Black Montana: Settler Colonialism and the Erosion of the Racial Frontier, 1877–1930

Abstract

This study fills a scholarly void, as only fragments of the Black experience in Montana have been published heretofore. This work is the first thematic attempt to embrace that experience, with chapters centering on the traditional kinship networking of African Americans in churches, clubs, and fraternal organizations; the impact of the handful of Black newspapers that served the largest communities, especially in the mining camp of Butte and the fledgling capital city of Helena in the 1890s; Black engagement with Montana's varied natural environment; and then the exodus of Black residents from Montana during the economic downturn after World War I. Traditionally, few African Americans migrated to Montana in the decades framing the turn of the nineteenth century; at any given moment they made up barely 1 percent of the overall population. Today, Montana is home to the fewest African Americans of any state (less than five thousand), and their numbers have steadily dwindled since the early twentieth century. Because of such limited numbers, Anthony W. Wood feels that there has been unwarranted historical occlusion, and he seeks to understand the historical roots to the ongoing exodus.