Montana New Deal Heritage Partnership

A Statewide Effort to Reconnect People, Place, and Public History

The Montana New Deal Heritage Partnership is a statewide, community-centered project dedicated to documenting, interpreting, and revitalizing the legacy of New Deal programs across Montana’s rural, Tribal, and frontier landscapes. What began as a research initiative has grown into a collaborative movement — one that brings together museums, historical societies, county governments, educators, youth programs, and local residents to tell a fuller, more human story of Montana.

Our work is grounded in a simple belief: Montana’s New Deal history is not a relic. It is a living inheritance — written into our towns, our watersheds, our community halls, our schools, and the land itself.

 

“The New Deal did not just build projects — it reorganized Montana’s landscapes, institutions, and communities.”

What This Project Is

The Partnership is a research-driven cultural landscape initiative that integrates archival materials, photographs, maps, administrative records, field documentation, and geospatial data into a single statewide resource.

At its core, the project follows a three-stage interpretive model:

1. What Led to the New Deal Projects (Pre‑1933 Conditions)

We examine the ecological, economic, and institutional conditions that shaped federal intervention, including:

  • drought cycles and rangeland degradation

  • agricultural collapse and commodity volatility

  • land tenure fragmentation

  • reservation land loss and federal policy shifts

  • watershed instability and erosion

  • rural infrastructure deficits

  • county and state fiscal crises

These conditions explain why certain counties, Tribal Nations, and landscapes became focal points for federal programs.

2. What Projects Are Known (Confirmed New Deal Footprints)

We compile and verify all documented projects across agencies — CCC, WPA, FSA, SCS, RA, REA, BIA, PWA, and others — including:

  • public buildings and civic infrastructure

  • range and watershed rehabilitation

  • shelterbelts and soil conservation systems

  • land-use reorganization and resettlement

  • electrification and rural utilities

  • Tribal governance reforms and land consolidation

  • cultural documentation and public art

Each project is linked to its place, program, agency, year, and landscape function.

3. What Projects Are Expected (Inferred but Not Yet Located)

Using program mandates, administrative patterns, ecological conditions, and county-level histories, we identify likely but unconfirmed project sites. These include:

  • undocumented stock ponds in known SCS districts

  • unrecorded WPA road segments

  • CCC erosion-control structures in high-risk watersheds

  • FSA rehabilitation features on former submarginal lands

  • REA line extensions not yet mapped

This predictive layer guides fieldwork and archival research.

4. What Research Is Underway (Current Work)

We conduct ongoing research to locate, document, and interpret these landscapes through:

  • archival review

  • map and plat analysis

  • field documentation

  • geospatial reconstruction

  • collaboration with museums, Tribal Nations, and local historians

This iterative process expands the archive and strengthens the statewide narrative.

 

How to Use This Site

This site is designed to help you explore New Deal history at multiple scales — from statewide patterns to individual counties, Tribal Nations, and specific project sites.

Tribal Nations Index

Full chapter sets for each Tribal Nation, including ecological conditions, program histories, land-use changes, and cultural landscape analysis.

Tribal–County Crosswalk

A statewide matrix showing how all 56 counties connect to Tribal Nations through shared landscapes, administrative histories, and program footprints.

County Index

An alphabetical gateway to every county, each with its own narrative, project list, archival references, and landscape interpretation.

Cultural Landscape Archive

A digital repository linking archival materials to specific places, programs, agencies, and landscape features.

Contact

Reach out to collaborate, contribute materials, or participate in ongoing research.

Montana Cultural Landscape Archive

The Montana Cultural Landscape Archive is the digital humanities backbone of the Partnership. It documents, preserves, and interprets the landscape legacy of the New Deal through a cultural landscape lens — emphasizing relationships between people, land, institutions, and ecological systems.

The Archive links each item to:

  • specific geographic locations

  • program histories

  • administrative structures

  • ecological and cultural contexts

  • long-term landscape change

Users can explore New Deal landscapes from the scale of a single shelterbelt or stock pond to county-wide patterns and statewide land-use regimes.

Archive Mission

  • Preserve fragile and scattered records of New Deal conservation, infrastructure, cultural, and governance programs

  • Document the persistence, alteration, or disappearance of landscape features over time

  • Connect archival materials to specific places, communities, and ecological or institutional contexts

  • Reveal the long-term impacts of federal, state, and tribal programs on Montana’s landscapes and people

  • Support research, teaching, and public understanding of New Deal history

  • Collaborate with museums, Tribal Nations, agencies, scholars, and local communities

  • Provide a transparent, accessible, professionally structured digital repository

 

About the Partnership

The Montana New Deal Heritage Partnership brings together archival materials, photographs, maps, administrative records, field documentation, and geospatial data to reveal how New Deal programs shaped Montana’s cultural and environmental landscapes.

These programs:

  • built schools, courthouses, ranger stations, community halls, and public works

  • restored rangelands and watersheds

  • reorganized land tenure and grazing systems

  • expanded electrification and rural infrastructure

  • supported Tribal governance reforms and land consolidation

  • produced murals, public art, and cultural documentation

  • reshaped agricultural, ecological, and institutional systems

The Partnership works across Montana to reconstruct these histories in collaboration with local institutions and communities.

 

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What You Can Explore

  • Tribal Nations Index

  • Tribal–County Crosswalk

  • County Index

  • Cultural Landscape Archive

Montana Cultural Landscape Archive

The Montana Cultural Landscape Archive is the digital humanities backbone of the Partnership. It documents, preserves, and interprets the landscape legacy of the New Deal through a cultural landscape lens — emphasizing relationships between people, land, institutions, and ecological systems.

The Archive links each item to:

  • specific geographic locations

  • program histories

  • administrative structures

  • ecological and cultural contexts

  • long-term landscape change

Users can explore New Deal landscapes from the scale of a single shelterbelt or stock pond to county-wide patterns and statewide land-use regimes.