Dorotha Smola Interview, August 3, 1988

Dorotha Buck Smola discusses her family’s history in the Bitterroot Valley as well as her own life story, beginning in the mid-1800s up to the 1980s. She talks about the stories she heard as a child about her grandma and grandpa making their way out west to Montana, her grandpa, Fred Buck, for gold and to reunite with his brothers, her grandma, Rosa Victoria Knapp for teaching. She discusses her grandfather Buck’s mercantile store that her father kept running until the 1950s and the connections their family made through that business. Smola also talks about the Native Americans, including the Nez Perce and Flathead, who passed through Stevensville. She describes her grandparents’ orchards that used to be quite vast, but dwindled after the apple boom to only a few trees kept for personal use. Smola recalls attending the University of Montana during the Great Depression and suffering from tuberculosis most of her adult life. She concludes by saying how much she loves the Stevensville community.https://scholarworks.umt.edu/stevensville_oralhistory/1000/thumbnail.jp