A pair of historic murals from Glacier National Park have been restored and put on display at the O’Shaughnessy Center in Whitefish.
The murals are part of a collection preserved by the Hockaday Museum of Art in Kalispell and are the fifth and sixth pieces to be restored since 2012. The restoration of both paintings was made possible with a large donation from BNSF Railway Foundation.
Leanne and Alan Goldhahn donated the 15 paintings to the Hockaday a few years after Leanne found them in her mother’s garage in Billings. Leanne said her grandparents owned a store in East Glacier Park and as far as she can tell they saved them from a dumpster when the Glacier Park Lodge was being refurbished in the 1950s. Who exactly painted the murals that depict Glacier’s dramatic landscape is a mystery.
In the early 1900s, Great Northern Railway president Louis Hill commissioned a series of murals for the famous chalets and lodges being built in the newly created Glacier National Park. Evidence suggests that noted Glacier artist John Fery was originally commissioned to paint the murals that would line the walls. But Hill wanted them faster than Fery could produce them, so Hill hired another artist who eventually made 51 murals. The identity of that artist and when exactly he or she painted the landscapes of Glacier National Park has been lost to time.
Since the murals arrived at the museum, six have been restored. Four are on display at the museum in Kalispell and two are now at the O’Shaughnessy Center. Local art conservator and museum board member Joe Abbrescia has headed up the restoration of the murals. Museum spokesperson Brian Eklund said the museum wants to eventually restore all 15 pieces and display them across the region, including outside the valley. Eklund said the museum is always open to proposals of how to finance and display the remaining nine murals, all of which are stored in a climate controlled collection room in Kalispell.
“These murals fit in with our mission of preserving the artistic legacy of Montana and Glacier Naitonal Park,” he said “This is the type of project that is very important to us.”
As for Leanne, she said her family is excited that the public will now be able to enjoy two more murals that her grandparents fished out of a dumpster a half-century ago.
“This is exactly what we hoped for, to help preserve these pieces of Glacier National Park’s history,” she said.
For more information visit www.hockadaymuseum.org.