The Judith Mountains are located in central

Montana Montana ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota to the east, South Dakota to the southeast, Wyoming to the south, an ...

in the

Central Montana Alkalic Province The central Montana Alkalic Province is located in the United States in central Montana. Montana is bordered by Idaho, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Canada to the north. Central Montana is unique when compared to the rest of the Rocky M ...

Fergus County Fergus County is a county in the U.S. state of Montana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 11,446. Its county seat is Lewistown. The county was founded in 1885 and named for James Fergus, a Montana politician who was instrumental in cr ...

, just to the northeast of

Lewistown, Montana Lewistown is a city in and the county seat of Fergus County, Montana, United States. The population was 5,952 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Lewistown is located in the geographic center of the state, southeast of Great Falls, Mo ...

. Judith Peak is the highest summit of this range, with an elevation of .

History

To the southeast of Judith Peak lies the remains of

Fort Maginnis Fort Maginnis was established during the Indian wars in the Department of Dakota by the U.S. Army. It was the last of five forts: Fort Keogh, Keogh (1876), Fort Custer (Montana), Custer (1877), Fort Missoula, Missoula (1877), Fort Assinniboine, Ass ...

. Fort Maginnis was built in 1880 to protect the cattle ranches, the gold mining camps in and around the Judith Mountains and the Carroll Trail. The fort was constructed following the

battle of the Little Bighorn The Battle of the Little Bighorn, known to the Lakota people, Lakota and other Plains Indians as the Battle of the Greasy Grass, and commonly referred to as Custer's Last Stand, was an armed engagement between combined forces of the Lakota Si ...

. In 1879,

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

and his friend

Samuel T. Hauser Samuel Thomas Hauser (January 10, 1833 – November 10, 1914) was an American industrialist and banker who was active in the development of Montana Territory. He made his first fortune in silver mines and railroads, but he lost everything in the ...

along with Helena banker Andrew J. Davis established the ''Davis, Hauser and Stuart'' (DHS) cattle company. Stuart was made the general manager of the DHS brand and Stuart located the ranch headquarters on on the southern slopes of the Judith Mountains near Flat Willow Creek. The DHS Ranch was one of the largest open range cattle operations in the Central Montana prairie in the 1880s.

Mining and geology

The geology of the range includes

limestone Limestone is a type of carbonate rock, carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material Lime (material), lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different Polymorphism (materials science) ...

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

, and

siltstone Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility. Although its permeabil ...

Cambrian The Cambrian ( ) is the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 51.95 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran period 538.8 Ma (million years ago) to the beginning of the Ordov ...

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 mya (unit), million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era (geology), Era, as well as the longest. At around 77.1 million years, it is the ...

age which were intruded by alkaline intrusives of

monzonite Monzonite is an igneous intrusive rock, formed by slow cooling of underground magma that has a moderate silica content and is enriched in alkali metal oxides. Monzonite is composed mostly of plagioclase and alkali feldspar. Syenodiorite is an ...

syenite Syenite is a coarse-grained intrusive igneous rock with a general composition similar to that of granite, but deficient in quartz, which, if present at all, occurs in relatively small concentrations (< 5%). It is considered a tinguaite composition of Cretaceous to

Tertiary Tertiary (from Latin, meaning 'third' or 'of the third degree/order..') may refer to: * Tertiary period, an obsolete geologic period spanning from 66 to 2.6 million years ago * Tertiary (chemistry), a term describing bonding patterns in organic ch ...

age.

Epithermal Hydrothermal circulation in its most general sense is the circulation of hot water (Ancient Greek ὕδωρ, ''water'',Liddell, H.G. & Scott, R. (1940). ''A Greek-English Lexicon. revised and augmented throughout by Sir Henry Stuart Jones. with th ...

gold and silver

veins Veins () are blood vessels in the circulatory system of humans and most other animals that carry blood towards the heart. Most veins carry deoxygenated blood from the tissues back to the heart; exceptions are those of the pulmonary and fetal c ...

are found along the intrusive contacts. The mountains were the center of gold and silver mining in the 1800s and current exploration continues.Gies Mine (Red Metal Claim group; Gies Mine; Elk Peak project; Bertha claim group), Cone Butte Sub District, Warm Spring District (Gilt Edge District; Gold Hill District; Maiden District), Fergus Co., Montana, USA
/ref> The old mining camps of Maiden and Gilt Edge were built during the mining boom in the 1880s and 1890s. Southwest face Judith Mountains

References

External links

Judith Mountains
Mountain ranges of Montana Landforms of Fergus County, Montana Volcanism of Montana {{FergusCountyMT-geo-stub

History

Mining and geology

See also

References

External links