Greetings, Beacon Nation!Tristan Scott here to float your boat with this Tuesday edition of the Daily Roundup.
Each summer, thousands of visitors experience the majesty of Glacier National Park by embarking on a scenic tour on board one of four historic wooden boats, which since 1938 have ferried passengers across the park’s most iconic lakes. In recent years, those passengers have occasionally included members of my family.
Although the boat tours are a departure from our long-running annual family backpacking tradition, they’ve been far more accommodating as our multigenerational age gap widens and our packing abilities vary, providing us with a low-impact activity that we can all enjoy together. I remain optimistic (read: naive) that I’m still a long way off from permanently swapping my backpack for a boat ride, but I’ve come to cherish the scenic summer tours, in large part because of my fascination with the fleet of historic wooden boats that’s served Glacier’s largest lakes since 1938.
In June, I relished seeing my nephews learn some of the park’s history from atop the upper deck of the DeSmet (pictured below), which in its 97-year history has never left its natal waters on Lake McDonald. That interpretive history was courtesy of Capt. Ethan Kennedy, who not only chronicled the park’s development since 1910, but also covered its deeper cultural and geological annals spanning 20,000 years. And, in a memorable bit of trivia that made an impression on my nephews, he pointed out Lake McDonald’s resident pair of bald eagles, Pickles and Big Mac, which mate for life.
Now, please help balance the load by distributing your weight evenly across the port and starboard sides of this vessel and I’ll get the next leg of our tour underway.
Because the old wooden boats function as a sort of living museum to showcase their own inimitable history as well as the park’s, I often wonder if the average visitor appreciates their intangible value, which is priceless.
But thanks to a new 20-minute documentary-style video commissioned by Glacier Park Boat Company to honor the vessel’s 100th year of service, the history of Glacier and its boats is more accessible to visitors.
The documentary, “Little Chief: The Centennial Restoration,” is now streaming publicly online and will be coming soon to the St. Mary Visitor Center this season, with local screening times still being finalized. It captures the behind-the-scenes preservation of one of Glacier National Park’s most iconic historic wooden vessels, Little Chief (pictured above), which was built in 1926 by Captain J.W. Swanson, of Kalispell.
Glacier Park Boat Co. has held the concession contract to operate the boats for recreational purposes in Glacier National Park since 1938, purchasing the fleet from Swanson, a prolific boat builder who constructed many of Glacier’s historic boats, including four of the current vessels — the Sinopah on Two Medicine Lake, Little Chief on St. Mary Lake, DeSmet on Lake McDonald, and Morning Eagle on Josephine Lake. (Swanson also built the M.V. International on Waterton Lake.)
The video chronicles the labor-of-love process required to preserve a piece of living maritime history. The production captures roughly 20 weeks of the winter and spring portions of the restoration, showcasing the intricate woodworking and incredible modern craftsmanship required to bring the 1926 flagship to its successful summer launch back onto St. Mary Lake.
Originally launched in 1926, the Little Chief has served as a cornerstone of the visitor experience in Glacier for generations. Its extensive restoration ensures the vessel remains structurally sound for its next century of service on the park’s glacial lakes.
Brandy Burke, local videographer (and former park employee) hired by the boat company to film the project, said capturing a thread of the park’s little-known history was a personal passion project.
“Documenting history is incredibly important to me, and as a storyteller, this project was a perfect fit because I was able to partner with a team that cares just as much about preserving history as I do,” she said. “Working alongside the Glacier Park Boat Company crew has been an amazing experience, and I have learned so much about these historic vessels throughout the process. They hold the history and the physical boats, and I have the storytelling capability, together, we are ensuring this legacy isn’t lost.”
The Little Chief video marks the first phase of a broader multi-year visual preservation effort by Glacier Park Boat Company. Two subsequent video features are currently in development: a dedicated chronicle of the upcoming centennial restoration of the Sinopah, scheduled to begin immediately after the boats are pulled for the 2026 season, and a comprehensive historical retrospective of the Glacier Park Boat Company, slated for release this winter.
The full video is now streaming publicly on the official Glacier Park Boat Company YouTube channel. To watch the video online, visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Mouk-DHVS4
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For more than eight decades, Glacier Park Boat Co. has taken painstaking care to ensure its heritage is on display with its fleet of historic wooden boats
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