Remote Wolf Point Ranches Try to Snare Visitors

Hard as it may be to believe, Amtrak does stop here.

With a population of 3,074, Wolf Point is also the smallest city in the United States offering regularly scheduled, commercial flights.

But the rails are the lifeline in this expansive agricultural region known as Missouri River Country.

Wedged in by the North Dakota border and Canada to the north, Wolf Point’s wheat farmers and cattle ranchers might seem an unlikely presence on the tourism bandwagon.

But in these tough times for America’s small farmers, promoting tourism as an adjunct to farming is one way Wolf Point and the surrounding communities are attempting to keep pace.

Everything is big out here--the prairies, the cultivated fields, the sky. There are few trees in any direction to break the view. Parents routinely drive children 50 miles for a piano lesson.

Farmers, long isolated by the sheer size of their properties, usually build a spare house or two to accommodate help. Today, with the farm economy down and farmers being paid by the government not to grow, these spare homes sit empty.

Help With Chores

Wolf Point isn’t a tropical resort, but you can rent a furnished two-bedroom house for $150 a week. If you wish, you can help with ranch chores such as calving or branding. Or just read a book, take a walk or do nothing at all.

This is a part of Montana that few people visit. In Missouri River Country, you will be hobnobbing with working people, not polished tour guides, and you’ll get a glimpse inside the skin of a community that is not exactly the hub of anything.

A sense of remoteness is ever present. You can gaze 100 miles across the rolling Missouri River breaks and study the approaching storm clouds. Thunder echoes and lightning crackles.

Coffee at the General Sherman Motor Inn--the town’s largest motel--is 35 cents. Steak and eggs, with juice, toast and coffee, tops the menu at $4.

So what does one do after breakfast in Wolf Point?

If you are staying in John Rabenberg’s $150-a-week furnished spare house, you might go flying with your host. He has a private landing strip on his ranch, and for a small fee takes passengers for rides. He also can supply motorbikes or horses.

Rabenberg’s place is only one of more than a dozen cattle, hay or wheat ranches in Wolf Point with an extra house for rent.

Depending on the season and the sort of ranch work being done, visitors can watch or participate in branding, cattle drives, planting, harvesting and other ranch chores.

Another effort to cope with changing times in Wolf Point is being waged by Louis Taovs. Beneath a green baseball cap, Taovs’ eyes twinkle as he leads visitors through what he claims to be the largest and most complete collection of John Deere farm equipment in the world.

Deere Collection

Taovs’ collection overflows 14 cavernous sheds and includes at least one of everything Deere ever made, dating to an 1892 steam tractor.

In addition, the spotlessly well-kept collection includes 500 tractors, Model A and T Fords, the complete Mark series of Lincolns, and hundreds of odd antique water pumps, grinding wheels and assorted farm paraphernalia.

It is all currently on display at Taovs’ LLL Ranch, but not for long. Last summer, the Burlington Northern Railroad donated 25 acres to the Wolf Point Chamber of Commerce for an industrial park and permanent museum to house the Taovs’ collection.

Other visitors stroll down Main Street to Gene Martin’s Wolf Point Saddlery (213 Main St.). Martin has been making saddles by hand for 40 years. He explains each step in the custom-fitting, cutting and shaping processes. Martin ships hand-tooled belts and saddles as far away as Australia. Saddle prices start at $350.

Due north of Wolf Point, only 14 miles from the Canadian border, vacationers reach Scobey, Mont.

Highlights of the community include a combination golf course and squash club. The Pioneer Town and Museum is a recreated frontier town made up of buildings and equipment from the Missouri River Country.

Lots of Antiques

There are board walkways leading to an old one-room schoolhouse and church, a general store filled with antiques, a 1915 doctor’s office and even an old movie theater that now features live stage shows.

Every summer there’s a weeklong covered-wagon trip from nearby Richland to Scobey, culminating in an annual threshing bee held on the Fourth of July--the biggest event of the year, with pancake breakfasts and barbecues, antique car shows and sports events.

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Wolf Point is 225 miles northwest of Billings. Northwest Airlines operates two flights daily between the cities. The fare is $118 one way, or $171 round trip, with a seven-day advance purchase. The best connections from Los Angeles to Billings are through Salt Lake City on Delta Airlines, or through Denver on United or Continental.

Accommodations include the General Sherman Motor Hotel, 200 E. Main St., Wolf Point 59201, (406) 653-1100. Rates for a double room are under $35. For information on renting John Rabenberg’s house, write Rabenberg at Ft. Peck, Wolf Point, Mont. 59201, or call (406) 525-3318.

The Pioneer Town and Museum in Scobey is seven blocks west of Main Street. For more information, contact the Daniels County Museum Archives, P.O. Box 133, Scobey, Mont. 59623, (406) 487-5559.

For more information on Wolf Point and Montana’s Missouri River Country, contact Travel Montana, Montana Department of Commerce, 1424 9th Ave., Helena, Mont. 59620, (800) 541-1447.