May 2nd

A quick aside about “casinos”. I have visited on my trip Atlantic City and Las Vegas, the only two cities where gambling was legal during a good bit of our lifetimes. Now of course we have reparations to Native Americans like Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun and all the states that have legalized it – even Massachusetts. But when I arrived in Montana, every third building on main streets had “Casino” on their sign – gentlemen’ clubs, restaurants, liquor stores, gas stations. When my Howard Johnson (!) motel last night also listed it on its sign, I asked the desk clerk. He said that it’s the keino type games we have in bars, that all “casinos” in the state have to offer the exact same games and the only places you can play roulette, craps etc. Are the real casinos on Indian reservations.

After my singular focus on Glacier NP Wednesday, yesterday I had a variety of activities in the greater Helena area. I went to a mining museum with a “Ghost Town Hall of Fame” on the wall – this added to my appreciation of how the search for gold, silver, copper and all kinds of other valuable minerals led to the growth of the West. Another key factor was raising cattle to feed the country – I went on a tour of the Grant-Kohrs Ranch, one of the largest in the mountain states. I crossed the Continental Divide on a mountain pass leading into Helena – see pictures. The State Capitol building had a lot of Western art, including a large painting in the house chamber of Lewis and Clark meeting a tribe in current-day Montana. The Montana Historical Society museum around the corner had good exhibits about the original residents and the American settlers in the land known as the Big Sky. I ended the day hiking up near the tree line in Helena National Forest.

Today’s song is “Meet me in Montana” by Dan Seals and Marie Osmond.