Land Use, Environment and Conservation

Mission Mountains

Archives and Special Collections holds a significant number of collections from businesses, organizations and individuals documenting land use, environmental policies, and conservation efforts in Montana and the region. Examples of collections documenting land use include the records of the Anaconda Forest Products Company, the Collins Land Company, the Lincoln Backcountry Protective Association, and the John Wight Papers.

A number of grass-roots environmental and conservation movements and organizations, and their leadership, have western Montana connections and many of their collections are housed here. Collections with particular depth include the papers of Guy Brandborg and Stewart Brandborg, Bud MooreDoris Milner and Clifton R. Merritt. Archives and Special Collections also houses the organizational records of the Boone and Crockett Club.

Homesteading and its impact on the land is well represented in maps, pamphlets and other published materials housed in Archives and Special Collections. Information about additional relevant photograph, manuscript, and oral history collections can be found in this Land Use, Environment and Conservation Collection List and by keyword searching or browsing the Archives West database. Several oral history collections cover the changing nature of land use through the years, including the Badger-Two Medicine Oral History Project, interviews about the removal of the Milltown Dam, and the Upper Swan Valley Oral History Project.

Maps, including orthophotoquads, topographics, plats, and forest health protection (pest) maps, are excellent sources of information about land use in Montana over the last 200 years. Our extensive photograph collections, including the photographs of K.D. SwanMorton J. Elrod, and R.H. McKay contain thousands of images supporting research into land use and the landscape in Western Montana.