Old Missoula

Missoula Man Writes Letter To A Friend In Nebraska

Carl T. Seeley in a recent letter to the Madison, Nebraska, Star, gives the people of that section of the country some idea of what Missoula is and what can be found here and in the vicinity. He says:

I always did like Madison and her people better than any place I ever lived in, until I came to Montana. But I believe I like it better in Missoula than I ever did in Madison. This is the garden spot of Montana and is beautifully situated in a verdant valley, nearly surrounded by lofty mountains. The valley proper is about 75 miles long, by from two to six miles wide and is watered by the Bitter Root [and] Missoula rivers. Many little valleys branch off from the Bitter Root and the products of their soil is something truly remarkable. The finest wheat, oats, barley, rye, blue grass, clover, timothy and alfalfa grow luxuriantly while there is nothing in the vegetable line but what can be grown to perfection and in mammoth proportions. But it is in the production of fruit that this part of Montana particularly shines. Such apples, pears, plums and berries I never saw anywhere and I have traveled around considerable in my time. We have strawberries here from June till October. I noticed last fall when I wrote about the fair here and told about the strawberries on exhibition, the Norfolk News intimated that I was prevaricating. But I wasn’t. There are little ranches away up in the mountains and the higher up they are located the later the berries are grown. That is the only solution of the matter I know of. Of course they are not plentiful so late in the fall.

Well, Doc, I didn’t start out to write up the productiveness of Montana, but to tell of a little outing my bother-in-law, W. A. Buswell, (you remember him, the optician who occasionally visited Madison), and myself took last week up the Rattlesnake creek for trout. Buswell has developed into a first-class amateur photographer, and he never goes out of town without his trusty kodak. He can shoot better with that than with any other kind of weapon, as the sequel proves. When we were about three miles from town and industriously engaged in pulling speckled trout from the roaring waters of Rattlesnake creek, we happened to glance above and across the stream and there in full view stood a magnificent specimen of the Rocky Mountain lion. He looked as big as an elephant to me, but Buswell declares the animal wasn’t much bigger than a cow. We were partly hidden by boulders, and the great cat evidently could not make out just what species we belonged to, and did not run away at first. In fact I began to be afraid he wouldn’t run away at all, and was almost wishing I was a fish so I could dive out of sight, when Buswell grabbed his kodak and got a snap shot at the lion, and I send you his photo herewith. I had a 38-calibre revolver with me, but as the trout I had just pulled out was so big that he almost gave me nervous prostration to land him, I handed the gun to my valorous brother-in-law and told him to be sure and hit the lion in the eye, so as not to injure the beautiful skin. Buswell rested the gun over the big rock you see in the picture, took careful aim and blazed away. But say, Doc, I don’t believe he came within 50 feet of him, and the wonder to me is that he got such an excellent shot with his kodak. When the pistol cracked the lion gave a roar that almost threw me into the creek, and with a bound disappeared in the forest. Although I should have liked getting that lion’s skin above all things I was real glad when he went away in the opposite direction, for if he had come over the creek he certainly would have spoiled our fishing. At least we would have lost all interest in piscatorial pursuits in the more strenuous effort to outrun each other back to town.

I bought a handsome pair of horns from an Indian the other day and will send them to you when I get something to go with them.

The above letter appeared in The Daily Missoulian on August 24, 1902.

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Carl Seely’s name was spelled differently in an obituary for him, which appeared in The Daily Missoulian in 1925 (see below). He had a long career in the newspaper business and was a devoted fisherman as the above article above attests.

 

Carl T. Seely Dies at Long Beach, Washington.

Carl T. (Dad) Seely, veteran Missoula printer, died suddenly at Long Beach, Wash., Thursday. News of his death was received yesterday morning by his son, Thomas Seely. Mr. Seely died suddenly, although he had been in poor health for more than a year. A month ago with Mrs. Seely he went to Washington in the hope that the change of climate would improve his health. The message received yesterday said the body would be sent from Astoria, Saturday to Madison, Neb., the old home, where he will be buried.

Besides the wife, Mr. Seely is survived by two sons and a daughter. They are Thomas of Missoula, Paul of Omaha and Mrs. W. E. Wells of Red Oak, Iowa.

Long Service Here.

Only within the last few months did Mr. Seely reluctantly give up his work as a printer after nearly 55 years devoted to the trade. Nearly 20 years of that time was spent with the Missoulian Publishing company.

Mr. Seely was born in Minnesota in 1852. He set his first type on April 1, 1871, on the Sioux City, Iowa, Daily Times. After one year he went to The Daily Journal of the same city, where he finished his apprenticeship. From there he went to Lincoln, Neb., where he held “cases” on The State Journal for nine months and then went to Omaha, where he was foreman of the newsroom of The Daily Republican for three years. He also worked on The Bee and The World-Herald of that city.

Buys Paper at Madison, Neb.

After working on several other newspapers in Nebraska and Iowa he finally settled at Madison, Neb., where, after working for The Chronicle for 10 years, he purchased the paper and published it more or less successfully for seven years.

During the Spanish-American war Mr. Seely was for three years deputy collector of internal revenue for the northern part of Nebraska, but still kept in the newspaper business as a side issue.

He came to Missoula in 1901 and established a small advertising sheet known as “Every Saturday,” which he conducted for three years, when he sold his plant to the Missoulian Publishing company and himself entered its employ and had been with them ever since, though during the past few years he had not worked steadily. For a couple of years he resided in the Orchard Homes district, where he engaged in poultry raising and truck gardening, but two years ago he moved back to the city and resided on Beckwith avenue.

Mr. Seely was an ardent fisherman and he found his principal diversion along the trout streams of western Montana, where he was known as a successful angler. Much of his time during the month spent in Washington was devoted to this sport.

The above obituary appeared in The Daily Missoulian on July 25, 1925.

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Carl Seely’s son, Thomas C. Seely, was also a resident of Missoula for most of his life, and spent 43 years as a Missoulian pressman. He married Helen Lombard, the daughter of early Missoula dentist, Dr. Charles Lombard. They were parents of two children. He died in Missoula in 1960.

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