A story re the article about St. Mary’s Mission in Montana: My family’s roots go back to pioneer days in MT. My grandfather and my grandmother’s families homesteaded around a big Catholic Native American school, St. Peter’s, south of Great Falls. The little chapel there was the headquarters for the Ursuline Order for all of the US west of the Missouri to the Pacific. It was my my dad’s parish church growing up. The ranch house was 1/4 mile from the chapel.. St. Peter’s buildings burned down in two fires around 1900, and the property was absorbed into the family’s ranches. The chapel is still there, and is on the National Register of Historic Places. Now, for the story: At some point, someone decided to move the bell from the little chapel to St. Mary’s Mission, the one in the article, and it got moved. My grandther decided, “They’re not taking our bell!” He took my dad and my uncle with him to St. Mary’s, and they used a Model T and ropes and pulleys to lower the bell and take it back to St. Peter’s and re-install it in the chapel bell tower, where it is to this day! St. Peter’s: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Peter%27s_Mission_Church_and_Cemetery There is a wonderful book about the Usuline history in pioneer Montana named, “Lady Blackrobes:” https://www.amazon.com/Lady-Blackrobes-Missionaries-Indian-Country/dp/1555916171 The little chapel: https://fortbenton.blogspot.com/2010/04/saint-peters-mission-historic-scenic.html?m=1 A photo of the historic cemetery at St. Peter’s. The cylindrical tombstone is, in fact, my great- grandfather. The one on the left is my great-uncle, Raymond, that my grandfather accidentally shot and killed when Raymond was 10. https://www.flickr.com/photos/montanatom1950/4781755524

Michael O’Grady, Ireland