The Board of Trade Saloon

By Richard I. Gibson

Up the street, and ‘cross the corner
Stood the spacious Board of Trade;
It was noted for its whiskey.
They served but the highest grade.
—The Saloons of Old-Time Butte, by Bill Burke, 1964
(one of 106 verses)

A saloon occupied the southeast corner of Park and Main, its angled door facing the intersection, from before 1884 until 1916, when the multitude of buildings around that corner were torn down to make way for the Rialto Theater.

The heart of town, Park and Main was always a focal point for Butte’s citizens—and therefore a focal point for saloons. In 1900, at least ten bars could be found on the south side of Park between Main and Wyoming, and five more on the east side of Main from Park to Galena. The Board of Trade, on the exact corner, anchored them all.

Early Butte saloons typically were known simply by their proprietors’ names. William Fritz was the first known operator of the saloon on this corner, beginning before 1884 and continuing through 1892, but it was called the Board of Trade at least by 1891. Subsequent owners included Michael Donovan, Doherty & Satterly, Parker & Mathews, and Zorn & Gregovich until 1900 when long-time managers at the California Saloon and Brewery, Louis Lienemann and Charles Schmidt, branched out to the Board of Trade. Schmidt’s name would be associated with the place until its demolition in 1916. The central location meant that unlike many saloons that catered to particular ethnicities, the Board of Trade's clientele was “of necessity of all sorts and conditions of people.”

16-18 East Park St., summer 1939. Photo by Arthur Rothstein.

When the Rialto Theater opened in 1917, a new two-story building also went up immediately to the east, with a 4-story building east of that, to house the second Board of Trade Saloon and Restaurant on the ground floor at 16-18 East Park. Managed through the late 1910s by Greek immigrant George Papp, it survived prohibition in typical Butte fashion, as a “soft drink parlor and cigar store.”

A long and colorful history at this second location was “highlighted” by the June 8, 1959 killing of Andy Arrigoni as he sat at a gaming table, by his common-law wife, Lee Arrigoni. She was better known as Ruby Garrett, the last madam of the last brothel to operate in Butte, the Dumas, in use until 1982. There was no doubt that she shot Andy, but she pleaded abuse by him: “I didn’t plan on it, but if he beat me up again I wasn’t going to take it any more.” Ruby Garrett died in Butte March 17, 2012.

The Board of Trade on East Park continued in business until 1965, when the Rialto was demolished. Today, the US Bank occupies much of the footprint of the old Rialto, and the drive-thru to the east is where the Board of Trade and other buildings stood.The sign in the front, behind the newsboy in the 1939 photo, says “Thru our Doors Pass the Nicest People in the World—Our Customers… Board of Trade, 16 & 18 E. Park.” The sign was retrieved from a dumpster in 2013.

But that was not the end of the Board of Trade. Company president Ernest Bruno and café manager Arlene Rule moved to 10-12 East Broadway—the California Saloon building (second structure on that site to bear that name) and opened the Board of Trade in its third building in 1965. Unfortunately, a disastrous fire on June 24, 1969, destroyed all four buildings on the corner of Main and Broadway, including the Board of Trade. It did not rise again.

In the video clip in the link below from Franklin Roosevelt’s 1932 campaign visit to Butte, you’ll catch a glimpse of the old Board of Trade on East Park Street at about 1:27. The Butte footage runs from about 1:20 to 2:05.



Resources: Vertical files at Butte Archives; city directories; Sanborn Maps; Butte Evening News for Feb. 20, 1910; Montana Standard for June 9, 1959. Arthur Rothstein photo via Library of Congress. Thanks to Matt Vincent for pointing out the video of the Roosevelt campaign trip to Butte to me. Board of Trade matchbook cover in Dick Gibson's collection.

The January 15, 1895, explosions

By Richard I. Gibson

“Alas! Alas! What woe it wrought! What pain, what sorrow, what blight to human hopes! Only the recording angel, with pen dipped in tears, can truly write the story of that awful night.”

Jim the horse in 1901, at the Arizona Street Station,
which still stands (pawn shop today).

January 15, 1895, a deadly date in Butte history: the multiple explosions of illegally stored dynamite in the warehouse district. Almost the entire Fire Department was wiped out.

Dave Magee, hose-cart driver, was one of only two of the nine fire fighters who responded to the call and survived. And the story of a horse named Jim who saved Magee is true—Magee was blanketing the horses against the cold when an explosion threw one horse into him, killing the horse and injuring Magee. The protection offered by both the dead horse and Jim the survivor saved Magee’s life. Jim subsequently became an icon of the Fire Department, and of Butte.

Magee was so severely injured that he could not drive the wagon, but he rode in the 3,000-member procession that honored the fallen fire fighters and the many more volunteers and bystanders who died that cold January night. The final count will never be certain, because the violence of the explosions literally destroyed human bodies, but the most common count is 58 dead. This was, I believe, the second most deadly event in Butte’s history, second only to the Granite Mountain Disaster in 1917.

Map of the area. Iron Street today goes
about through the center of this map.

A contemporary list of the dead reveals a microcosm of Butte: 56 white, 1 colored. Forty single men and boys, 14 married, 1 widower, 2 unknown. Six from Germany, four from Ireland, five from Canada, two from England, one from Norway; native-born Americans were from New York (8), Pennsylvania (3), Utah (2), Montana (2), and one each from Dakota, Minnesota, and Ohio, with 21 whose nativity was unknown. The ages of the dead ranged from 12 to 78; at least a dozen teenagers were killed. Twenty-two others were in their 20s.

Research note: There’s always more to learn. I’d been saying that there were three survivors within the Fire Department (because that’s what I was told years ago), but the contemporary accounts make clear that there were only two. Besides Magee, the other survivor was John Flannery who was manning the plug, well away from the force of the explosions.

Resources: The Great Dynamite Explosions at Butte, Montana, January 15, 1895, by John Francis Davies, 1895 (scanned by Google—source of map, quote at top, and image of devastation); Souvenir History of the Butte Fire Department, by Peter Sanger, Chief Engineer, November 1901 (scan by Butte Public Library—source of photo with Jim the horse).

The Mantle & Bielenberg Block – 3. Creamery Café

By Richard I. Gibson

Previous posts about the M&B block are here and here. 

1979 HABS/HAER photo.

The Creamery Café, commemorated in the prominent ghost sign on the east face of the M&B building (and a less prominent one on the west face), occupied part of the ground floor here from 1913 until 1957. The Café moved to the M&B on Broadway following the devastating fire on North Main, its original location.

Theo McCabe and Roy McClelland both came to Butte in 1903, and in July 1903 partnered to establish a restaurant in the basement at 36 North Main Street. Four years later, the Creamery Cafe subscribed to the Independent Telephone Company’s network (phone no. 5058), and the partners each had home phones as well, at 502 South Washington and 662 Colorado, respectively.

36 N. Main St. circa 1904.

In 1911, the Creamery was at 24 North Main, but it hadn’t moved—the address scheme changed. It was still in the basement of the same building, known as the O’Rourke Estate Building. (The building at Granite and Main, Curley’s store today, is the one we think of as the O’Rourke Estate, but the Estate likely owned many properties around Butte). On July 30, 1912, a fire and explosion at about 4:00 a.m. resulted from a worker rendering lard in the café oven and placing the burning container on the stove, where the flaming grease spattered everywhere spreading the fire very quickly. Although “all the fire equipment in the city” responded, ultimately three buildings were lost.

The fire burned out several businesses, wiping out almost the entire inventory of the McDonald Shoe Company, a $22,000 loss. Residents in Mrs. Josephine Bietz’ rooming house on the upper floors barely escaped with their scant night clothes; several ailing residents had to be carried out as the flames reached their apartment doors. Mrs. Bietz had been burned out when her lodging house was in the Harvard Block on West Park, destroyed in the huge conflagration that wiped out the Symons Stores and more in 1905 (Phoenix Block today). Several pets were killed in the fire, but no humans were injured seriously.

July 30, 1912. D'Acheul building at right,
Creamery Cafe in building at left.

The building south of the O’Rourke Estate/Creamery, 20 N. Main (32 N. Main before 1911) was erected before 1891 and for many years housed D’Acheul’s drug store. (See the vignette in this previous post; compare to the 1912 fire photo here.) At the time of the fire that destroyed it, Ley’s Jewelery was on the ground floor there, and the second level held offices and meeting halls; ironically, the Cooks and Waiters Unions met there. The total value of losses was estimated at more than $70,000 at the time, with about $52,000 covered by insurance. Later estimates pegged the total loss at about $49,000.

The three destroyed buildings were replaced in short order by three more, including two that survive today: the Rookwood Hotel/Speakeasy (and BS Café) at 24-26 N. Main, and the three-story building next door which holds a Ley’s Jewelry ghost sign. All the buildings in the rest of the block adjacent to these buildings, all of which survived the 1912 fire, were lost in conflagrations in 1969 (buildings to the north to Broadway) and 1973 (Medical Arts Center fire south to Park).

Sources: Montana Catholic Newspaper (Butte), January 21, 1905, including interior shot of café; Sanborn Maps (1900, 1916); City Directories (1903-1957); Anaconda Standard (fire image) and Butte Miner for July 31, 1912; ghost sign photo from 1979 HABS/HAER survey, via Library of Congress (public domain).

The Butte Hotel

By Richard I. Gibson

Butte Hotel, left center with awnings, c. 1904.
Windsor is 2-story to left; Hirbour Tower at far left.
Original California Saloon (gray) at right behind the people.

The four-story Butte Hotel at 23-31 East Broadway (a parking structure today) was erected in 1892-93, opening in August 1893. It contained 120 rooms, expensive at $3 to $5 per night, as street cars “pass the door every 10 minutes,” their advertising boasted in 1895.

The Wilson Brothers, Frank and Hugh, were merchants in Centerville where they ran a general store at 942 North Main Street in the early 1890s. Apparently it was successful enough for them to erect the Butte Hotel on a vacant lot, the former site of the St. Nicholas Hotel. The St. Nicholas dated to before 1884, and I do not know if it burned down or it was demolished, but the location was a vacant lot by 1891.

Hugh Wilson was the first manager of The Butte. In 1918, brother Frank bought him out and managed it for years thereafter, succeeded by his widow, Mabel. The place became associated with the Democratic Party (Republicans met down the street at the Anaconda Employees Club, the old Thornton Hotel), and was known as “Liberty Hall” for the political addresses delivered from its balcony.

The Butte Hotel was one of the primary residences of Augustus Heinze. It contained both a public restaurant and a dining room for hotel patrons, as well as various store fronts on the first floor, and of course a big saloon and billiard parlor.

Butte Hotel lobby, 1895.

John Jahreiss operated a noted barbershop in the hotel. The Cabaret (probably in the original dining room) was a venue for national performers. The sketch here, from 1895, shows the lobby as viewed from the main Broadway Street entrance.

The hotel was vacant for some years until 1952 when remodeled stores opened on the first floor, and in September 1953 major remodeling had created 42 “ultra modern apartments” in the Butte Hotel building.

Unfortunately, the most expensive fire in Butte’s history to that date destroyed the building on August 9, 1954. Almost all of the apartments were occupied, and the fire left 125 residents homeless. Damage was estimated at more than $1,000,000 in 1954 dollars.

Montana Standard: coverage of August 9, 1954 fire.

The Windsor building to the west of The Butte was also destroyed in the fire. It was built in Deer Lodge in the 1870s and moved to Butte about 1880, and held Clifford’s bar and cigar store when it was destroyed in 1954, having survived the Shabbishacks campaign of 1928.

The Butte Hotel had survived at least two previous fires, one on July 13, 1901 ($10,000 damage) and another during World War II in a bingo parlor on the first floor.

The sketch of the lobby is from an ad in The Great Dynamite Explosions at Butte, Montana, by John Francis Davies (1895). The postcard image (from Dick Gibson's collection) is from between 1901 (Hirbour Tower present) and 1905 (original one-story California Saloon present – it was demolished in 1905). The fire photo is from the August 10, 1954 Montana Standard (in the Butte Archives).

The Store Beautiful

Photo courtesy John McKee.

By Richard I. Gibson

Symons’ first store opened October 14, 1897, at 54 West Park, but within a year they expanded to the York Block (68-72 West Park) and in 1899 Symons purchased the Maule Block a bit further west, multiplying their total area by six times, to 50,000 sq ft.

All of that was destroyed by the great fire of September 24, 1905, but the Phoenix Block rose from the ashes. By opening day December 5, 1906, the Phoenix held the much expanded Symons Department Store where 300 employees worked in 92,000 square feet of store. Thirty-three more years took a toll, and in 1938-39 a major renovation resulted in the grand re-opening of Symons on May 6, 1939—a $200,000 project created “the store beautiful,” as the Montana Standard called it.

Among many other things, you could have purchased a hard-bound copy of Gone With The Wind for $1.18 (marked down from the usual $3.00), anticipating the December 1939 movie release. They had 1,000 pairs of shoes at $1.49 each, ironing boards for 89¢ and sweaters for 49¢. Their fur department boasted the hiring of Miss Lula Brewer, fur designer and buyer back in Butte after nine years in high-class New York City. Furs with “clever little collar or collarless necklines display a new smartness,” for the best-dressed ladies of 1939.

Valuable furs were kept in a vault under the sidewalk on the Galena Street side of the store. John McKee’s photo here is of the surviving vault door at the sub-basement level. The door probably dates to the 1939 renovation, although the Herring-Hall-Marvin Safe Company was in business under that name from 1892 to 1959. The vault behind this door was cedar-lined and contained untold thousands of dollars worth of furs over its lifetime.

The upper floors of the southern part of the building (facing Galena) were removed about 1965.

A grim centennial

Ruins of the Olsen Block at left

Lost Butte book update: Photos sent to publisher; word count at 34,000 – requirement is 34,000-36,000, and I’m not quite done yet – so, it’s looking good. Text deadline May 15.

By Richard I. Gibson


A grim centennial

April 10, 2012 marks the centennial of one of the most expensive fires in Butte’s first 75 years. Someone tossed a cigarette into the hay bin at Campana Feed Company’s warehouse at Iron and Nevada. It quickly erupted into a conflagration that destroyed two entire city blocks and left some 200 people homeless, but while there were some injuries, no one was killed. Nearly half of those driven from their residences lived at the Olsen Block, 741-747 S. Wyoming, where a wall of fire blasted out the windows. The total loss was estimated at $350,000 initially, later revised down to $295,000, but it was still the third most costly fire in Butte above ground before 1946 when old Butte High School burned.

Later in 1912 the fourth worst fire loss in pre-1946 Butte struck on September 1 when the original Thomas Block burned in the middle of the first block of West Park Street. Multiple businesses were burned out with a loss totaling almost $221,000 in dollars of the day. The present building, designed by Butte architect Herman Kemna, replaced the old Thomas Block in 1913.

Other big 1912 fires included the destruction of the Grand Opera House where the Leggat Hotel now stands (May 25, a $24,500 loss), Henningsen Produce (January 11, $21,000), Creamery Café (July 30, $49,000), H&B Block (Oct. 18, $49,000), and Sacred Heart Church (Nov. 17, $26,000).

The greatest fire losses in early Butte were the 1889 fire in the first block of West Granite ($512,000) and the 1905 Symons fire on West Park where the 1906 Phoenix Block stands today ($698,000).

The news of the Campana fire was overshadowed in Butte and around the world by the Titanic disaster five days later.