In 2011 the Three Forks Historical Society rescued the Trident Northern Pacific Railway Station, moving it to Three Forks. The station was scheduled for demolition by its owner, Montana Rail Link. Built at Trident, Montana in 1910 by the Northern Pacific Railroad, the station was the town's major link to the outside world until the advent of improved highways and motor vehicles. Built by the Three Forks Portland Cement Company, the town of Trident was a company town with but one product, cement processed from the surrounding limestone hills. When, in the 1940s and 50s, it became easier to commute from nearby Three Forks, employees, despite the cheap rent available in Trident, began to build houses in Three Forks. Slowly Trident emptied, the post office closed and the railway station closed, remaining unused until being threatened with demolition in 2010.
When the station arrived in Three Forks it was placed at the northern end of a small historical park named
Milwaukee Railroad Park alongside the Milwaukee Road tracks in Three Forks. Nearby is a Milwaukee Railroad caboose which serves as the Three Forks Visitor Information Centre. The rest of the park is dedicated to educating visitors to the town on the importance of the Three Forks area to the settlement and development of Montana. Signs and placards, large and small, relate the story of Three Forks, the Headwaters of the Missouri River, and the natives, fur traders, explorers and others who came to the area, if only briefly.
Much of the content is dedicated to the Headwaters of the Missouri, where the Jefferson, Madison and Gallatin Rivers meet to form the Missouri River, only four miles northeast of Milwaukee Railroad Park.
Along the south end of the park are a series of nine plaques which cover an array of historical subjects. This, the fifth one, contains a bit of the story of Sacajawea, the Shoshone woman who proved invaluable to the Lewis & Clark Expedition on their trek west to the Pacific. South of here, across Main Street, is
Sacajawea Park, in which is a life-and-a-quarter-size bronze statue of Sacajawea.
During the winter of 1804-05, Lewis and Clark stayed with the Mandan Indians in present-day central North Dakota, where they met Charbonneau, according to accounts of the expedition. They enlisted him as a guide in their quest for a northwest passage. They soon realized Charbonneau was virtually useless as a guide, but his wife, Sacajawea, about 16 at the time, proved invaluable to the explorers. According to legend, when the Corps of Discovery reached the Missouri River Headwaters at Three Forks in July 1805, Sacajawea recognized the Tobacco Root Mountains to the southwest and knew she was “home.”
From the Belgrade News
Milwaukee Railroad Park is just a mile east of where the Lewis & Clark expedition passed on the Jefferson River, on their way to the Pacific. Given that Lewis & Clark were charged with exploring the possibilities of the Missouri's becoming a waterway to the Pacific, the headwaters area could well have marked the end of their journey. They did camp and rest in the area for several days, continuing southwest down the Jefferson River, passing near the present town of Three Forks. On the return trip, after Lewis and Clark separated, Clark and his party passed by Three Forks again.
Familiar with the Headwaters area, Sacajawea was invaluable as an interpreter for Lewis and Clark.
SACAJAWEA CAPTURED
IN 1800
In 1800, Sacajawea was camped on the Jefferson River with her Shoshone tribe. Attacked by a band of Minnetarees, she was captured and traded to the Mandans. There at the age of about 16, she became one of the wives of a French-Indian trapper, Toussaint Charbonneau, and accompanied him when he was hired by Lewis and Clark as an interpreter. Sacajawea proved more knowledgeable than her husband, however, and the Expedition came to rely on her. Clark commented in 1806: "The indian woman ... has been of great service to me as a pilot through this country. . ."