Sometimes, it’s the details that make a landmark significant. Other times, it’s the deliberations that happened there that matter more. And reimagining the conversations that likely took place at the Steere Residence at 630 First Ave. W. are worth the conjuring effort, for they can certainly teach us a thing or two — in more ways than one.
The place is the namesake of Eugene A. Steere, the former Montana state superintendent of public instruction from 1892 until 1897. He came to Kalispell in 1898 to become the superintendent of city schools. Like many new arrivals, Steere initially stayed at the Dillon Hotel (formerly at First Ave E. and First St. E.), along with his wife Susan Elizabeth (née Covillion) and their two children Metta and Maynard.
However, as they do, things changed. When the Flathead County high school was organized, Steere became the principal. And in September 1900, his wife succumbed to tuberculosis. But this was an era of undismayed perseverance. Steere recovered, remarried, and had another daughter Esther (born 1901) with his second wife, Lillian (née Comfort). Along with his two other children, Steere relocated his family to this residence in 1903.
In the summer of 1904, Steere’s daughter Metta followed in her father’s footsteps. Barely a teenager herself, Metta went to Pleasant Valley (some 40 miles west of Kalispell) and turned an abandoned cabin into a makeshift school for a handful of students eager to learn anything they could from anyone who would give them a chance.
Metta returned to Kalispell that fall and graduated high school in 1905, along with 12 other students including Dean King (aka Judge Dean King), whom she later married.
Metta and her graduating class attended school at a frame building on Sixth Ave. W., where her principal/father stoked the wood stoves to ward off the chill from the classrooms. In warmer weather, the students played “prisoner’s base,” or basketball, or swam in nearby Ashley Creek during recess.
Incidentally, Metta helped form the girls’ basketball team, which took to the courts in blouses and bloomers, despite much parental protest and perceived improprieties — yet with permission (if not encouragement?) from the school principal.
Meanwhile, the boy’s track team went to a meet in Missoula that year. Never mind needing more cup-holders in the minivan. The boys had to mount the horse and buggy by 4 in the morning to reach the docks at Demersville by 5, to take a steamboat down the lake to Polson, to board the stagecoach for Ravalli, to catch whatever sleep they could and compete the next day. Even more remarkably, some of the boys had measles — and still competed [so, should any friends or relatives reference having to “walk 8 miles to school uphill in the snow backwards,” politely mention this particular scholastic sojourn].
After high school, Metta attended the University of Wisconsin (her father’s alma mater). She then taught in Troy, Libby, and at the Kalispell Central School. Metta continued to advocate advancement, particularly for women (although warranted, her perspective was not exactly welcomed in her lifetime).
Indeed, E.A. Steere forged a lasting legacy in local history and Montana education in general. He was a consummate educator, one who tirelessly advocated betterment and often spoke of the “obligation of education.”
Thus, this is a place where pioneering educators forged a family legacy. It’s a place where teachers planned for students to achieve. And it’s where a father undoubtedly sat down and told his children the truth — perhaps the hardest lesson in life to bear — which much like the history of this place, seems to have regrettably faded with passing generations.
Jaix Chaix is a columnist and author of Flathead Valley Landmarks and other local history books that are available for sale at the Flathead Beacon at 17 Main St. in Kalispell.