About Big Arm - History

Downtown Big Arm, circa 1912

• The United States Government named the new town site Big Arm because it lay on the “big arm” of the Flathead Lake.

• The Reservation was opened to homesteader in 1910 and 1911.  Claims were 40 to 160 acre farm units in an area of 645 acres.

• Six or seven tribal families were already living in the area. 

• Claim number one was owned by Pat Quigley.

• There was a population at this time of 640 people.
  

• Businesses included:

  • The Blacksmith shop was operated by Mr. and Mrs. Clarence Sterling

  • Bakery operated by widow Owings and daughter Margaret

  • J.O. Rude and Sons Hardware Store

  • Restaurant operated by the Neising family

  • Paint Shop operated by Ebineezer Park

  • Restaurant operated by the Foltz family

  • Attorney at Law was John P Swee

  • Furniture store and Mortuary operated by the Dawson Brothers

  • Dr. Powell was the village Doctor

  • Barber shop run by the Thorbans

  • Livery Stable and Stage Line to Hot springs run by Mr. Bramer

  • Photo Shop run by Bill Baumert

  • Virgil Holman was the Land Locator, helping homesteaders with their claims

  • Lumber Yard operated by Bill Hennessey

  • Butcher Shop operated by Jack Hennessey

  • Verge McCoy operated a Pool and Dance Hall

  • Mr Brodrick was a Butcher

  • Abbey Rude operated another Barber Shop

  • A second Grocery Store was operated by Retz and Goff

  • A Curio Shop run by the Copelands

  • General Merchandise Store operated by Mr Thorban

  • A new two story Lake Hotel was run by Mr. and Mrs. Jack White

  • The Rocky Mountain Elevator Company had a grain elevator and load chute that loaded onto barges

  • Bill Howell operated the Dock and Warehouse which was built by the whole community

  • A Harness, Hardware and Implement Business was run by O.A. Knox

  • Miss Marion Lamb was the first  Postmistress and also ran a General Merchandise Store

  • C.E. Vert was the best Model T Mechanic

  • Reverend McVey Fisher, a Presbyterian Minister, Reverend Guinn, a Methodist, and the Reverend Elder, who also served as a school teacher were the first ministers for the new Catholic and Protestant churches

  • Mrs Howe was a trained Nurse and Artist

  • Benjamin H. Walker  was the local Tanner and entertained folks with the fiddle and piano

  • Bill Sweet, Fred Bauchman and Dave Winchel were the best Carpenters

  • The Big Arm Graphic a Weekly Paper was published by C.M. Copeland
    
    

• Billie Olds was the first to irrigate using the lake waters

• The laws forbade the sale of liquor on the Reservation for 20 years.

• The Big Arm and Loon Lake built a rural telephone line and the Model T cars came with the telephone.

• Automobiles were not taxed or licensed. There were no roads.

• Big Arm had a ball park one mile wide and two miles long and was sometimes used as a racetrack.

• Tobogganing and ice skating were the prime winter sports.

• Homesteading problems were drought,  tormenting flies, wild herds of horses, neighbor’s cows and goats running wild through the town site and very destructive gophers.

• The first few years of homesteading produced abundant crops including 1916  when the crops were bountiful, but later years pro­duced very little and the grain elevator was torn down

• According to Ida Buchholz in her "History of the Buchholz Family" by 1925 there were very few people living in Big Arm, only one store, McDonald’s Mercantile, and a blacksmith's shop run by C.L. Sterling.

(The above information was taken from the book "In The Shadow of the Missions" compiled by Inez Siegrist and the Publication Committee. The chapter on Settling of Big Arm was written by Roberta Culp)