Urbach School - Livingston, MT - Former Schools on Waymarking.com

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Urbach School - Livingston, MT

in Former Schools

Posted by:  T0SHEA

12T E 533943 N 5056834

Built in both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the Urbach School has since moved to another school.

A small one room rural school, the Urbach School educated youngsters until the mid twentieth century. The little log building was constructed between 1898 and 1904, opening for classes, we assume, in 1904. In a very rural area, it stood along Swingley Road, about 6 miles east of Livingston. At its height the school housed 21 students, in grades one to eight. At its nadir there were as few as three. In fact, there were sometimes no students, as the little community periodically had trouble finding sufficient funds to keep the school open, having to close it temporarily, sending the students home until more funding could be unearthed. Finally, in 1947, after attendance at the school had apparently permanently dropped to three students, the school was closed. Fifty four years later it was disassembled and reassembled at the Yellowstone Gateway Museum. It has been refurnished with period pieces from this and other rural schools in the Livingston area.

Built in 1907 of concrete block simulating rusticated stone, the four room Northside School replaced several smaller wood framed schools scattered about Livingston's north side. Serving as an elementary school until 1971, the building was purchased by the Park County Museum Association in 1976, the Park County Museum opening in the building the next year. Today it is known as the Yellowstone Gateway Museum.

Today made easy to find with a dingy red wooden Northern Pacific caboose on the front lawn, the building is filled with artefacts relating to the early days of Livingston. Behind the building is a fenced yard and another building in which are displayed fire trucks, agricultural equipment, wagons, various machines and other large historic items, including a blacksmith shop, donated and moved to the museum in July, 1997.

Yellowstone Gateway Museum
Discover the history of Park County and its connection to Yellowstone!

As a crossroads of culture, Park County, Montana has served as temporary or permanent home for many: native peoples from as long as 11,000 years ago, fur trappers and explorers, homesteaders, and today's residents. Livingston became a major entrance to Yellowstone National Park in 1883 when the Burlington Northern Railway arrived and established a spur line south toward the park.

The museum is housed in a three-story 1906 schoolhouse that is on the National Register of Historic Places. Four large exhibit rooms: Native Cultures, Expeditions, Pioneer, and Transportation, and courtyard also interpret archaeology, modern-day flint knapping, Lewis and Clark, Yellowstone National Park (including historic vehicles), railroad, veterans' history, women, and more. Museum Explorer's Journal guides families through the museum; new children's exhibits.
From Visit Montana