GOLD DISCOVERIES IN MONTANA

When Nate Vestal reached Montana Territory in 1867, gold mining was already at a fever pitch. In 1852 François Finlay (aka “Benetsee”), a French half-breed from somewhere along the Red River of the North, made the first strike in what would become Montana, showing his hand when he paid for supplies in gold at Fort Connah, the Hudson’s Bay Co. post south of Flathead Lake. Asked where he’d obtained the ore, François