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The Conrad banking business flourished in north-central and northwestern Montana during 1880-1914. Local banks at Fort Benton, Great Falls, and Kalispell, owned and managed by the William and Charles Conrad families, helped to finance Montana's economic development through an intricate pattern of familial, friendship, and business ties. Correspondent linkages to large metropolitan banks sustained the relatively small country banks by assuring them access to capital. The Conrad banks were aggressive in penetrating new lending markets and making inroads into the local farming, ranching, merchant, and manufacturing sectors. The banks grew in reputation and stature as the region developed, but remained single-unit, family-based enterprises.<ref>Henry C. Klassen, The Early Growth of the Conrad Banking Enterprise in Montana, 1880-1914. Great Plains Quarterly 1997 17(1): 49-62</ref>
The Conrad banking business flourished in north-central and northwestern Montana during 1880-1914. Local banks at Fort Benton, Great Falls, and Kalispell, owned and managed by the William and Charles Conrad families, helped to finance Montana's economic development through an intricate pattern of familial, friendship, and business ties. Correspondent linkages to large metropolitan banks sustained the relatively small country banks by assuring them access to capital. The Conrad banks were aggressive in penetrating new lending markets and making inroads into the local farming, ranching, merchant, and manufacturing sectors. The banks grew in reputation and stature as the region developed, but remained single-unit, family-based enterprises.<ref>Henry C. Klassen, The Early Growth of the Conrad Banking Enterprise in Montana, 1880-1914. Great Plains Quarterly 1997 17(1): 49-62</ref>
===Schools===
===Women===
The legal status of women in the 19th-century trans-Mississippi West has drawn the attention of numerous interpreters, whose analyses fall into three types: 1) the [[Frontier Theory]] inspired by [[Frederick Jackson Turner]], which argues that the West was, among other things, a liberating experience for women and men; 2) the reactionists, who view the West as a place of drudgery for women, who reacted unfavorably to the isolation and the work in the West; and 3) those writers who claim the West had no effect on women's lives, that it was a static, neutral frontier. The history of Montana shows that the Turner thesis best explains the improvement in women's status in Montana and the achievement of suffrage in 1914.<ref> Judith K. Cole, "A Wide Field for Usefulness: Women's Civil Status and the Evolution of Women's Suffrage on the Montana Frontier, 1864-1914". ''American Journal of Legal History'' 1990 34(3): 262-294 </ref>
Margery Jacoby was a typical Great Plains teacher at the turn of the 20th century. She began teaching in Montana at 15 with a first-class certificate gained by examination. She lacked formal training but attended summer school to improve her skills. She taught because her family needed the money, and she wanted independence and an opportunity to advance her own learning. The need for teachers in the West and the belief that women were natural teachers for the young also contributed to her entry. Like other Plains schoolmarms, Jacoby was a Westerner by birth and changed teaching jobs frequently. Unlike most, she was elected county superintendent of schools, served two terms, married and quit the profession. However, she never lost interest in the classroom and her daughters later became teachers.<ref> Kathleen Underwood, "Schoolmarms on the Upper Missouri." ''Great Plains Quarterly'' 1991 11(4): 225-233 </ref>
Margery Jacoby was a typical Great Plains teacher at the turn of the 20th century. She began teaching in Montana at 15 with a first-class certificate gained by examination. She lacked formal training but attended summer school to improve her skills. She taught because her family needed the money, and she wanted independence and an opportunity to advance her own learning. The need for teachers in the West and the belief that women were natural teachers for the young also contributed to her entry. Like other Plains schoolmarms, Jacoby was a Westerner by birth and changed teaching jobs frequently. Unlike most, she was elected county superintendent of schools, served two terms, married and quit the profession. However, she never lost interest in the classroom and her daughters later became teachers.<ref> Kathleen Underwood, "Schoolmarms on the Upper Missouri." ''Great Plains Quarterly'' 1991 11(4): 225-233 </ref>