Things You'll Need:
- Camera
- Binoculars
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Step 1
Find the tiny town of Ekalaka. Ekalaka is the home of the Carter County Museum. This museum was the first one chartered in Montana. The museum has one of the three duck-billed dinosaur skeletons in the world today. Ekalaka is one of 15 stops and is located on the Montana Dinosaur Trail. It is also a replica of some of Montana's early towns. Take a drive through Medicine Rocks State Park, which is between Ekalaka and Baker. The name comes from the fact that the early American Indians thought this area was "good medicine." Get your water container filled with the water from Medicine Rocks spring. Find it near the entrance to the Medicine Rock State Park.
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Step 2
Turn around on Highway 7, toward Baker. Go North. Find Wibaux. "We-bow," as it is pronounced, is where the President Theodore Roosevelt spent his early days.
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Step 3
Get back on I-94. Go west and stop in Glendive. Take time to explore the Makoshika Dinosaur Museum. Ask about the "paleo-kids" program that provides an opportunity to dig for some fossils. Montana's biggest State Park is just a short trip away. Visit the place where the North American Dinosaurs were found. This place is called Makoshika. See the paddlefish at the visitor center there.
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Step 4
Travel on and visit Terry, Montana, the place that was home to Evelyn Cameron, a famous 19th century pioneer/photographer. She shot hundreds of negatives that recorded the times and the lives of people who lived around the area in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Her photo's helped to create a better understanding of how people lived in Montana in the pioneer days. Some of the glass photo negatives are on display in the Pioneer Museum located in Terry. Forty-seven of her more than 2000 photographs are shown at the Arlee Historical Society Museum in Arlee, not far from Terry.
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Step 5
Continue on to Miles City, Montana. The "Custer's Last Stand" Massacre ended with the creation of new forts in eastern Montana. Fort Keogh began as a few winter cabins, and Nelson Miles as its captain. "Miles City" was named after this captain. The first open ranges in livestock began in the late 1880s, and the railroad extended in this area. The Texas drives of many cattle to Miles City created rapid growth of the area until the 1920s when Billings, Montana, began to provide more jobs because an oil refinery was built there.
