Old Missoula

NP Concentrates on Bringing New Settlers Into This Area

With the close of World War 1 and the approach of a new decade, the Northern Pacific resumed in earnest the job of bringing more settlers into the Missoula area.

The history of Northern Pacific’s settlement and agricultural development activities in the Missoula area in the 1920s and 1930s is largely the history of the railway itself in this area during this period. Without agriculture there would have been no settlers, and without people there would have been little need for a railroad.

An agrarian economy is most quickly established in any territory that has arable lands. Thus, it was toward this end that the railway now directed its efforts.

The fertile lands of the five great valleys which stretch out from Missoula were still comparatively sparsely settled in the early twenties. More people were needed to farm these lands and the railway joined other community agencies to help introduce prospective settlers to the area.

Two men, who are remembered by many who settled in the Missoula area, are the late W. C. Larsen and his brother, Peter, who joined the NP as immigration agents in 1924 after having been in the real estate business in Charlo. Setting up shop in an old railway dining car, spotted on a side track at Charlo, these men for more than a decade devoted most of their time toward settlement of the Flathead project. L. A. Campbell of Polson, for many years NP agricultural development agent at Missoula, was also active in land development work during this time.

Numerous tours bringing prospective land buyers and farmers to the Flathead Valley on inspection trips were organized. Many of those who came liked what they saw and stayed. A good number of the farmers who settled in the valley came from the Snake River Valley in Idaho. There were men who were experienced in irrigation which had been under way for many years in the Snake River Valley. But there was no more irrigable land in that area and these second generation irrigation farmers were looking for new lands to farm. Many of them chose the Flathead.

In 1923, about the time NP began this colonization effort, there were only 786 farms on the Flathead irrigation project, there were 1,828 people on those farms and 19,741 acres under irrigation. By 1939 there were 1,932 farms with 4,654 people living on them and 76,246 acres under irrigation.

The railway was also active during this time in settlement and development of agriculture in the Bitter Root Valley. In 1928, a 25-mile relocation of the Bitter Root branch line between Florence and Hamilton was carried out. The line was moved from the east to the west side of the river where more irrigable lands were available.