 1880s was carried by a mine four miles up the mountain. Charles McLure of Philipsburg's Hope Mill took an option on the Granite Mountain property in 1880, and local tradition holds that the backers' order to quit arrived by a delayed telegram after the last blast had struck the bonanza. From 1885 to 1893 the mine yielded about $20 million in silver, and its company town of Granite held some 3,000 people. When Congress repealed the Sherman Silver Purchase Act in 1893, the mine shut and the town emptied almost overnight.

What the plaque says

Southern Flint Creek Valley The Flint Creek Valley has, according to archeologists, been the home to humans for around 10,000 years. Fur trappers and traders frequented the valley in the early 19th century. Prospectors discovered gold in the Granite Mountains and on Henderson Gulch in the early 1860s. Founded in 1864, Philipsburg became an important mining camp in Montana by the 1880s. In 1865, the Stone stage station was established near here on the road between Philipsburg and the Mullan road junction near Drummond. By the early 1880s, the stage stop included a post office, school, store, and boarding house. After the construction of the Drummond-Philipsburg branch of the Northern Pacific Railroad in 1887, this part of the valley became important for the productivity of its farms and ranches. Named for pioneers Henry and Julia Byrne Hall, the community of Hall was an important agricultural center in the valley and a shipping point for the farm and ranch products raised there. The town thrived until the economic depression following the First World War caused Hall's bank to close. The history and verdant beauty of the Flint Creek Valley is a lasting monument to pioneer vision and enterprise.

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• Madison Limestone and the Garnet Mountains — 11 mi