Western Montana

Located across the street from the Old Montana Prison is the Powell County Historical Museum. My friend and I decided to take in a little more history about the area after our tour of the prison. We walked in to the Powell County Museum and were greeted by 3 people, one of them being a former counselor for the prison. He shared some stories about the prison and informed us that we were standing in the old women’s prison after they had moved the women out of the main prison. He also told us about some of the guns in the museum. The gun displays were quite extensive, including several from Germany, England and the United States, many from World War I & II. The display was mostly handguns with a few shotguns thrown into the mix.

We moved into the second room and found a massive, and I mean massive display of salt and pepper shakers. I found this interesting because I have a really bad habit of collecting things and this was obliviously something that would grab my attention. I probably spent more time looking at the salt and pepper shakers than anything else in the museum. After I pulled myself away from the shakers I found a few other displays of furniture from the earlier times, including a classic hand cranked washing machine.

Once we had completed the tour around the museum we went to Cottonwood City, a replica of a 1858 town including a old school house, blacksmith shop, jail, a post office and an old cabin. Cottonwood City is located next to the Powell County Museum. The school house and the cabin were relocated to Cottonwood from near Avon Montana. The cabin was restored by three sisters along with the museum. The sisters filled the cabin with their family’s artifacts to give it a more authentic look. The cabin had a book for visitors to sign, which ironically as we were from out of town, the last people who had signed the book were from our home town, about 7 hours away in Idaho!

If you would like to visit the Powell County Historical Museum or Cottonwood City they are free of charge with your ticket from the Old Montana Museum. The museum is open from noon to 6pm daily and is located at 1106 Main street.