Snow and clouds obscure the Deerlodge National Forest in southwestern Montana. Western Montana is a canvas of unspoiled mountains, ripe for a writer’s (and photographer’s) imagination. Photo permitted by Paula Krugerud
By Kevin S. Giles
Dear Montana,
You stole my heart. You own my soul.
Can you help me understand why I left your embrace, crossing over your borders to places far from the rhythm of your waters and the beckoning from your tallest peaks? To live apart from you for all these years?
By Kevin S. Giles
Writing a novel set in my childhood brought a flood of memories, many of them good, reminding me that kids in the pre-driving, pre-job years see life with eyes of wonder.
As I drafted Summer of the Black Chevy those memories stirred the senses: Catching the scent of lilacs down the block while walking to school, my grandmother’s chocolate cake coming out of the oven, fresh earth when winter ice gave way to spring thaw. I heard the siren blowing curfew at City Hall two hours before midnight and the chimes ringing on the hour at the Catholic Church. I saw the lights of the big prison on Main Street at night, the spray of stars when the town went to bed, the red fire skies and the black thunderheads sweeping over the mountains.
The Rialto Theater in Deer Lodge, Montana, was built in 1921 with 720 seats. The Beaux Arts theater featured extensive painted murals, artistic plaster designs, and a painted stage background. Fire destroyed much of it in 2006. The community rallied, restoring and reopening the Rialto in 2012. Here’s an early view.
By Kevin S. Giles
Everyone has a hometown, or should, because it figures strongly in matters of the heart.
Mine is Deer Lodge, a dab of humanity in a seam between two rambling mountain ranges. Deer Lodge is a dwindling place, even smaller than my long-ago days there, but it stands proud before a mighty promontory known as Mount Powell in western Montana. It’s here, in a town with a real Main Street, where memories sleep and the fictional Summer of the Black Chevy takes place.
My favorite postcards show the downtown district through the years. It’s less robust now, but the buildings remain much the same, like history stood still.