Traveling through Mineral County, you’re never far from a river. The Clark Fork and St. Regis Rivers cut their way through canyons and wind through valleys. Above them rise tributaries branching out into the hills and mountains beyond. While the rivers served as aquatic thoroughfares, they also challenged travelers making their way through the region’s rugged landscape.

In 1855, Washington Territorial Governor Isaac Stevens followed the St. Regis River, which he crossed numerous times before reaching the mouth, where he encountered the “Bitter Root,” today’s Clark Fork. He described the river as “fordable only at the lowest stage of water in fall and winter.” Stevens encountered a “large band of Flathead Indians” camped at the ford who impressed the Stevens party with their ability to cross the river “in a simple and ingenious manner” by swimming their horses and using their buffalo skin lodges as boats to ferry their possessions. The Stevens party constructed rafts to complete the crossing.

In 1859, John Mullan encountered the same river crossings while he scouted the route of his military wagon road. Along the reach of the St. Regis, the roadbuilders crossed the river 46 times. At winter camp, Mullan ordered several men in his party to prepare timbers to construct a ferry over the Clark Fork. In February 1860, they completed the first permanent river ferry at St. Regis, which was a flatboat 42 feet long and 12 feet wide. Mullan placed a “Mr. Hilreth” in charge of the ferry crossing, ordering that “white persons and Indians will have free and willing use of the boats at all hours. You will lend every co-operation and aid to such persons, citizens, and others, as may desire to cross the ferry, and, by good understanding with the Indians, promote the best results for the expedition.” Free passage was only temporary. In Mullan’s “Miner’s and Traveller’s Guide” for the wagon road, he listed charges at the St. Regis Ferry of $4 per wagon and 50 cents per man.

The Cedar Creek gold rush led to the establishment of a commercial ferry a mile east of the present site of Superior. Joseph Booth is said to have built the original Cedar Creek Ferry, later selling it to C. W. Berry who, in turn, sold it to S. P. Johnstone. With the acquisition, Johnstone took over the town’s post office and eventually moved both enterprises a mile west, where he platted and founded the town of Superior. Of all Clark Fork River ferries, the ferry that remains fresh in the minds of local residents existed along the Sanders County line. Powered entirely by river current, the vessel was a remnant of bygone days and remained in service until 1962, when it was replaced by a bridge. At the time, the ferry was one of only a few river ferries remaining in Montana.

Credits and Sources:

Forssen, John A. “This Sunday Drive Includes a Ride on Water-Powered Ferry.” The Daily Missoulian, August 30, 1959.

Hahn, Margie. Montana’s Mineral County in Retrospect. Stevensville, MT: Stoneydale Press Publishing Company, 1997.

“Last Ferryboat on Clark Fork Makes Final Run,” Great Falls Tribune, December 9, 1962.

Leeson, Michael A. History of Montana, 1939-1885. Chicago: Warner, Beers & Company, 1885.

Mullan, Captain John. Miners and Traveller’s Guide. New York: Wm. M. Franklin, 1865.

Stevens, Hazard. The Life of Isaac Ingalls Stevens. Vol. II. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, The Riverside Press, Cambridge, 1900.

Stout, Tom, ed. Montana, Its Story and Biography: A History of Aboriginal and Territorial Montana and Three Decades of Statehood. Vol. II. Chicago: The American Historical Society, 1921.

Historic photographs of the “Clark Fork Snail” and “Site of the Superior Ferry” courtesy of the Mineral County Historical Society, Superior, MT.

Historic photograph of “Ferry at Frenchtown” courtesy of the Audra Browman Papers (MSS 468), Archives and Special Collections, Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, University of Montana, Missoula.

Contemporary photograph of the St. Regis ferry site courtesy of Historical Research Associates,