Homesteading On The Missouri River Bottoms At The Mouth of Cow Creek and Bull Creek
Where small creeks or streams emerge from the breaks to meet the Missouri, there are broad riverside "bottoms" with meadows and cottonwoods. Cow Creek opens to such a bottom at its junction with the Missouri, and further downstream Bull Creek opens up another bottom as it flows into the Missouri.
Just upstream from the mouth of Cow Creek, the Kipp homestead lies in Cow Creek bottom. It is adjacent to the site of the old upper steamboat landing, above the mouth of Cow Creek. One source reports that the Kipp homestead was originally filed by the historic figure James Kipp (1788–1880) and was lived in by his son, Joseph and then his grandson, James Kipp, but that this Kipp homestead and the homestead downriver on Bull Creek became the property of the Jones family, related by marriage to the Kipp family. Another source indicates the homestead was claimed by Jim Kipp in 1913. Jim was the son of Joseph Kipp (1849–1913) who was the son of the historic figure James Kipp (1788–1880) and his wife Earth Woman.
The elder historic James Kipp (1788–1880) helped establish Ft. Union at the mouth of the Yellowstone in 1828 and he also founded Ft. Piegan at the mouth of the Marias River in 1831. The Kipp homestead is abandoned but a few cabins and outbuildings remain standing at the homestead site.
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Looking up river to the Kipp Homestead.
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Kipp homestead buildings – newer cabin in center, original cabin on right, dugout on left.
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Kipp homestead – detail of original cabin. Note mud chinking and earth roof.
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Kipp homestead – stable, dugout of bank going down to river from cabins.
Just downstream from the mouth of Cow Creek is the mouth of Bull Creek. Here on Bull Creek bottom is another abandoned homestead with decaying and collapsing log buildings, and the debris from failed farming efforts. This homestead is attributed to the Jones family, related by marriage to the Kipp family.
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Three Homestead Buildings, Bull Creek Bottoms, Missouri River Breaks, Montana
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First Homestead Building, Bull Creek Bottoms, Missouri River Breaks, Montana
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Second Homestead Building, Bull Creek Bottoms, Missouri River Breaks, Montana
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Third Homestead Building, Bull Creek Bottoms, Missouri River Breaks, Montana
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Abandoned truck and farm equipment, Homestead on Bull Creek Bottoms, Montana
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Stove, Homestead on Bull Creek Bottoms, Montana
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Homestead, Bull Creek Bottom, Chickenhouse dugout and what's left of the old tractor
Road access to both homesteads was along a primitive road that traveled downstream along the Missouri on the north side of the river to the site of a power plant. This road was still passable from the power plant site to Cow Creek a few years ago. During the homesteading years, one of the few ferries in the Missouri breaks operated at the site of the power plant. From the power plant ferry a road went north to the Zortman area, and another road went south toward Lewistown, Montana.
Read more about this topic: Cow Creek (Montana)
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—Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961)