Talk:Eastern Montana

Need of references
Without reliable sources providing a basis for delineating what qualifies as Eastern Montana, this article seems like original research or a point of view. Monty 845  17:47, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Central Montana
Have to comment that the person who added the awkward edit about "central Montana" is correct. Those of us in the westernmost part of the east of the divide part of the state absolutely consider ourselves in "western" Montana and not "eastern" Montana. There isn't a consistent definition, but everywhere from Great Falls to Lewistown does get included in varying definitions. Montanabw (talk) 21:38, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

central montana
Lewistown is the geographical center of Montana. a good place to start with the 21st century understanding of what Central Montana is.

Eastern Montana
As the article states, there is not a universally accepted definition of "Eastern" Montana. But the most common definitions all include Billings. People living west of the divide sometimes even lump places like Havre or Great Falls as "eastern", though this is not common. Lewistown may be at the geographic center of the state by mathematical calculation, but that does not equate to putting Billings in "central" Montana, particularly when Montana Public Radio (KUFM, etc., based in Missoula) describes the Great Falls/Helena corridor as "central Montana." I also must point out that MSU-Billings also used to be called Eastern Montana College. Montanabw (talk) 06:04, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

It is true, there is no true definition of what is eastern Montana, central Montana or western Montana, just the point I am making. I see Billings as central Montana you see it as eastern Montana, we are both right. Perusing the internet I easily find Bozeman referred to as south central Montana the same with Billings and Great Falls and Havre referred to as north central or just central Montana. I could see Bozeman as western Montana and central Montana as I could see Great Falls and Havre and Billings as eastern and central. to me there is no doubt the Lewistown is central Montana. And I am pretty sure not a soul outside of Missoula thinks Helena is in central Montana, or Butte only 60 miles south. Missoula seems to have a rather skewed view of Montana and their place in it.

I feel this page needs some tweaking considering there is no universally accepted definition. I also think a new "central Montana page should be added and the western Montana page may need some tweaking. Or another idea might be to put them altogether in one page.

Before MSUB was Eastern it was Billings Normal school and the college once called Billings Polytechnic Institute is now Rocky Mountain College

Mizmontana (talk) 18:29, 20 December 2014 (UTC)


 * MSU-B, if you note the history, was EASTERN Montana Normal School (and MSU-B calls Billings "eastern" Montana) I am sorry, but your opinion is a minority one and I can prove it with dozens upon dozens of reliable web sites. In fact, I challenge you to provide ANY truly reliable source that lists Billings as "central" Montana.  As far as "central" Montana, I would agree that that definition is even harder to parse than the east/west split.  (FWIW, MTPR calls Bozeman and Dillon "southwest Montana", for perhaps even more inexplicable reasons). Reality is that some folks who live west of the divide want to lump the entire state east of the divide - including Helena, Bozeman and so on - as "eastern" Montana. (I do disagree with that view, having spent most of my life living east of the divide) As for Lewistown, if you look at a map, you can clearly see that it's almost due north of Big Timber and well west of both Laurel and Billings (at least 50 miles west of Billings by longitude, not looking at the N-S distance as well - and Lewistown looks more to Great Falls as the "metro" shopping destination).  Though technically the geographic center of the state, such designations are meaningless.  The Geographic center of the United States is in South Dakota, the Geographic center of the contiguous United States is in Kansas, and yet we call Ohio the "midwest."  Go figure. (OK, so my dad calls Minnesota "back east" but he's a 3rd-generation Montanan)  Likewise, the Billings Gazette implicitly seems to include Billings as "Eastern Montana" - just two days ago!  And please do not bash Missoula as "skewed", it's not appropriate, it's no more "skewed" than folks in Sidney, Glendive, or Miles City trying to make a case for Billings to not be "eastern" Montana.  If you really want to argue about this, you can take it to WikiProject Montana or even to one of the silly drama boards, but honestly, you ARE going to lose this one.   Montanabw (talk)  00:18, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Trust me I do not care to argue and was not, you seem to be the one being hostile. I am just on a talk page pointing out that I think this page and the western Montana page need review and maybe merging. In what you have written you back me up on this. if a portion of the state sees Helena and Bozeman as eastern Montana that should be included in the new merged page or both eastern and western and central Montana pages.

Mizmontana (talk) 04:59, 23 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Assume nothing about me. I'm just tired of wasting bandwidth on silly arguments.  I haven't even read the Western Montana article, seems I should take a look.  What would you "merge"?    Montanabw (talk)  00:06, 24 December 2014 (UTC)