Authorities do not agree on when or by whom Montana's first printing
was undertaken. It was either at Bannack or Virginia City, both
gold-mining towns, probably in October 1863.[138]
The earliest Montana imprints in the Library of Congress were printed
at Virginia City in 1866 by John P. Bruce, who owned _The Montana
Democrat_ and was designated Public Printer. Of these, the first may
be an eight-page pamphlet, _Reports of the Auditor, Treasurer, and
Indian Commissioner, of the Territory of Montana_. The latest document
incorporated in the text is dated February 22, 1866, and the pamphlet
was printed in the office of _The Montana Democrat_ probably not long
after that date. Most likely the second Montana imprint in the Library
is the _Message of Governor Thomas Francis Meagher, to the Legislature
of Montana Territory, Delivered on the 6th Day of March, 1866_. Three
thousand copies were ordered, according to a printed note on the
eighth and final page of this work. Neither of these two imprints
bears any mark of provenance, and both appear to have entered the
Library before the turn of the century.
Another early example of Montana printing in the Library is the 22d
number, dated April 12, 1866, of _The Montana Democrat_, a sizable
four-page sheet displaying the paper's motto: "Be faithful in all
accepted trusts." It is addressed in pencil to the State Department.
From about the same time the Library can boast two copies of _Laws
of the Teritory_ [sic] _of Montana, Passed at the Second Session of
the Legislature, 1866. Beginning March 5, 1866, and Ending April 14,
1866_, a work of 54 pages. Although copy one is imperfect, lacking
pages 49-54, it is of interest for the penciled inscription on its
title page: "President Johnson."
[Illustration: (REPORT OF THE AUDITOR OF THE TERRITORY OF MONTANA.)]
The Library of Congress also owns three copies of a celebrated Montana
book published at Virginia City in the same year by the proprietors
of _The Montana Post_ press, S. W. Tilton & Co.: _The Vigilantes of
Montana, or Popular Justice in the Rocky Mountains. Being a Correct
and Impartial Narrative of the Chase, Trial, Capture and Execution
of Henry Plummer's Road Agent Band, Together With Accounts of the
Lives and Crimes of Many of the Robbers and Desperadoes, the Whole
Being Interspersed With Sketches of Life in the Mining Camps of the
"Far West;" Forming the Only Reliable Work on the Subject Ever
Offered the Public._ The author, Prof. Thos. J. Dimsdale, was an
Englishman who served Virginia City as a teacher and as editor of
the _Post_, where his work originally appeared in installments. This
first edition in book form contains 228 pages of text. The Library
date-stamped copy one in 1874. Copy two was deposited for copyright
in 1882, the year that D. W. Tilton put out a second edition. Copy
three bears the signature of Henry Gannett (1846-1914), geographer
of the U.S. Geological Survey and at the time of his death president
of the National Geographic Society. It contains a "War Service
Library" bookplate and an "American Library Association Camp Library"
borrower's card (unused). The Library of Congress received the copy
from an unknown source in 1925.[139]
[Footnote 138: See Douglas C. McMurtrie, _Pioneer Printing in Montana_
(Iowa City, Iowa, 1932); the Introduction to McMurtrie's _Montana
Imprints 1864-1880_ (Chicago, 1937); and Roby Wentz, _Eleven Western
Presses_ (Los Angeles, 1956), p. 49-51.]
[Footnote 139: Three Virginia City imprints dated 1866 are excluded
from the present account. One of them (McMurtrie 19) cannot have been
issued before January 10, 1867. The others (McMurtrie 130 and 131)
were actually printed in Maine according to McMurtrie's bibliography.
None of the Library of Congress copies of these imprints has a notable
provenance.]