From the stately Queen Anne mansions of the West Side to the hastily constructed shanties of Cabbage Patch, Lost Butte, Montana traces the city's history through its architectural heritage. This book includes such highlights as the Grand Opera House, once graced by entertainers and cultural icons like Charlie Chaplin, Sarah Bernhardt and Mark Twain; the infamous brothels protested by reformer Carrie Nation, wielding her hatchet and sharp tongue; and the Columbia Gardens, built by copper king William Clark as a respite from the smoke and toil of the mines and later destroyed by fire. Through the stories of these structures, lost to the march of time and urban renewal, historian Richard Gibson recalls the boom and bust of Butte, once a mining metropolis and now part of the largest National Historic Landmark District.
Richard I. Gibson is a geologist, historian and tour guide in Butte, Montana. He leads historic walking tours for Old Butte Historical Adventures and drives the tourist trolley for the Butte Chamber of Commerce. He has served on the local Historic Preservation Commission and as education director at the World Museum of Mining, and he is currently the secretary of Butte Citizens for Preservation and Revitalization. He also serves on the Mai Wah Chinese Museum Board and wrote the guide to the Mai Wah Archaeological Dig Exhibit. Gibson edited the guidebook for the 2009 Vernacular Architecture Forum in Butte and wrote most of the Butte section and two essays. He contributed eighteen columns on historic architecture to the Montana Standard newspaper and is the author of the Butte History blog, http://buttehistory.blogspot.com.