A Multitude of Opportunities: From Dinosaurs to a Farmers’ Diner
“Things have snowballed,” observes one resident about all the changes going on in Glendive, Montana. “Negativism is being replaced by enthusiasm for diverse projects.” Community members from many backgrounds and interests are joining together to help grow Glendive, beautify the community with cleanups and artistic murals, and develop its tourism potential through attractive street banners and other innovations. Glendive now promotes what is in their backyard and is eastern Montana’s best-kept secret: the majestic Badlands and hidden dinosaur fossils. Some residents are also looking to serve locally produced food in a farm-to-table restaurant adjacent to the Yellowstone River that bends through town.
The abundance of new ideas that have surfaced were sparked in part by Horizons, a community leadership development program sponsored by the Northwest Area Foundation. Community meetings have spurred collaboration and have helped change attitudes about Glendive’s future. Once silent residents and business owners are suddenly volunteering for projects, sharing their perspectives at regular committee meetings, taking responsibility for fundraising and staying engaged in various community development efforts. Like many small towns that succumbed to the oil boom and bust cycle, Glendive residents experienced a decline in the 1970s and 1980s. But thanks to the international attention the community receives for their abundance of paddlefish in Yellowstone River and fossils in the Badlands, as well as participation in Horizons, residents of this small town are not headed toward extinction.
One bold new initiative undertaken by residents is the transformation of Glendive into a dinosaur-themed town, leveraging the community’s most popular existing asset: dinosaur fossils. The fossil-laden Makoshika State Park is world renowned for its complete triceratops horridus skull now on display at the Visitor Information Center and found on premise, as was the skeleton of the rare thescelosaur. Located in downtown Glendive, the 13,000 square foot Makoshika Dinosaur Museum houses fossils from the area as well as from around the world. It also offers Paleokids — an educational program for children that sometimes includes hands-on dinosaur digs. The latest attraction, the Glendive Fossil and Dinosaur Museum, continues in the spirit of establishing the community as a dino-destination with its 40,000 square feet of exhibit space devoted to the “intelligent design” interpretation of evolution.
As a part of developing the dinosaur theme throughout town, new dinosaur-themed street banners, sponsored by area businesses, will welcome visitors to the community. A “Dinosaur Passport” is available for visitors to use as they tour through the town and visit various businesses, each retailer agreeing to become an “expert” on one of the dinosaurs featured on the passport. Visitors can then get their booklets stamped as they leave the businesses.
The community also recognizes the invaluable — and marketable — natural resource of the Yellowstone River that bends through the city and lures thousands of anglers each year who descend on Glendive to cast for paddlefish. Heralded as the “Paddlefish Capital of the World,” Glendive has harnessed this asset and acclaim by developing a community-managed enterprise that processes the paddlefish roe (eggs) into caviar and exports it throughout the world. Proceeds from the sale of caviar are pumped back into the community for historical, recreational and cultural projects.
Innovative approaches to community development have spawned some fishy art, too. The leadership training reinforced the notion that there is more to do with paddlefish than catching and eating them. Playing off the prehistoric local fish and, in part, inspired by an art project in Billings that provided fiberglass horses and rams for artists to paint, Glendive’s “Hooked on Paddlefish” showcases artists and features their local fish. Each year, twenty fiberglass paddlefish are painted by regional and local artists. Ten small resin paddlefish feature designs and artwork by area students. Each large paddlefish is sponsored by a local business that can exhibit the work of art for two months. Then each large piece is auctioned off to support the newly purchased Dawson County Arts Unlimited Gallery on Merrill Avenue, the central street through town.
Besides fish art and dinosaur street banners, the effects of a Glendive Beautification Committee are seen throughout town, including a cleanup effort completed in partnership with the local fire department. Sometimes beautification efforts attract high school art students who devote their artistic talents to paint murals — dinosaurs, of course — on the sides of old buildings. Other fresh ventures include the development of a walking and bicycling recreational path following the Yellowstone River and featuring the historic Bell Street Bridge.
Not content to stop with fossils and fish, Glendive is exploring the launch of a farm-to-table restaurant with a commercial kitchen that can be used by community members, a microbrewery, and a marketing cooperative featuring locally produced, value-added agricultural products. The commercial kitchen will provide new opportunities for local specialty-food entrepreneurs to create jams and jellies made with local plums and wild buffalo berries. “Transforming a negative to a positive,” shares one resident, “we’re hoping to transform an old building into a multiuse facility that can be used by a wide constituency in the community, from farmers to small business entrepreneurs.”
As a community cooperative — one of the most democratic forms of business organization — the farm-to-table facility will offer a voice for everyone in the community and feature locally grown foods. It will also offer farmers an opportunity to add value to their products and sell direct to consumers, including some of the passengers in the 1.8 million vehicles that pass by Glendive every year. Besides economic opportunities for existing businesses and residents, the committee involved with the proposed farm-to-table restaurant and marketing cooperative are anticipating as many as 18 new part-time and full-time jobs to be created. To be as inclusive as possible, rental of the kitchen will be on a sliding scale based on size of business. Diverse input into the facility’s design has been accomplished through a steering committee, with community members visiting the successful Mission Mountain Market in Ronan, to draw ideas and inspiration from this similarly conceived project.
Realizing that partnerships are important to the project’s success, leaders working on the farm-to-table restaurant have attracted the involvement of numerous community and state groups including Community GATE, the Glendive Beautification Committee, the Dawson Resource Council and the Montana Cooperative Development Center. Reaching out to form partnerships with Dawson Community College, Glendive residents have established educational development opportunities tied to new jobs in culinary arts, restaurant management and agricultural product development.
“More and more young people are coming back to Glendive to raise their families and open up their own businesses,” shares one longtime resident. Local dining might soon feature meals prepared by neighbors and made with ingredients harvested by friends. With this, and endless fossil-hunting potential, Glendive offers the ideal backdrop to living the good life in eastern Montana.