Harmon’s Histories: Missoula welcomed 1925 with lavish midnight dinners, dancing

By Jim Harmon

Missoula’s well-to-do certainly knew how to ring in the New Year a century ago.

Mrs. Margaret Meagher Veasey hosted a “watch party” at her Rattlesnake Valley home.

“The season’s colors of red and green were used in the bright decorations in the large living room being carried out with flowers and lights and evergreens.”

Card games were followed by “a delicious supper served by the hostess and her mother, Mrs. Charles Meagher at midnight when the New Year was welcomed with horns, bells and drums. Dancing followed the supper.”

Meantime, the Hellgate Lodge of the Elks hosted nearly “four hundred members and their guests in the ballroom of the Elks temple.” The decorations were described as “elaborate” and guests “were all presented with gay favors, toy balloons and paper caps. 1925 was given an enthusiastic welcome and dancing was enjoyed until a late hour.”

In the University district, Mr. and Mrs. J.M. Keith opened the doors of their home on Gerald Avenue to host a dancing party. “The ballroom was gay with holiday decorations. Numerous unique and amusing costumes were worn by the young guests. Supper was served as the old year vanished and the new one appeared.”

On Missoula’s west side, “the officers and ladies of Fort Missoula gave a very charming dancing party for themselves and a number of guests from the city.”

In Kalispell, the National Hotel was the location for many parties around the holiday period. The society columns noted that John Grover hosted family and friends at one of the small parties there, while Kalispell Mayor Boorman attended the New Year’s Eve ball there.

The mayor was apparently quite a popular fellow. He returned home to find that “a group of young people had taken possession of his living room and danced the night away, waiting to welcome him home upon his return from the ball.”

In the Bitterroot Valley, “one hundred couples attended a dance at the Woodside Social club. Music was supplied by the Harmony Four of Hamilton and at midnight a supper was served by a committee, from donations of housewives present.”

In Hamilton, a “jolly crowd of young people turned out for a party at the home of Mr. and Mrs. M.L. Chaffin.”

At Corvallis, “Mrs. Hugh Wylie entertained the Merry Wives Club at her home.”

Of course, we cannot ignore that time-honored ritual of “New Year’s resolutions.” Finding such lists in newspapers of the past is easy, but sticking to those resolutions is difficult, if not impossible.

But I found one list that I can embrace with certainty! I quote from the Wolf Point Herald of January 1, 1925:

“The waiting for Old Man Time to fire the pistol that starts the human race off on the annual dash toward a better life, is something awful. Very much like waiting for the dentist to get the non-skid attachment of his forceps geared to your jaw.”

“Let’s be sensible and reasonable. If we must make resolutions, make such as will do no harm if broken. It’s a really big idea! Let’s swear on, instead of off.”

“Let’s resolve that in 1925, we will: Smoke more and better cigars; work at the office until three a.m. three nights a week (on crazy stuff like this), patronize all the places along the street and have it charged.

“Buy a better car and trade the old for a block of oil stock; not bother with a garden, so we can play golf all day Sunday as well as Friday and Tuesday afternoons, write no letters to anyone, especially relatives.

“Stay away from community meetings, neglect to pay our bills, give our spare cash to the bootlegger, be done with paying life insurance premiums, etc., etc., ad infinitam.

“If we can’t keep our resolutions let ‘em bust, and we can face the fatal midnight moment without turning a hair.”

And that makes for a very Happy New Year!

Jim Harmon is a longtime Missoula news broadcaster, now retired, who writes a weekly history column for Missoula Current. You can contact Jim at fuzzyfossil187@gmail.com. His best-selling book, “The Sneakin’est Man That Ever Was,” a collection of 46 vignettes of Western Montana history, is available at harmonshistories.com.