The Project on Oral history began in 1974 as an officially sanctioned activity of the Gallatin County Bicentennial Committee. Directed by Lee Ann Cooper, the project produced eighty-three tape recorded interviews with senior citizens of Bozeman and Gallatin County. At the end of the project the interview summaries were collated and indexed and a printed guide published giving subject access to the various interviews. The original summary sheets were photocopied on unstable liquid toner stock and were transcribed by the staff of Montana State University during the spring and summer of 1999. Most of the interviews were conducted by high school students in Gallatin County, and the few interview transcripts produced were composed by volunteers.
The interviews cover a wide variety of historical subjects including: agriculture, amusements, business, industry, merchants, churches, communications, education, electrical power, ethnic groups, the Depression, homemaking, immigrants, Native Americans, medicine, Montana State College, organizations, frontier and pioneer life, politics and government, prominent families, religion, social life and customs, Spanish American War, transportation, weather and natural disasters, World War I, and World War II. Places mentioned Belgrade, Bozeman, Bridger Canyon, Chestnut, Churchill, Gallatin Canyon, Manhattan, Salesville, Springhill, Three Forks, and Yellowstone National Park.
This collection is open for research.
Original tape recorded interviews, interview summary sheets, and interview transcriptions gathered by the Gallatin County Bicentennial Oral History Project were donated to Montana State University on April 23, 1976 by Lee Ann Cooper, project director.
This collection was processed 2009 March 6
The interview summaries and transcriptions have been placed in alphabetical order in box one, with the tapes arranged the same way in boxes 2-5. Those interview summaries which have transcriptions have been placed together in their own folder and so indicated.