The course of Montana’s history changed in 1862 because of a few weathered wooden buildings that were standing beside Grasshopper Creek. Prospectors discovered rich deposits of gold in the area and established Bannack, the territory’s first major mining town. Thousands of miners, merchants, and fortune seekers poured into the remote settlement within months, and transformed it into one of the busiest places in the northern Rockies. But the boom would not last. As richer discoveries pulled miners elsewhere, Bannack’s population steadily declined until it became one of the best-preserved ghost towns in the American West. Montana ended up designating Bannack as a state park in 1954 rather than allowing the site to disappear, which preserved dozens of original structures that continue to tell the story of the Gold Rush. According to Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks , Bannack State Park now contains more than 50 historic buildings, making it one of the country’s most complete surviving frontier towns.
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