Saugus is a rural

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

in Prairie County,

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 ...

, United States, along the

Yellowstone River The Yellowstone River is a tributary of the Missouri River, approximately long, in the Western United States. Considered the principal tributary of the upper Missouri, via its own tributaries it drains an area with headwaters across the mountain ...

. It was the location of the Custer Creek train wreck. Saugus was once one of the biggest

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, bovid ungulates widely kept as livestock. They are prominent modern members of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Mature female cattle are calle ...

and

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 mi ...

shipping points in eastern Montana. In 1909, then in Custer County, Saugus opened its post office. Saugus was also home to a school. In 1925, the post office was discontinued. The community is now served by the

Terry Terry is a unisex diminutive nickname for the given names Teresa or Theresa (feminine) or Terence (given name), Terence, Terrance (masculine). People Male * Terry A. Canales, American politician * Terry A. Doughty (born 1959), American district ...

post office (Zip Code 59349). The town was on the

Milwaukee Road The Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (CMStP&P), better known as the Milwaukee Road , was a Class I railroad that operated in the Midwestern United States, Midwest and Pacific Northwest, Northwest of the United States from 1847 ...

railroad line. On June 19, 1938, the ''Olympian #15'', a Trans-Missouri passenger train, derailed when bridge piers were undermined by the high water of Custer Creek caused by a

cloudburst Cloudburst in New Orleans A cloudburst is an enormous amount of precipitation in a short period of time, sometimes accompanied by hail and thunder, which is capable of creating flood conditions. Cloudbursts can quickly dump large amounts of wat ...

. Seven of the 11 cars derailed. Of the 175 people aboard, 47 people drowned and 75 were injured. Some bodies were never recovered. The Milwaukee Road changed the named of the station to Susan to honor Cattlewoman Susan Haughian (who, along with her sons, owned the land the station was located on) and to remove its association with the accident. The last railroad to run through Saugus was the

Burlington Northern Railroad The Burlington Northern Railroad was a United States–based railroad company formed from a merger of four major U.S. railroads. Burlington Northern operated between 1970 and 1995. Its historical lineage begins in the earliest days of railroad ...

References

Saugus on Google Maps Interstate Commerce Commission Report
Unincorporated communities in Montana Unincorporated communities in Prairie County, Montana {{PrairieCountyMT-geo-stub