05/25/2026
Welcome to Montana Mondays, our weekly series dedicated to uncovering the rich and rugged history of Montana!
Love was sometimes hard to find at the turn of the 20th century, especially for those living in rural areas of Montana. So well-known was the plight of lonely homesteaders that postcards from the era show both women and men searching for that special someone.
To assist these solitary sufferers, newspapers of the time advertised matrimonial publications like “Mutual Magnets” (Anaconda Standard, 4/1/1900, p 23). The Great Falls Leader described how a Chicago matrimonial service operated: a person seeking love or companionship could enter the office and peruse ads such as:
“Unencumbered Widower, worth $150,000, with beautiful home and extensive lucrative business interests, seeks wife to love and cherish,”
or
“Handsome American lady, valuable property, generous income, is serious in desiring to find loveable husband to share home with her.”
Upon finding a suitable ad, the matrimonial service would forward a letter from the prospective partner, for a fee. Montana, the Leader lamented, had no such “up-to-date” service available (09/17/1900, p 6).
The Kalispell Bee printed a letter on Jan 8, 1901, in which two ladies from Hoboken, NJ, requested to learn if any farm with plenty of bachelors had work for them, preferably one where there were no other women present. The Bee promised to release the ladies’ address to any “sincere and honorable applicants” while also warning said successful applicant that he “would have the matrimonial harness on before he knew it,” (p 2).
While the success of these ads is unknown, people certainly continued to move to Montana, drawn by the lure of land, employment, and freedom. The population of Montana increased by over 50% between 1900-1910, to 376,000. Sixty-four percent of the counted residents had been born outside the state at that time.
Sources: https://mthspublic.newspapers.com/ , https://www.mtmemory.org/ ,https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1910/bulletins/demographics/359-population-mt-composition-and-characteristics.pdf
For more Montana history, please check out the 978.6 section of the library!
