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Garnet, Montana, part 5

© Mary Trotter Kion

One very necessary business that is required in any frontier town, including Garnet, Montana, was a blacksmith shop. The blacksmith was housed in the building (see first photo in part 1) that is just barely visible behind the two tall pines in front of the hotel. The smithy opened sometime between 1896 and 1900. Billy Liberty was the blacksmith and it was said that Liberty was the best. Billy made just about everything from horseshoes to ore wagons. When he wasn't working in his forge he drove ore wagons to the mills. Later, in the early 1920s, Billy Liberty drove the stage to Bearmouth for Frank Davey.

Another necessity in any new, or old, town such as Garnet, Montana was a jail. The folks of Garnet erected one, off to the right of town, in 1897. It seems that the town of Garnet was a rarity among other mining towns of the era in that its jail was seldom used. Sure, in the town's early days, there were a few fusses stirred up. But mostly trouble stemmed from shootings and problems with claim jumpers, but the town folks seemed more inclined to work the problems out themselves than to rely on the law. One fellow, Frank Kearn, did cool his heals there for a while. It seems he over indulged in some liquid entertainment one night and killed someone's dog.

Somewhat off to the right of where the business houses and miners' cabins, and a bit into the woods and on the far side of a bridged gulch, a school was built in 1897. In 1902, Pearl Wood was the teacher. In 1938, another building on about the same site replaced the old school.

Garnet did have one feature that made it somewhat unique among mining towns-a Honeymoon Cabin. Like many of the other buildings in Garnet, the Honeymoon Cabin was built between 1896 and 1900. It was built by a miner on Frank Davey's land. Davey took over the cabin, in 1917, when the miner left and began letting newlyweds live in it, rent-free. The rule was that the couple could live there until there was a more recent newlywed couple in need of lodging. Then the new couple had use of the cabin under the same situation. Evidently Frank Davey wasn't all bad as some of the earlier residents of the town seemed to think. Perhaps he had mellowed some by 1917.