Sorted by date Results 1 - 25 of 1827
Standing in a circle under an afternoon autumn blue sky, big fluffy clouds blocking the view here and there, the students of Swan Valley Elementary School were told to be a tree. More specifically, a model of a tree. Taylor Tewksbury, education program coordinator with Swan Valley Connections, explained that models are examples and scientists use them to understand something without, in a tree's case, needing to chop it down. Students made concentric circles of their classmates and were...
A grizzly bear was killed by a hunter on Saturday, Nov. 2 after an encounter south of Placid Lake in the Seeley-Swan Valley. The hunter reported the bear charging him at close distance, and he then shot and killed the bear. The hunter was not injured in the encounter. Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks wardens responded and confirmed the mortality of the adult male bear. No further management action by FWP is planned. This incident is still under investigation by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS), who also assisted with the response. Be...
Public Services • Alcoholics Anonymous (AA): Mon, 7pm, Holy Cross Lutheran Church, www.aa-montana.org • Missoula County Treasurer: 2nd & 4th Thurs, 9:30am – 3:30pm, closed for lunch 11:30 – 12:30, Satellite Office, 3360 Highway 83N • Montana Veterans Affairs Division: 3rd Wed, 10am-2pm, Citizens Alliance Bank. 406-721-1288 for apt. • Potomac Food Bank: Second to last Sunday each month, 5-7pm, Potomac Greenough Comm. Center • Seeley Lake Caregiver Support Group: Third Tues, 1-2pm, via ZOOM. For log in info call Missoula Aging Service the Wednesd... Full story
Local Government • Missoula County Commissioners Public Mtg, 2nd & 4th Thursdays, Courthouse Annex, Room 151, Missoula, 2pm. http://www.missoulacounty.us/government/administration/commissioners-office • Seeley Lake Community Council, 2nd Mon, 6pm, Seeley Lake Historical Museum & Visitors Center, 2920 Highway 83. For the agenda and virtual access visit the Facebook Page for Zoom link. http://www.missoulacounty.us/community/community-councils/seeley-lake-community-council • Swan Valley Community Council, 3rd Tues, 6pm, Swan Valley Commu... Full story
To commemorate the end of an era, the Pathfinder went back through the archives to find mentions of Pyramid Mountain Lumber all the way back to 1983 when the paper was published as The Valley Times. There aren't instances from each year since, mainly because we'd run out of space, and also because one gets the general gist from the compiled remarks. A main refrain after the announced closure of Pyramid Mountain Lumber on March 14 of this year was that it was the glue that held Seeley Lake...
Missoula, MT — Missoula Electric Cooperative (MEC) has secured a $6.6 million federal grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to improve wildfire protection and storm resilience in a portion of its service area. The grant is part of the Wildfire Assessment and Resilience for Networks (WARN) initiative, which will provide more than $145 million to enhance grid reliability in rural, high-risk regions across 16 central and western states. MEC’s project, Seeley-Swan Undergrounding for Wildfire and Storm Safety, will bury approximately 46...
On the coldest day of 2024, Montana's Poet Laureate Chris LaTray spoke in tandem with author Peter Stark at an Open Book Club event in Seeley Lake, lending an Indigenous perspective to Stark's latest book about the West. Those of us lucky enough to attend have been eagerly awaiting LaTray's return. Fresh from a nation-wide tour, Chris LaTray will be presenting his newest book, Becoming Little Shell, A Landless Indian's Journey Home at the Swan Valley Community Hall in Condon, Saturday, Nov. 9...
Maybe you opened your paper today thinking, I’m pretty sure the Pathfinder’s missing something. Don’t we have a new president? Statehouse representative? You’re probably right. Since our papers are printed on Mondays, it made for a very quiet Nov. 7 paper regarding election details. We sent the paper off to press before Election Day even began. I intend to publish a story online focusing on the statehouse races pertinent to the Seeley-Swan and Blackfoot Valleys on Wednesday or Thursday this week. But in the meantime, there are plenty of othe...
The Flathead National Forest has received an application from Eric Jacobsen and Thomas Knowles for a special use permit to operate Holland Lake Lodge with no proposed expansion. Private equity investors Jacobsen and Knowles held a meeting announcing their interest in purchasing the historic lodge in the Swan Valley in September and the Forest Service received notice of a purchase agreement between the two and the current holders of the lodge’s special use permit — longtime owner Christian Wohlfiel and POWDR, owner of ski resorts across the cou...
Thirty five years ago... Thursday Nov. 2, 1989 Citations issued in moose shootings; general doe season ended Sunday The general hunting season seems to be going along "pretty normal," according to FWP game warden Jay Haveman, except for a couple of moose that were shot. "It may have been mistaken identification," Haveman said, but he issued citations in both instances. "One involved a bull moose that was shot near Squeezer Creek, east of Goat Creek, in the upper Swan Valley," Haveman said. The...
On Tuesday, Oct. 22, 20 Missoula County officials participated in the “Swan Valley Community Conversation,” held at the Swan Valley Elementary School. The event, designed to foster communication between county government and the more outlying Swan Valley community, had a unique format and was met with positive reviews by attendees. Rather than a large open meeting, eight “stations” of citizens were seated at tables, and the officials rotated every 10 minutes, so that each group of three to five attendees had face-to-face interactions with re...
The northern lights have been visible in the Seeley-Swan Valley many times this year, including multiple times this month. Meteorologist Dave Noble, who works with the National Weather Service in Missoula, explained why the northern lights occur. "Occasionally we can have these explosions off the sun that are spewing plasma at a million miles an hour towards space, and sometimes they can be directed towards the earth," Noble said. "If it is carrying the right magnetic field with it, or the...
Folks who live in our Seeley-Swan Valley fall into several categories: old timers, newcomers, “medium timers” and people who returned after many years. One person who returned after many years was Mabel Stilwell. Born Mabel Lundberg in the Swan Valley in 1917, she may well have been the first baby of white settlers born in these parts. Let’s take a closer look at the Swan Valley during these years, and where Mabel’s life took her. During the years around Mabel’s birth, the Swan Valley had homesteaders moving in, drawn by the beauty and amaze...
The Forest Service received notification of a purchase agreement regarding Holland Lake Lodge between Eric Jacobsen, Great Falls native and current Utah resident, and longtime owner of the lodge and holder of its special use permit, Christian Wohlfeil, and POWDR on Oct. 11. POWDR, a company that owns and operates ski resorts across the country, owns about 20% of the assets of Holland Lake Lodge. A controversial plan to expand the lodge was rejected by the Forest Service last fall after being met with forceful local opposition. Ivy Gehling,...
Twenty years ago... Thursday Oct. 28, 2004 Who homesteaded here? Another reason to visit the Seeley Lake Museum Have you ever wondered who homesteaded the property where you live? Have you ever wondered if any of your family namesakes homesteaded in the valley? Now you can find out. The Seeley Lake Historical Society has a listing of all the people who successfully homesteaded in the Clearwater Valley. A project entitled “Who Homesteaded Here?” was completed with a grant from the Hansen Endowment Committee through the Wilderness Institute at...
The Missoula County Commissioners approved spending a portion of funds from a 2018 bond to preserve 158 acres in the Swan Valley for conservation. The funds made available in 2018 were part of a voter-approved open space bond measure. This bond provided $15 million that was to be used to enhance open space for purposes including access, agriculture, fish and wildlife habitat, rivers, streams and scenic views, per the ballot language. One way those purposes can be realized is through the...
Steve Lamar has only lived in these parts for 48 years. I asked him if he was a rich out-of-stater who doesn't understand our Montana values. He assured me he isn't running for political office. Perhaps you have heard of the Lamar Valley in Yellowstone National Park, the Lamar River or Lamar Mountain. An ancestor of Steve's was head of the Interior Department under Grover Cleveland. An army friend of Mr. Lamar was sent to the Yellowstone area to survey it and was given the responsibility of...
The Seeley-Swan Lady Blackhawks beat the Saint Regis Tigers, 3-0, in an intense game. After losing the games last week, the Blackhawks had a lot to prove. Hoping to take home victories this weekend, the girls walked onto the court confident that they'd walk over winners. Starting the first set on Oct. 10, the Tigers were leading, but with quick reflexes and smart play, the Blackhawks made a comeback. Kilty Hanson, a junior, got an ace, leading Seeley-Swan to win the first set, 25-23. The second...
Since its founding in 1993, Clearwater Montana Properties has emphasized community-building as a key component of its company culture. Through its Charitable Giving Program, the company's agents give back a portion of all real estate proceeds to the communities in which they were earned. To date, the program has produced over $1,248,284 in charitable donations to causes throughout Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, Washington and Wyoming. "Each year Clearwater and our agents give a portion of each...
Seeley Lake started off the homecoming weekend in style with a parade requested by student athletes and assembled by the newly re-established Seeley Swan Blackhawk Booster Club. Various official vehicles and floats with the football and volleyball team players drove down local roads for about 30 minutes to help get the town hyped for the football game later in the day on Oct. 4 and the volleyball game the day after. The booster club also sold burgers at the football game. Jamie Wood-Hanson,...
By reading the column “A Place for All” in the Pathfinder over the years, we can learn about the places, organizations and programs that make our valley a special place. We can remember what went on in the past underlies all of what we have now. In times like today with lots of changes happening, it’s important to look back at this history and ask ourselves a question. Is what we are today because of external — things from the outside -— or internal, driven by those who live here? The answer is both. Indigenous peoples were present in our ar...
Tour some of western Montana's most amazing artist studios while driving through the explosive fall color of our region's tamaracks during the 22nd annual Tour of the Arts. Alpine Artisans offers this self-guided artist studio tour on Oct. 12-13. Saturday hours are 10-5 p.m., and Sunday from 12-5 p.m. This free tour stretches from Condon through Seeley Lake to Ovando and Lincoln, Montana. The tour features 10 studios and galleries and over 25 artists showing and demonstrating their work...
The Seeley-Swan girls' volleyball team and boys' football team faced off against challenging teams on homecoming weekend. Playing against their toughest opponents yet, the pressure was on, and unfortunately, the teams came up short. Football On Oct. 4, the Seeley-Swan football team took on the Valley Christian Eagles. The Blackhawks entered the game undefeated at 5-0, the same as the Eagles. The Blackhawks knew this game would be the toughest they've faced all season, and anticipated an... Full story
Nearly 60 community members piled into Seeley Lake's Sullivan Community Hall last Tuesday evening to hear what the people vying to represent them in Helena had to say. Sponsored by the Seeley Swan Pathfinder, the candidate debate, moderated by editor Keely Larson, starred seven hopeful state representatives and senators, plus written statements shared aloud by Larson from one absent candidate. Audience members, about a third of whom wore bright red "Ted Morgan" t-shirts in support of House...
In 2020 Montanans elected a super-majority of Republicans to govern our Last Best Place. Republicans currently control every branch of government. The consequences of that election cost ordinary Montanans dearly. Homeowners saw huge property tax increases. Housing costs increased and that burden is passed on to renters. Our utility rates were also raised by 28% by a Republican dominated Public Service Commission. Montanans are understandably upset about being priced out of our homes. Who is getting blamed for this catastrophic mess? Montana...
