Prairie County Museum & Evelyn Cameron Gallery

03/13/2026

Evelyn Cameron with her arms around two wolf pups — likely pets Weecharpee and Tussa — around 1908. [MTHS , PAc 90-87.N133]

Evelyn J. Cameron (1868-1928) was a pioneer photographer and rancher in eastern Montana. Originally from England, she married Ewan Cameron in 1889. They moved to Montana together, establishing the Eve Ranch near Terry in 1893.

To help support their ranch, Evelyn became a skilled photographer, documenting local families, ranch life, and special events. She also kept detailed diaries from 1893 until her death in 1928, recording everything from daily chores and weather to letters, books she read, and the photographs she took.

The images and diaries provide detailed insights into the lives of early eastern Montana ranch families. Evelyn’s negatives and vintage prints, her camera, and her extensive diaries are now housed at the Montana Historical Society.

02/02/2026

09/29/2025

09/24/2025

Work has started on the railroad depot. The members present were Bernie,Vera,and Perry. They scraped and painted the west wall and part of the front. Thanks everyone it’s looking great.

09/03/2025

As we welcome kids across Montana to the 2025-26 school year, we owe much to the inspiration for this classic brick school building located in the town of Terry about 35 miles northeast of Miles City.

Its namesake, Charles W. Grandey, arrived in Terry in 1907 to teach in a two-room schoolhouse. “The budding community quickly embraced Grandey’s energy and enthusiasm, and in January 1908, the school board offered to build a new grade school if Grandey would stay on. He agreed, and voters passed a $15,000 bond issue,” writes historian Christine Brown in our newly released book, “A History of Montana in 101 Places: Sites and Stories from the Montana Historical Society.”

Grandey went on to influence public education statewide, helping revise Montana school law in 1912, rewriting Montana’s high school English curriculum, and stopping proposed cuts to humanities instruction during World War II. He was a founding member and president of the Montana Education Association (now the Montana Federation of Public Employees) and the Montana High Schools Association.

Writes Brown: “A newspaper reporter wrote of Grandey’s accomplishments in 1947, ‘To be sure there was a Terry before Grandey came west. There would have been a Terry if he had never migrated, but it would have been a different Terry.’ And without Grandey, it would have been a different Montana.”

The Grandey School is just one of the educational institutions featured in “A History of Montana in 101 Places” alongside train depots, theaters, homestead cabins, and numerous other buildings and landscapes that have made and remade Big Sky Country. Get your copy today at https://loom.ly/KiKiGmQ or visit your local bookstore.

Photography by Tom Ferris.



Farcountry Press

06/30/2025

The Prairie County Museum was recently awarded a collective $105,000 between two state historic preservation grant programs to restore parts of the 1906 State Bank of Terry building along Laundre

06/10/2025

June 15 meeting rescheduled to June 22 https://www.pcmuseum.org/board

05/27/2025

A wee friend visited Evelyn's grave Sunday.

04/10/2025

Board meeting rescheduled to 4/13 to accommodate Easter Sunday.

04/09/2025

Great article, Sheila Mothershead Dixson!

Scattered about the prairie town of Terry are a number of buildings still standing more than a century later as monuments of the community's vibrant people and culture throughout time.

01/14/2025

Taking pictures of pets under the Big Sky is nothing new! Evelyn Cameron’s photogenic feline friend, Patchy, was one of her common photographic subjects. Patchy may even be the most photographed individual cat in the MTHS collections. Cameron's photographs have been longtime favorites in Montana The Magazine of Western History. The Summer 2014 issue featured the article
"Divas, Divorce, and Disclosure: Hidden Narratives in the Diaries of Evelyn Cameron," by Ann Roberts and Christine Wordsworth and a photo essay "Under the Big Sky" of some of Cameron’s best photography.
[Cat sitting in eroded hole in rock, Eastern Montana, ca. 1900, Evelyn Cameron, photographer, MTHS PAc 90-87.G003-002]