Gold Creek is a creek in southwestern

Montana Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbi ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

, on

Interstate 90 Interstate 90 (I-90) is an east–west transcontinental freeway and the longest Interstate Highway in the United States at . It begins in Seattle, Washington, and travels through the Pacific Northwest, Mountain West, Great Plains, Midwest, and ...

northwest of

Garrison A garrison (from the French ''garnison'', itself from the verb ''garnir'', "to equip") is any body of troops stationed in a particular location, originally to guard it. The term now often applies to certain facilities that constitute a mil ...

, between

Butte __NOTOC__ In geomorphology, a butte () is an isolated hill with steep, often vertical sides and a small, relatively flat top; buttes are smaller landforms than mesas, plateaus, and tablelands. The word ''butte'' comes from a French word mea ...

and

Missoula Missoula ( ; fla, label=Salish language, Séliš, Nłʔay, lit=Place of the Small Bull Trout, script=Latn; kut, Tuhuⱡnana, script=Latn) is a city in the U.S. state of Montana; it is the county seat of Missoula County, Montana, Missoula Cou ...

. It flows through parts of

Granite County Granite County is a county located in the U.S. state of Montana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 3,309. Its county seat is Philipsburg. The county was founded in 1893, and was named for a mountain which contains the Granite Mountain ...

and Powell County and empties into the

Clark Fork (river) The Clark Fork, or the Clark Fork of the Columbia River, is a river in the U.S. states of Montana and Idaho, approximately long. The largest river by volume in Montana, it drains an extensive region of the Rocky Mountains in western Montana and ...

at the

own Ownership is the state or fact of legal possession and control over property, which may be any asset, tangible or intangible. Ownership can involve multiple rights, collectively referred to as title, which may be separated and held by different ...

of Goldcreek (), northwest of the town of Garrison. In 1852, a trapper named Francois Finlay, who was also known as Benetsee, found the first recorded

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...

in what is now Montana in what he named Benetsee Creek.Fogarty, Kate Hammond. ''The Story of Montana.'' New York and Chicago: A. S. Barnes company, 1916. However, not enough gold was found to make mining commercially viable. In 1858, prospectors James and

Granville Stuart Granville Stuart (August 27, 1834 – October 2, 1918) was a pioneer, gold prospector, businessman, civic leader, vigilante, author, cattleman and diplomat who played a prominent role in the early history of Montana Territory and the state o ...

and Reese Anderson discovered gold in the creek.Milner, Clyde A. and O'Connor, Carol A. ''As Big as the West: The Pioneer Life of Granville Stuart.'' New York: Oxford University Press US, 2008. The three men didn't have sufficient tools to begin excavating, and were unable to return with the proper equipment until 1862. The creek was renamed "Gold Creek" because of the gold found there. The Stuart brothers and their prospecting party helped open up Western Montana to settlers, all due to their initial find at Gold Creek. Gold Creek is near where the last spike of the Northern Pacific Railway was driven on September 8, 1883.

Notes

Gold rushes Bodies of water of Granite County, Montana Bodies of water of Powell County, Montana Rivers of Montana Ghost towns in Montana {{Montana-river-stub