No Hangin’ Tree ’round These Parts

Most Old West towns grew up helter-skelter around mines or along cattle trails. But Great Falls, named for a spectacular series of waterfalls clustered along a short stretch of the Missouri River in central Montana, was different. “The beautiful thing about Great Falls is that it was established with a thought for the future,” says Megan Trent, the archives administrator for the town’s history museum. William J. Furdell, who wrote a popular history of the town, proudly described it as a