P a g e 2 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r Rosie Roesler, sitting here on a sulky plow, received her homestead patent for 320 acres in Prairie County in 1915. Photo by Evelyn Cameron, 1912. PAc 90 -87.G065-006 homesteaded together in the Sumatra area in Rosebud County in 1911. The three women from Ottumwa, Iowa, along with Dana’s mother, came for the adventure. They claimed land, used each other as witnesses for final proof of occupancy, and then commuted their patents by buying their properties. Dana and Binks each paid $200 for their land titles. All three women left their claims after a year. A photo album documents the pride they felt in their accomplishments on the land, details the homes they made, and the neighbors they enjoyed. Some women homesteaded in partnership with other family members to accumulate large holdings. The Scherlie family claimed land in a desolate area in Blaine County called the Big Flat. Thirty-two-year-old Anna Scherlie filed in 1913 on land adjacent to two of her brothers’ claims and three of her sisters’. At that time, women made up about one-fourth of the total homestead applicants in the four surrounding townships. By 1916, Anna Scherlie had forty acres planted in wheat, oats, and flax. Isolation on the Big Flat led many settlers to winter elsewhere, and Scherlie was no exception. Legend has it that during the winters she went to St. Paul to work for the family of railroad magnate James J. Hill. Over the decades, Scherlie made few changes to her small, wood-frame shack, adding only a vestibule she used as a summer kitchen, storage shed, and laundry. She remained in that shack on her land until 1968. Many homesteading women came to Montana from Canada, where single women could not claim land until the 1930s. They often filed on claims in Montana, but continued to work in Canada while they proved up. One of these independent women was teacher Laura Etta Smalley, who arrived from Edmonton, Alberta, in 1910. Smalley had a meticulous plan, and luck was with her all the way. Over the long Easter weekend, Smalley packed her bag and boarded the train for Inverness, Montana. She arrived in the middle of the night. The hotel was under construction, but the clerk rented her an unfinished room. The next morning, the land locator took her out to view available claims. Smalley found the land she wanted and took the night train to Havre to file. Because it was not safe for single women to travel alone, the locator’s secretary kindly accompanied her. Smalley arrived at the Havre land office on April 1, 1910, the first day a person could file under the new Enlarged Homestead Act. She was the first in line. Within two minutes, many other land seekers were in line behind her. Smalley returned to Canada, finished out the school year, and then returned to Montana. In Havre, she bought a readymade shack and filled it with furniture and supplies. Men then transported the shack on two wagons twenty-six miles out to her claim and dropped her off. That fall, Smalley returned to teach in Edmonton, but by the opening of the 1911-1912 school year, she had secured a teaching position in Inverness.
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