The Montana History Portal is a free, digital collection of Montana’s cultural heritage, history and art. Much of the catalog is historic material, some items listed are contemporary. Each is a resource for education, personal, business, and lifelong learning. Its materials are comprised of maps, photographs, rare books, historic documents, diaries, oral histories, audio and visual clips, and artwork from Montana libraries, museums, archives and cultural institutions. Their mission, “encourages cultural institutions to digitize historic and contemporary resources reflecting Montana’s rich cultural heritage and to make them freely available for lifelong learning.” Click here to get started.
Their database has over 90,000 materials, including over 40,000 images, 10,000 documents, 4,000 audio files, and 2,000 yearbooks to search through. You can browse the database without an account, but creating one allows you to keep track of your history, save materials and more. Creating an account is easy and free, requiring just an email and password to register. On the homepage, use the search bar to find terms you are looking for. You can narrow your search results using the item type, date, within data and search for menus. If you would like to make copies of any of the materials, you must submit an inquiry to the institution that provided it. For more information on navigating the portal, click here to watch several videos to get you started.
