Bozeman, MT news and local guide

In 1863 John Bozeman, a frontiersman from Pickens County, Georgia, and his partner John Jacob opened the Bozeman Trail, a northern branch off the Oregon Trail to the mining town of Virginia City through the Gallatin Valley. Bozeman, Daniel Rouse and William Beall platted the town in August 1864. Red Cloud's War closed the trail in 1868, but the valley's fertile land kept drawing settlers. Bozeman was killed in 1867 near the mouth of Mission Creek on the Yellowstone River. For years the story was that Blackfeet had killed him while he traveled with his friend Tom Cover, but some accounts suggest Cover was the killer. In 1866 Nelson Story, a Virginia City gold miner from Ohio, drove about 1,000 head of Longhorn cattle up the Bozeman Trail into the Paradise Valley east of town, evading Army efforts to turn him back, and founded one of Montana's first significant herds. He later donated land for what became Montana State University. Fort Ellis was established near the town in 1867 by Captain R. S. LaMotte and two companies of the 2nd Cavalry and was decommissioned in 1886. Sources Wikipedia: Bozeman, Montana