FLATHEAD COUNTY
INDIAN RIDGE
Glacier National Park
Site was used prior to the establishment of Numa Ridge
1923: "Telephone lines were built to the top of Indian Ridge and a lookout post organized." (Report of the Director of the National Park Service)
1926: "The following building was authorized in our 1925 appropriation and work is in progress on the fire lookout on Indian Ridge." (Report of the Director of the National Park Service)
July 31, 1935: "It wasn't the Fountain of youth but it might have been the mountain air. At any rate age was no reason why A.E. Purviance, Columbia Falls octogenarian, should sit at home. While visiting Glacier National Park this week he climbed to the Indian Ridge lookout near near Bowman Lake. The elevation of the lookout is 6,800 feet, about 2,500 feet above the valley floor. Rangers said the hike was an extremely hard hike, even for a young man.
That night Mr. Purviance spent the time reminiscing with Alexander Beaton, lookout operator, and the next day hiked from the lookout to Oil lake and back to Bowman lake, a hike of eight miles or more.
Mr. Purviance owned land around Indian creek during the oil boom of 1904 in that section.
He planned to visit other parts of the Park before returning home." (The Daily Inter Lake)