Radio RSS

Happy holiday! What holiday, you ask? Why it’s Seward’s Day, of course. I know, it’s only celebrated in Alaska. But I could use a day off, so I’m partying like it’s 1999! Well, actually – like it's 1867!

Let me take you to “Dreamland.” Well, Dreamland, the dance pavilion in Superior, Montana, during the ballroom days of the 1930s.

Most folks are familiar with The University of Montana’s student newspaper, the Kaimin. But did you know there was another, albeit short-lived, student newspaper back in the early days of the campus – this one published by the Forestry School?

At exactly 9 o’clock, the guests arrived at the newly completed Graves Hotel to “the most elaborate electrical display ever shown in this part of Montana. The whole building dazzled with numerous electric lights.” It was Saturday night, June 19, 1909.

This week, we salute a Valentine – not the day, but the man: Valentine H. Coombes. In the 1890s, his name was ubiquitous, appearing on dozens and dozens of legal documents, mostly timber land purchases.

Camels, cookies, coaches and clairvoyance headlined the year on the University of Montana campus in the fall of 1937. Oh, and let’s not forget Sam Caras’ parrot! All that, and so much more, filled the columns of the Montana Kaimin.

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.