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Sweetgrass

Travel Montana

A view from 1939:

SWEETGRASS, (3,471 alt., 356 pop.), is a port of entry with U. S. customs and immigration offices. It was so named because of the abundance of sweet grass on the surrounding prairie. Only the invisible boundary line separates Sweetgrass from Coutts, the Canadian customs station, and they are often mentioned as a single place, Sweetgrass-Coutts. The Stars and Stripes and the Union Jack flutter above the twin villages.

In 1887 a narrow-gauge railroad called "the Turkey Track" was built across the border between Shelby and Lethbridge. Before that time the country was traversed only by range riders whose headquarters were south of the Marias River. Not until the coming of the dry-land farmer, about 1900, did Sweetgrass become much of a trading center.

Source: Montana: A State Guide Book; Compiled and Written by the Federal Writers' Project of the Work Projects Administration for the State of Montana; September, 1939.