Cascade Courier - Your trusted local news source since 1910

Have you ever wondered why Montana looks the way it is?? Why do we have that funny western border? Then Idaho looks a bit weird in itself. Why that panhandle? Some maintain that Montana stole part of Idaho way back when.

In 1863 President Lincoln sent well-respected lawyer Sidney Edgerton to the Idaho Territory as Chief Justice. He immediately recognized that the remote gold fields would be extremely valuable to the Union and the gold camps needed their own territorial government. He convinced Congress in May of 1864 to create the Montana Territory through the Organic Act. President Linc...