Serving Southern Jefferson County in the Great State of Montana
Serving Southern Jefferson County in the Great State of Montana
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POWER UP MIRACLES 1ST PLACE: Whitehall's ACE Hardware had 78.32% round-up participation for the Children's Miracle Network and Shodair Children's Hospital, garnering a $7,500 donatioin from Duracell. On Monday, Thunder the Bison and her handler were in Whitehall to present the ACE ladies with their award. Boulder's ACE took second place....
What do you get when you combine Montana's cowboy culture with winter activity and snow? The answer is rodeo meets skiing: skijoring, a competitive contest in which a rider on horseback pulls a skier through a course of obstacles. Where the fastest and best wins! Could anyone design a more perfect winter activity in Montana? The timed course features obstacles such as gates, ring grabs, jumps, and rollers, with skiers pulled at speeds up to 25 mph and jumps up to 7 ft. A competitive sport that h...
New Whitehall Mayor Linda Jung held her first Whitehall Town Council meeting on Tuesday, January 20th. The Council heard a detailed presentation on a proposed mixed-use tennis and pickleball court project, swore in two new council members, and appointed new board members during a quick, productive meeting. Sean Wisner, from the Wisner Family Foundation, presented plans for a mixed-use tennis and pickleball court facility, describing the project as a community recreation initiative rooted in a...
Dear Editor, We are a nation in distress. I carried an inverted US Flag at a protest this weekend for the first time. For the unfamiliar, an inverted flag indicates dire distress. Everyone may not agree that our nation is in dire distress, but I am quite certain that Renee Good and Alex Pretti's families consider it so. My criteria for dire distress follows: Japan is six months from a nuclear weapon with South Korea and others close behind, Ukraine is freezing to death from Russian aggression du...
You can drink water through your nose. Southerly wind becomes northerly upon crossing the Arctic region. There are friendships that only existed because you were both lonely at the same time. Unintentionally, porn turned into the most extensive documentary archive. Ice cream is measured in volume despite being a solid. Are big companies more out of touch than ever because they got trapped in their own filter bubbles and algorithms? Social media would actually be really helpful during a zombie apocalypse. Microsoft might have lots of your...
Dear Editor, The most frequent question I get from Montana voters since the last legislative session has been, "Republicans have the majority in the legislature; so how on earth did multiple liberal ideas pass?" That is a legitimate and frustrating question. Much has been said in the recent past about political party bosses and control, but that is just a deflection from addressing the real concern. In reality, voters support and advocate for the values and ideas behind a party or legislator....
Dear Editor, As part-time citizen legislators in Montana, there is a concerning trend of Montana special interest groups unduly influencing, or worse yet, outright controlling legislators. The most stunning example of this is the Montana Hospital Association (MHA). In 2015, the federal government made available the Medicaid Expansion program. I am not going to debate its merits here, rather only call in question the way the Montana Hospital Association has gone about securing a huge windfall of tax dollars year after year. (Today, Medicaid...
As primary season approaches, the rhetoric is getting sharper and smoke thicker. With the barrage of attacks from Americans for Prosperity (AFP), Montana Freedom Caucus (MFC), and the State GOP that they control, it’s hard to know who’s who and why they are attacking. AFP – A Koch-linked political machine based in the D.C. beltway using “grassroots” branding to advance out-of-state corporate interests. It floods states with lobbying, mailers, robocalls, and pressure campaigns – often funded by undisclosed donors. MFC – A hard-right fa...
Could University of Montana President Seth Bodnar be Montana’s next U.S. senator? It sounds improbable — which, in today’s politics, is exactly why it sounds promising. Washington has become a place where performance matters more than results, outrage more than outcomes, and party loyalty more than people. The two major parties have turned governing into a blood sport, and voters are exhausted by it. One recent poll shows that 45 percent of Americans now identify as independents — not Democrats, not Republicans, but people who are tired o...
New lights on the Whitehall I-90 interchange could light the way to town as early as the following week. John Starcevich, area project engineer for the Montana Department of Transportation, said tentative plans call for installation of the new streetlight poles and lights to start on Monday, Jan. 29. STarcevich, who works out of the MDT field office in Whitehall, said the wriing, conduits, and bases for the poles were all completed earlier, and he said he expects it to take three days to...
The Whitehall Garden Club’s first meeting of 2026 will be held on Wednesday, February 4th, in the Whitehall Ambulance Barn located at the corner of North Whitehall Street and West 2nd Street. The public is welcome to join us beginning at 9:30 AM to socialize and enjoy refreshments provided by our hostesses, Glenna Waltee and Joan Myhre. Beginning at 10 AM, visitors and guests are invited to join us for our educational program as we welcome Mr. Patrick Plantenberg, an arborist and the Chairman of the Montana Urban and Community Forestry A...
Bible Study at St. Teresa’s Catholic Church will begin on Monday, January 26th, and run until Easter. The designated book is $15. For questions or to sign up, please call Bonnie Brown at 406-490-0265....
WHAT EXPRESSION DO YOU NEVER WANT TO HEAR AGAIN? SIX SEVEN! - KE 10-4 - BH Know your place - JB It is what it is - KJJ WHAT MODERN TECHNOLOGY DO YOU REFUSE TO GET INVOLVED WITH? The internet, I don’t think it will catch on, probably just a fad like space hoppers. - NH Quantum computing. It can ‘listen in’ on conversations. - JPD TikTok - TM and TO Electric cars in Montana - AKP Twitter/X. Not interested in the insanity - HD Alexa. - KH Crypto. - KK Chipping. I won’t scan my hand to pay for milk- MK WHAT MINOR INCONVENIENCE ALWAYS ANNOYS...
Some days, writing this column for the Whitehall Community Library is easy, and some days there is so much to write and think about that it takes me a minute to decide what I want to share. With this ever-arguing world, I am constantly asked to join this organization or that one to fight the evils of the other side. I am a librarian, which means my mission is to create lifelong learners who seek to discover knowledge daily, research information from various perspectives, and ensure that every...
The Whitehall Senior Center would like to remind everyone that it is that time of year - time to renew your Whitehall Senior Center Membership! Not a member? Now is the perfect time to join! Membership to the Senior Center is $10 per YEAR. Minimum age requirement is 55. If you have any questions, please contact the Whitehall Senior Center at 406-287-5336. The Senior Center is located at and is open daily, and serves Meals on Wheels to locals in the area!...
The Whitehall FFA Alumni & Supporters will host their annual dinner and dance fundraiser, "Forever Blue," on March 7 at the Whitehall Community Center, inviting the community to come together for an evening of good food, live music, and support for local FFA youth. The event will feature a dinner, live and silent auctions, and a dance, with doors opening at 4:30 PM and dinner served at 5 PM. The evening will continue with auctions and dancing, highlighted by live music from Lance Handyside, who...
Whitehall Indivisible (WI) and Whitehall had its first political protest of the year on Sunday, January 25th, in solidarity with the people of Minneapolis to mourn the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. With little notice, ten locals made signs and stood near the fishpond on Legion, waving at passersby. Community feedback was far more positive than negative, which encourages us to do it again. Thank you to all who waved or honked. WI had a regular meeting on January 22. Our homework is to pinpoint specifically what each of us will demand...
Please join in celebrating A SERVICE OF INSTALLATION for Reverend Gideon Pullmann as pastor for Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church. This service will be held on Sunday, February 1, 2026, at 4 PM at the Zion Lutheran Church, located at 301 W First Street in Whitehall. A reception meal will be held in the parish hall immediately following the installation. Pastor Gideon Pullman is the fifth of six children, raised in Laurel, Montana, where his father continues to serve as the Pastor of St. John’s Lutheran Church. He attended high school in C...
WHS alumni Ashlyn Alley, of Whitehall, was recently named to the 2025 fall semester dean’s list for Carroll College in Helena. To be included on the dean’s list, a student must receive a 3.5 grade point average or higher on a 4.0 scale and take at least 12 graded credits in a semester. A complete, sortable list of fall 2025 dean’s list recipients can be found at www.carroll.edu/deanslist....
What a mess. And it’s getting so out of hand. I am not here to lay blame but to lay out how this is supposed to work. How it has worked for decades. When you come across a nation’s border illegally, you are subject to deportation. For decades, our nation has allowed a number of individuals to live under the radar. These individuals do provide a service at a cut rate; this saves farms and ranches the money they need and, theoretically, they pass that saving on to their customers. I have had the opportunity to work side by side with some of the...
If someone told me 10 years ago that people would willingly pay over $5 for a one-gallon container of water, I would have scoffed. Yet here we are buying bottled water even by the cup. People buy teeny bottles that hold less than 8 ounces of water. Then while hiking or traveling, they drink and then toss. Plastic marked PET and HDPE for are said to be recyclable. Said bottles are shredded and melted into “nurdles,” the picturesque name for plastic pellets used as raw material to make more plastic products. That sounds promising, but according t...
The landmark property tax legislation state lawmakers passed in 2025 reduced the tax bills sent out last fall for an estimated 4 in 5 Montana homeowners. As of this week, it’s also facing a lawsuit that could send lawmakers back to the drawing board. The court challenge, brought by Senate Taxation Committee Chair Greg Hertz, R-Polson, and two other prominent Republicans, attacks the new tax law over alleged flaws in the convoluted legislative process that brought the policy change to the desk of Gov. Greg Gianforte. It asks a judge to invalidat...
Girl Scouts of Montana and Wyoming will kick off their 2026 Girl Scout Cookie season on January 30, 2026, a time when Girl Scouts everywhere hone their entrepreneurial skills as they find new and inventive ways to sell cookies, unboxing brighter futures for themselves. With the much-anticipated cookie season back in full swing, cookie lovers can rejoice as they indulge in the classic cookie line-up. ExploremoresTM, a rocky road ice cream-inspired sandwich cookie, will join the legendary lineup for the 2026 Girl Scout Cookie season. Filled with...
More than a hundred health policy wonks filled an auditorium on the campus of Montana State University on Thursday, January 22, 2026. They were there to try to understand how Montana’s Rural Health Transformation Program — the deluge of federal funding that could amount to more than $1 billion over five years — will actually take shape in just a few short months. The vibe was somewhat buzzy, as advisory committee stakeholders from Miles City to Pablo talked about their ideas for spending the state’s massive first-year grant of more than $2...
An evening of space science, nanotechnology, and polar research awaits those attending Science Night on Feb. 5 at Montana State University. About 200 community members are expected to visit the Strand Union Building ballrooms on campus for the free event. Science Night is open to attendees of all ages and will be held from 6 to 7:30 PM. An adult must accompany children at the event, and registration is not required. Attendees will circulate through about 25 demonstrations and activities in a festival-like environment, gaining hands-on experienc...
