We Still Hold Cowboys in the Highest Regard

When Barb and I moved to Malta from Bozeman 17 years ago I jokingly told people I was moving back to Montana.

Bozeman, like many places in the state had begun to look like everywhere else in the country: same stores, same housing developments, same traffic jams. It also was a place of economic vitality. There were jobs and opportunities to make a living there.

Barb and I, however, didn’t need that. We could work online, and brought our jobs with us to Malta, where, unlike Bozeman, the economy was on the wane and the population was dropping.

Little has changed up here since we arrived except for the closing of more businesses. Despite the surge of newcomers moving to Montana in recent years, Phillips County’s population continues to fall.

Pride may have a lot to do with it. This is ranching country, and although the number of folks engaged in that occupation is falling, we still hold cowboys in the highest regard.

When the America Prairie Foundation -- a conservation organization, which advocates for the return of bison to the prairie -- began buying ranches in Phillips County in 2001, the ranching community was openly hostile. Many remain on the fight today.

“Save the cowboy, stop the APR” signs greet visitors to Phillips County.

Consequently, when American Prairie decided recently that they wanted a headquarters in central Montana, they purchased a building in Lewistown and based a handful of employees there instead of Malta.

And while folks up here were outraged that the Keystone pipeline project and its promised tax revenue was nixed, no one is complaining about the loss of tax revenue because we voted against legalizing recreational marijuana in the county. Let the neighboring counties with dispensaries cash in on that. Apparently, cowboys and weed, even when it’s legal, don’t mix.

While I moved here for the hunting, the abundance of public land, and the cheap housing, few are following my lead. Most newcomers to Montana want ski hills, trout streams, and a Wal-Mart closer than 90 miles away.

Like cutting off your nose to spite your face, making newcomers feel unwanted has been of little benefit to Malta.

On the other hand, it has kept down real estate prices. Too bad few are buying.

Parker Heinlein is at [email protected]