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The Lady Griz have generated some great names in recent years. But we have to go back more than 100 years to find the rest of them.

“Cleaner streets and compulsory education” are to blame! The number of street urchins were getting “scarcer every year” and the president of the American Water Color Society, John George Brown, was very concerned that he couldn’t “find any more ragged boys to paint.”

“Live, by remote control,” direct from the studio in the Hammond Arcade, it’s “Paul Keith and His Arcade Orchestra!” That’s right, Missoula's Hammond Arcade had its own orchestra, appearing on its own radio show (the Hammond Radio Review) for the downtown building’s grand opening in 1934.

“A jolly little blue bear, illuminated at night, sits above the main entrance inviting all to enter and enjoy themselves,” reported the Western News in Libby on September 23, 1948.

It’s a birdwatcher’s paradise this time of year. The annual southern migration of the “Northern Snowbird” is underway to destinations like Palm Springs, California; Destin, Florida; Phoenix, Arizona; and numerous locations in Mexico, Costa Rica and Hawaii. It's a longstanding phenomenon in these parts.

Blowing and drifting snow. Severe wind chills. What a week in western Montana. We have to go back in our own previous reporting from 2017, and way back in the record books and newspaper reports (1875, 1888, 1897 and 1899) to find anything comparable.

This year’s gift suggestions include fancy watches, cordless cork removers, skin-care products, beverage makers, beard trimmers, yoga mats, wine collections, rechargeable hand warmers, and self-heating beverage cups. It’s enough to make one look back fondly to simpler times and simpler gifts.

The Christmas message from Rev. F.D. Kelsey rang true in 1886, and also today: "Many a man whose exterior is rough and pointed and a caution to handle, will have on Christmas his heart opened, revealing to himself and others a much richer and more precious heart than the exterior seemed to promise."

Explosions rocked both Miles City and Baker in eastern Montana on March 23, 1944. The Miles City blast was planned; the Baker explosion was most certainly not.

What tunes topped the charts in the 1800s? Well, according to an advertisement in the New York Herald of October 6, 1843, the popular music of the day included waltzes, marches and quicksteps.