Archives West Finding Aid

Daniel Webster Tilton was born in Silver Creek, New York, on July 3, 1839, the only child of John and Angeline Tilton. He studied at the Bryant and Stratton Business College in 1859, and then traveled to Missouri and Colorado. During the gold rush, he was engaged in business ventures, initially at Denver and later at Central City.

In 1863 Tilton left Colorado and traveled to Virginia City, opening the town's first store, "D.W. Tilton Co. news dealers, book sellers, stationers, and job printers, Virginia City, I.T." He transported the first hand press to the territory and bought a newspaper, The Montana Post, from John Buchanan for $3,000. Tilton published the newspaper and did other printing jobs until 1868, when he sold out to Benjamin Dittes.

Tilton returned to New York in the winter of 1865, to marry his cousin, Lizzie D. May (1841-1866). The couple traveled to Virginia City the following spring, but Lizzie Tilton died of consumption on October 25, 1866, at the age of 25. Tilton remarried in May 1868, to Helen Elvira Barber (1850-1924) of Pennsylvania, a distant relative of his first wife. In the early 1870s, Tilton joined with his father-in-law, Orlando Beach Barber (1828-1913), to form Tilton and Barber, "wholesale and retail dealers in groceries, wines, and liquors, books and stationery, cigars and tobacco, powder and fuse, and c. and c.," located on Wallace Street. This partnership lasted until 1883.

With the decline of Virginia City, Tilton moved his business to Butte in 1884. D.W. Tilton's Book Store, located first at 63 West Park Street and later at 138 West Park, handled job printing, blank books, school books, ink, paper, newspapers, novels, and magazines.

Tilton and his wife raised a family of six children: Webster Barber (1869-1912), John Edgar (1871-1885), Orlando Beach "Orrie" (1876-1959), Charles Lester (1878-1948), Helen Elvira (1882-1962), and Howard Lee (circa 1890-1957). All but their youngest child were born in Virginia City.

Tilton and his sons, operating under the name of Tilton Brothers, maintained business interest in ranching and mining developments, primarily the Highland Mining Company of Butte.

Webster Tilton helped to operate the Highland Mining Company and ran the printing press in his father's book store in Butte.

Orlando Tilton, educated at the University of Michigan in taxidermy and violin, also worked at the Highland Mining Company as a young man. He was involved in ranching and the raising of poultry in the Ruby Valley from 1918 until his death.

Lester Tilton engaged in ranching in the Ruby Valley after the death of his grandfather, O.B. Barber. He married Clara Nichols and they were the parents of five children. He operated a store and post office in Woodside, Montana.

Helen Tilton was educated in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and was an accomplished figure skater. She married Andrew L. Spencer in 1928; the couple resided in Sheridan except for a period during World War II, when they lived in Bremerton, Washington.

Howard Tilton attended the School of Mines in Butte, Montana, and spent the greater part of his life on the family ranches. The Tilton family was linked through marriage to the Corby family of Butte when Howard Tilton married Edith Lillian Corby, daughter of Joseph and Sena Corby. Their son, Corby Howard Tilton, took over the family ranching interests. The ranch remained in the family for four generations, until it was sold in 1973 by Corby Howard Tilton.

Orlando Beach Barber also left Virginia City in the 1880s, becoming proprietor of Valley View Farm of Laurin, Montana. In 1898 Barber built a three story brick house one mile south of Sheridan, which was the home of the Tiltons for many years. He and his wife Samantha Gates Barber (1830-1899) owned a ranch near Sheridan and were joined in its operation by their son, Charles W. Barber (1856-1933), and the Tilton grandsons.

Joseph Corby, who was born in 1866, in Pennsylvania, came west at the age of 19, and worked as a hoisting engineer in the Butte mines. He served as an officer of the First Montana Volunteers in the Philippines during the Spanish-American War. In 1906, he attended the Tenth Montana Legislative Assembly as a Republican and then was elected mayor of Butte (1907-1909). Corby died in Butte in 1917.

D.W. Tilton spent the last years of his life in Grace, Montana, and on the family ranch. He died in Sheridan on October 15, 1919.