Literary Butte: A History in Novels & Film

by Aaron Parrett

Overview

Known worldwide as the "Richest Hill on Earth," Butte, Montana, lured immigrants from every part of the world to sweat in the copper mines that powered America in its Gilded Age. Dozens of writers celebrated this "wide-open town" with impassioned novels of the rugged souls who braved the western frontier at the edge of the Continental Divide. They wrote of the opulence of success and the agony of broken dreams. They catalogued the clash between labor and capital as Butte boomed from a crude village of mules and men to prestige as Montana's biggest city with towering buildings of brick and iron. In Literary Butte, award-winning author Aaron Parrett surveys the wealth of literature that has come from the town that calls itself "Butte, America."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781626198364
Publisher:	Arcadia Publishing SC
Publication date:	02/16/2015
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Aaron Parrett was born in Butte, Montana. He earned a degree in Philosophy from the University of Montana and holds a Masters' and a Doctorate in Comparative Literature from the University of Georgia. He has published widely in many fields, including fiction. He has also gathered accolades for his original music, including the 1996 album The Sinners. In 2004 he won The People's Choice Award from the Montana Historical Society for his article "Montana's Worst Natural Disaster."

Table of Contents

Foreword Peter Koch 9

Acknowledgements 11

Introduction: Butte, America 13

1 Before the Copper Kings: Josephine White Bates and a Blind Lead 21

2 Butte in its Prime: Mary MacLane and Other Early Narratives of Butte 37

Mary MacLane 37

Willis George Emerson 46

Harry Leon Wilson and Ridgwell Cullum 48

Gertrude Atherton 52

Charles Cleveland Cohan 58

Berton Braley 60

George Wesley Davis 66

Reuben Maury 71

3 After the War of the Copper Kings: The Literature the Company Town 73

Dashiell Hammett 73

Myron Brinig 78

James Francis Rabbitt 85

4 Modern Butte: Writers of the '40S and '50S 91

Joe Duffy 91

Clyde Murphy 95

Butte in the "Pulps" 101

Norman Macleod 109

5 The Psychology of Decay and Endurance 113

David MacCuish 114

Richard K. O'Malley 119

Camden Wells 122

Donald McCaig 123

6 Life in the Industrial Sublime: Butte Literature Since 1990 127

Ed Lahey 129

Ivan Doig 132

Richard Wheeler 133

Dorothy Bryant 134

Reif Larsen 136

Pauls Toutonghi 138

JakeMosher 139

Jon Jackson 140

Sandra Dallas 141

Heather Barbieri 141

7 Mining Town Cinema: Butte on Film 143

A Romance of Butte (circa 1920) 143

Perch of the Devil (1927) 144

The Sisters (1937) 147

Evel Knievel (1971) 147

The Killer Inside Me (1976) 147

Bell Diamond (1986) 148

Don't Come Knocking (2005) 150

Who Killed Cock Robin? (2005) 152

The Young and Prodigious T.S. Spivet (2013) 152

Other Butte Appearances in TV and Film 153

Afterword: 'And… Away Runs Jenny through the Cactus…" 155

Selected Bibliography and Suggestions for Further Reading 161

Index 169

About the Author 173