A Little About Life at Ninemile

We’ve been here almost a month, and it’s rained about everyday, with temps in the 40s and 50s. While spring arrives late in Montana, the locals say it’s been an usually wet and cool June. However, this cool wet weather doesn’t necessarily mean a low fire season in July and August. In fact, it will probably make it worse as these spring rains promote more ground cover fuel when the weather turns hot and dry.

Things have picked up at the visitor center. We now average about 20-25 visitors a day. It’s fun meeting people from all over the country. It appears a mini-gold rush is underway. We’ve had several inquires about “where can I find the gold?” or “how can I file a claim? (Jim can tell the prospectors even before they come in: their vehicles are pretty beat up, and they look like they’ve been living in the backcountry for awhile) Of course, we direct them to the main office for those questions.

Ninemile Depot is certainly an interesting place. It was founded in the 1930s following a decade of devastating fires that destroyed millions of acres and several towns. Modeled after the old western depots that provided fresh stock and supplies to the calvary traveling through, Ninemile was built to provide trained and experirenced animal packers and stock (primarily mules) to transport equipment into the backcountry to fight fires.

All the buildings were constructed by the Civilian Conservation Core, which had one of the largest camps in the nation stationed here, about 600 men. The architecture is unique for a western ranch: the planners thought that having a Kentucky blue grass theme gave the image of an elite stock breeding and training operation.
In the 1940s, the smoke jumpers trained here as well. Their training facility moved to Missoula in the 1950s, but the depot still has a landing strip for when they practice out here.

Today, with the advent of the smoke jumpers and more roads into the forests, pack trains play less of a role in fire fighting. However, they are still used for trail maintenance work and assist the smoke jumpers by hauling out equipment that was parachuted in.

Ninemile Depot is also home to the Wildlands Training Center, which offers courses and clinics to both forest service personnel and the public. These fill up a year in advance and include animal packing, horsemanship, Leave No Trace for back country stock users, crosscut saw use and maintenance, log cabin construction, and use of compasses and GPS (I need to take that one!)

Well, that’s all for now. We just bought season fishing licenses and our goal is to hike into some mountain lakes to camp and fish and hopefully eat fresh trout for dinner.

The CCC Ninemile Remount Barn


Visitor Center (was the garage in depot days)


Ranger Station office (was the bunkhouse for the packers)


That's Splinters, our lifesize mule in the Visitor Center


A packing clinic at the Ninemile Wildlands Training Center


Corrals with horses/mules in pasture


A nice day at Ninemile

Starting Life at an Historic Ranger Station

We’ve been at our assignment post, the Ninemile Remount Depot, for a week. It's part of the Ninemile Ranger District of the Lolo National Forest. Arrived on Monday, May 24. And everyday, it’s rained!

On our way here, we made one nice stop: Ft. Abraham Lincoln State Park in North Dakato. It’s the post where General George Custer led his ill-fated 7th cavalry to its demise at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. It’s also the site of On-the-Slant Indian Village, a Madan tribal site that was already abandoned due to small pox when Lewis and Clark stopped by on their expedition.

Here at Ninemile, we completed our training last Wednesday and Thursday for duties as Visitor Center hosts. Our first real work day was Friday. We alternate work days with another couple from Arizona, Bill and Betty Jones, who worked here the summer of 2007. It’s hard to call this a real job, as the center averages only about 20 visitors a day, which means a lot of down time to read, do cross word puzzles, play cards, or visit the corrals and feed the horses and mules. On Saturday, the Ferrier was here, shoeing the animals. Pretty laid back.

I think what makes the Remount Depot unique is both its history and the role it plays today as a working ranger station and stock ranch. In 1984, it was designated a national historic site for its role in instituting and standardizing equipment and techniques for breeding, training, and using stock to fight forest fires.
Visitors can take a self-guided tour of the facilities but if requested, we are available to give tours as well. Our work schedule is sweet: on every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and every other Wednesday, which means we have lots of time off to explore the area. Good thing, as there is lots to see and do: we are 2.5 hours away from Glacier National Park, and 4 hours away from Yellowstone. Plus, there’s much to explore and enjoy in the surrounding region, including state parks, national forests and mountain lakes and rivers as well as Missoula, a nice university town only 30 miles away, where we are today, using the library’s internet.

We have a nice full-service camp site in the pine trees, courtesy of the forest service. But we discovered the hard way to be careful about what we store outside. It’s been really cold (40s) and rainy, so we thought we’d store our beer under the motor home to keep it cold. Bad idea. We woke up on our third morning here, and the entire 12-pack was gone. Found it ajavascript:void(0) few yards away. Four of the cans had been punctured by what looked like really BIG sharp teeth. Empty of course. Not sure why it only drank four cans. Maybe it didn’t like Pabst? Also, the-host’s bird feeder was raided the same night, so we are now keeping every thing that even resembles a food or beverage container under wraps, either in the motor home or the car.

All for now. Let’s hope it stops raining and the sun comes out for good. Next post, I’ll give you a brief outline of the Depot’s unique history.

A Mandan Dwelling


Interior of a Mandan Ceremonial House


Fort's graveyard. Note cause of this one's death.


Ready for guests at the visitor center (that's Splinter, the mule in the background)


Jim with one of the depot's permanent residents


The farrier at work