GOLD CREEK, Montana Community Information

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  Gold Creek Church

  Photo courtesy: MTOT

On September 8, 1883, Henry Villard, president of the Northern Pacific Railroad, came to Gold Creek to drive the iron spike that completed the line that linked the West Coast with the East.

This spot, at the junction of Gold Creek and the Clark Fork River, is claimed to be the scene of the first gold discovery in Montana; however, "no one has been able to establish exactly who discovered the first gold in Montana or where. Francois Finley, better known as Benetsee, is said to have brought a teaspoon of gold dust into Fort Connah to Angus McDonald in 1850 and reported that he had gotten it at the present site of Gold Creek, near Garrison" (Toole). The Gold Creek area was originally called the Benetsee Creek area. Nothing was done to develop it until James and Granville Stuart began working there. On May 8, 1862, they set up the first sluices in Montana near the head of Gold Creek. A letter written by the Stuarts to their brother Thomas in Colorado advising him to join them started a small rush to Montana.(from Cheney's Names on the Face of Montana, Mountain Press Publishing Company)