A Montana Football Thoroughfare

Looking north on 191 between Big Timber and Harlowton.

The following was written last year, but was never finished and thus never posted. After a recent trek up U.S. Highway 191 recently, I was reminded again of the many drives up and down this stretch of highway—going back to 1999.

September 2010
Even though it was the last official weekend of the summer, a touch of autumn was already in the air. Earlier in the week I had noticed a smattering of yellow leaves here and there within the trees of town and now, as I was making my way through Bridger, Montana on an early Saturday morning, the bank clock told me it was 39 degrees.

Continuing on up the road and approaching Laurel, Montana, I was thinking about the “regularity” of these trips into Montana to attend the football games in the state’s various small and obscure towns. One of those regularities had to do with where I found my second cup of coffee for the morning—lately it has been the City Brew in Laurel, Montana, just before I jump on Interstate 90 and head east or west.

There were some great games that weekend. Scobey at Wibaux, Harlowton at Joliet, Ft. Benton at Chinook—even the Powell Panthers (my town) were undefeated and on the road in Buffalo to face the equally undefeated Bison.

Nevertheless, I choose to attend an off-the-radar game in Moore, Montana where the winless three-school co-op of Hobson-Moore-Judith Gap faced the Refiners of Sunburst who hadn’t notched a win either.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
and looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Driving toward Moore that day, I considered another regularity in these Montana junkets—U.S. Highway 191. I started wondering how many times I’d been up and down its asphalt—maybe three or four times a year over the course of some ten years adding up to 30 or 40 roundtrips. Was it possible?

Titanettes at Moore.

For the record, U.S. Highway 191 is the main north-south artery to access many of the places where small town high school football is played in Montana. Starting with Harlowton, other game locations I’ve attended in the 191-vicinity include Moore, Hobson, Stanford, Geraldine, Highwood, Centerville, Geyser, Belt, Fort Benton, and Denton.

For me, U.S. Highway 191 begins in Big Timber, Montana—a place that acquired its name from Lewis and Clark as they gathered timbers to build rafts for their float down the Yellowstone River. From Big Timber, 191 is pretty much a straight north-south run with nothing but the foothills of the scenic (and usually snowcapped) Crazy Mountains and wide-open spaces farther north. There are no other communities that warrant a reduction in the speed limit until Harlowton, approximately 44 miles straight up 191.

Making up for the lack of human activity between Big Timber and Harlowton, any given traveler at any given time is likely to see mule deer somewhere along that 44-mile stretch—most likely just beyond Big Timber. I refer to that section of highway as “Deer Alley.”

Years ago when I was on my way to attend a six-man game in Geraldine, I left Powell on a Friday night with a motel reservation in Stanford. I followed a duel-wheeled pick-up truck out of Big Timber that Friday night, but I didn’t keep up with him. Somewhere in the foothills maybe ten miles up the road, I came across a sight I’d never seen—the fresh, fragmented and scattered remains of what was probably a mule deer that could have doubled as a suicide bomber. I attempted to slow my vehicle down as it started sliding on the animal’s spilled blood frozen to the cold highway. Fortunately I managed to maintain control of my car despite the steaming carnage. I half expected to find a wrecked pick-up somewhere off the road, but there were no signs that it had even passed through nor did I ever see it again. From that point, I easily remained wide-awake, driving through the dark Montana night and on to Stanford.

On any given road trip, the music of Mary Chapin Carpenter is a steady diet for my ears. On this particular day, her song “Alone But Not Lonely” grabbed me like no other time in the past. Its cello stirred me while the singer’s soothing voice ached with a question of who I was in my solitude on Highway 191. On that particular day I could definitely answer that, yes, I was alone, but hardly lonely in these wide-open places of Montana.

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

Harlowton (or “Harlo” as some call it) might seem bleak in its first impression, but I have grown more comfortable with each visit to this football enclave. Whether camping in my truck at the rest stop/campgrounds by the rodeo grounds, or getting my morning cup of joe at the Snowy Mountain Coffee Shop, I seldom just drive through this community. Cruise down Main Street to the old Graves Hotel and you might find yourself fantasizing about purchasing and fixing up that historic landmark. Of course, Harlowton has been a terminal destination as well thanks to the Harlowton Engineers eight-man football team, and few football fields in the state are better illuminated than Harlowton.

Judith Gap wind turbines.

As you take the next section of Highway 191 out of Harlow, the Judith Gap Wind Farm awaits you. The highway splits the collection of giant turbines giving the traveler a feeling of smallness. The first electrical power started flowing from Judith Gap in 2005. Some might claim these monstrosities ruin the scenic value of such locations, but given a choice, I’ll take the clean symmetry of a wind farm any day over the chaotic and dirty clutter of equipment associated with a gas or oil field operation.

Past the wind farm and into the tiny town of Judith Gap, a milkshake is in order from the Judith Gap Mercantile if time permits and it’s the right time of day.

For me, something in the landscape… something in the world starts to change as you make your way north from Judith Gap. This is a magical place… a place where the sagebrush begins yielding to the winter wheat… where the light is different because the sun’s angle is lower.

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

Five miles off the highway between Judith Gap and Eddie’s Corner is the town of Buffalo with its five residents. If you have the time, have a look around this town that once was. It’s about as close to a ghost town short of actually being one. The old bank building and school are worthy of a visit—if nothing else to only stare and wonder.

Officially Highway 191 picks up again on its northern direction at Lewistown, but for me it ends near the town of Moore where it meets Montana State Route 200. This junction is known as Eddie’s Corner—named after the one business that provides round-the-clock meals, gasoline, a lounge and a handful of windowless motel rooms. Although Moore is not far away, it is out of sight, rendering Eddie’s Corner more like an outpost on the frontier.

Before embarking on my return down 191, I often have a meal at Eddie’s Corner following a Saturday afternoon game in the area and listen to the other customers talking about the various football games they attended that day from all over the state. Thanks to Eddie’s Corner, I usually know about the outcomes of two or three other football games before I ever read about them on the Internet or newspapers.

Two Roads..., a photo by mdt1960 on Flickr.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

—Robert Frost

Remembering The Titans... and Refiners

Tri-Cities Titans and the Sunburst Refiners in action.

This past Sunday morning’s edition of the Billings Gazette had the typical listings of high school football scores. It’s usually pretty thorough when it comes to getting all the scores, but sitting in the Laurel City Brew coffee shop that morning, I noticed that there was no mention of the game I attended on Saturday afternoon in Moore.

A grin came across my face as I said to myself, “Another mission in obscurity completed.”

Although nothing was printed about the game, it was a doozy as the Tri-City Titans and the Sunburst Refiners rumbled in a knock-down, drag-out, eight-man shoot-out that resulted in over 100 total points on the scoreboard—with the lead changing hands several times before the final gun sounded. In a reference to the high-scoring game, one of the four officials on the field turned to me and said, “I didn’t know we were working a six-man game.”

Referees from Great Falls.

On paper, the game probably didn’t have that much appeal to someone who might be looking for a battle of undefeated teams. In this case, both teams were winless coming into the contest and even though there was a victor and a runner-up, both teams had something in common to cheer about—each scored a lot of points.

Billings Gazette take note: Tri-City Titans 59, Sunburst Refiners 44.

On a related note...

The Tri-City Titans represent the high schools located in Hobson, Moore and Judith Gap—a three-school co-op. I asked about how the colours of green, black and white along with the mascot name were selected. One source told me the following: about three years ago each school submitted two mascot names for the co-op. With six names coming forward, the three schools voted and “Titans” tallied the most votes. The colours are neutral to all three schools. The Hobson Tigers are orange and black, the Moore Bulldogs are Columbia blue and gold and the Judith Gap Tigers are royal blue and gold. The Titans rotate their home games between Friday nights in Hobson and Saturday afternoons in Moore. During basketball season, Hobson students put the orange and black on, making up their own team while Judith Gap and Moore form another co-op.

Shout-out: Congratulations to the Hays-Lodgepole Thunderbirds for already notching their first victory of the year (48-30) over the Froid-Medicine Lake-Grenora Red Hawks.

Autumn Habits, Ghost Teams and The Olive Garden

Highwood, Montana

Every year small town high school football comes and goes. And after it’s over—like Brett Favre—I’ve told myself and others that next year I’ll likely stay behind and only attend a game or two in the 100-mile radius of home. However, unlike Favre, there’s no million-dollar contract enticing me to travel the same distances as any previous year—not even the promise of gas money.

Perhaps my want or need to stay home has much to do with the fact that I’ve been almost everywhere in the two states of Montana and Wyoming when it comes to this genre of football.

So last week, I serendipitously obtained all the schedules for Montana Class C (six and eight-man) from the website of KPAX in Missoula. (BTW: kudos to KPAX for pulling all of these schedules together in such a thorough fashion.) It didn’t take long for me to spot a game here and there that I would like to attend. The next thing I know, there’s at least one game every week that I am eyeing up through mid-October. And not long after that, the playoffs begin.

Did I mention there are 27 teams playing six-man football in Montana this year—and another 36 teams signed up for eight-man play?

Obviously I’m hooked... again. And I haven’t even seen the schedules for Wyoming or a select few locations in Idaho that are realistically out of reach.

The truth is, I haven’t attended a game everywhere in these two states, but I have had time to survey almost every small town high school football setting (i.e., driving by any given gridiron during the off-season or on my way to another game somewhere else).

I suppose this means my work is not finished—not as long as teams change from one class to another or other schools introduce new teams in the stream of play.

Which makes me reminisce about a few schools/teams that have not fielded teams in years. Whatever became of the teams and players from Willow Creek, Belfry, Brockton, Box Elder? Are they teamed up with other schools in much the same way that resulted in Brady joining Power and Dutton or how Rapelje and Ryegate split to join Reed Point and Harlowton respectively?

Well, in case there’s anyone out there reading this that might wonder what I have in mind for this season, here’s my goals...

Power-Dutton-Brady: the Titans will also play a Saturday afternoon game in Dutton. Located off the Interstate 15 north of Great Falls, there’ll be no time for yard work on that weekend.

Fromberg-Roberts: this is about as close to home as I can get. About an hour drive. Though I’ve attended plenty of Fromberg and Roberts games in the past, these settings will serve as a reprieve from the typical hours of driving while still fulfilling my need to see a game.

Tri-Cities: That would be Hobson, Moore and Judith Gap—“Tri-Towns” might be a better name. One of their home games is scheduled for the gridiron in Moore on a Saturday afternoon instead of the usual dim-lit games in Hobson on Friday nights.

Great Falls Central Catholic: This is may be one of the few places in either state where you can witness a small-town football game in a good-size city like Great Falls. It may seem odd to the readers out there, but I’ve never been able to go to the Olive Garden immediately following a Class C football game. On a related note, I see Billings Christian is fielding a six-man team this year as well—providing another venue for small town football within a metropolitan setting.

Lastly St. Regis: Another lost weekend of driving for one six-man football game. This will be the Tigers first year of six-man football.