Century of Butte Stories

Butte's Newspapers Reported the News and Made History

By John Astle

(A column featuring stories from Butte's newspapers during the past 100 years).

The city of Butte and its newspapers went hand-in-hand through the 20th century. The Mining City's diverse ethnic, economic, and political population made news, and the newspapers printed it. Every viewpoint was represented, and most of the time the newspapers themselves were the center of controversy.

In 1900 there were 12 newspapers in Butte, including three dailies, The Butte Miner, Anaconda Standard (though published in Anaconda, most of its circulation was in Butte), and the Inter Mountain. Others were the Butte Times, Home Industry, Montana Journal, Montana Catholic, Pacific Woodman, Reveille, Slavenska Jedinstoo, Tribune, and Western Mining Journal.

Beginning with the Butte Miner in 1876, over 85 newspapers have circulated on the streets of Butte at one time or another. Many published for years, some only a few issues. Seven of the newspapers published daily.

Rarely did the editors of these early newspapers let the facts get in the way of a good story, or their point of view. And rarely did a point of view, regardless of how unpopular it was, not get into print.

The adage, "It's not smart to get into an argument with a newspaper because they buy ink by the barrel," was ignored in early-day Butte. You just started your own newspaper.

By 1908, there were 11 more newspapers in town. They included, Butte Copper Age, Butte Evening News (daily) Croatian World, Montana Volkszeitung, Servian Voice, Tribune-Review, Butte Independent, Butte Daily Post, Italian Weekly, Montana American, Montana Socialist, and South Side Gazette.

Montana's most famous newspaper battles were between Marcus Daly and W. A. Clark, Butte's Copper Kings. Daly owned the Anaconda Standard and Clark, the Butte Miner.

The fights started when Clark lost the election for territorial delegate to congress in 1888 to Thomas Carter. Clark used the Miner, to attack Daly, who he blamed for his defeat. Daly couldn't fight back because he didn't have a newspaper. So he stated one, sparing no expense.

John Durston, former editor of the Syracuse Standard in New York, put out the first issue of the Anaconda Standard in September, 1889, and the war was on. The two newspapers agreed on very little, except that the most effective weapon was a newspaper, and the second was money.

Their most famous battle was for Montana's capital. Daly wanted Anaconda, while Clark supported Helena. Allegations from both sides were shouted to the readers in big, black headlines. It didn't take long for the little guys' to sit up and take notice. Not only to the substance of the fights, but also how they were being fought.

Battles between the Standard and the Miner lasted long after Marcus Daly died in 1900. But, by 1917, the two papers had joined forces to attack the unions, wobblies, socialists, and communists in Butte. Finally in 1928, after W. A. Clark died, the Butte Miner and the Anaconda Standard merged into the Montana Standard, one of five major Montana newspapers controlled by the Anaconda Company until 1960, when they were purchased by Lee Corporation.

It could be dangerous being a newspaper editor in the early days of Butte. William Penrose, editor of the Butte Mining Journal in the 1890s, got into a contentious battle with the Miners Union on the front page of his newspaper. At the height of the controversy Penrose was shot and killed by unknown assailants at the corner of Montana and Galena. Three union officers were arrested, but were not convicted.

William F. Dunne, editor of the Butte Bulletin and a radical unionist,' was little more than a sliver on the bannister of life to the ACM and government agencies in Butte and Montana, but at times a painful sliver. In August, 1918, during WWI, the Bulletin ran a story which called the Montana Council of Defense a "slimy political gang, whose actions are a stench in the nostrils of decent people . . ." Dunne, his editor and business manager were charge and convicted of violating the Montana Sedition Act, a model for the national act.

According to Jerry Calvert in his book, The Gibraltar, Montana Governor Sam Stewart once exclaimed, "I defy anyone to produce a more radical or revolutionary sheet in the United States; certainly none can be found among the daily papers. Why it is allowed to circulate through the mails is more than I can understand."

Bill Dunne won election to the Montana House of Representatives from Silver Bow County in the 1918 election, but the Company and its newspapers still called the shots in Butte and Helena.

After 1940, there was a steady decline in the number of independent newspapers in Butte By the 1950s there were less than a handful that published regularly.