The Helena National Forest has an abundance of Chinese history in and around its landholdings. For the most part, the Chinese influenced the Big Belt Mountains to the east of Helena far more than any other area on the National Forest. In particular, there were substantial Chinese populations working and living in Cave, Magpie, Cooper, Oregon, and Confederate Gulches throughout the 1860s through 1890s. After a devastating wildfire in the early 2000s, archaeologists discovered a number of Chinese sites brought to view for the first time due to the fire. These sites are a lasting reminder of the Chinese workers who dominated mining in this area, but since had been forgotten. Sites on National Forests overlap with other public land agencies including the Bureau of Reclamation's Chinaman's Cove Recreation Site on Canyon Ferry Reservoir. Chinese and Euroamerican miners constructed extensive ditches to bring water from high in Cave and Cooper gulches down to Chinaman's Gulch to allow hydraulic mining. There is a great opportunity to interpret an entire Chinese mining landscape that transcends property boundaries.

Archaeologists mapping in structure pads that relate to the Chinese neighborhood of Cave Town east of Canyon Ferry.

Besides in the Big Belt mountains, Chinese had a presence down the Prickly Pear River, including an area known as Ruddville located in a remote part of the Elkhorn Mountains. Little is know about the development of Ruddville, and besides a few scraps of historical information about the buying and selling of mine claims at Wilson Creek, the location of Ruddville, there are no references to an actual town being established. Interestingly, in September of 1871 a man named Simmons purchased and consolidated all the claims near Wilson Gulch for $100. By November of 1871 he sold the same group of claims as a whole to a Chinese group led by Ah Chong for $3,000. This is perhaps more evidence of the swindling of Chinese in Montana during the 19th Century. There is some surface evidence of Chinese occupation of Ruddville but more works needs to be done at that location.

Deed of Sale for Wilson Creek Claims 1871 claims in Wilson Creek.
Found at Jefferson County Courthouse records, Boulder, MT.