Today we learned how Great Falls got it's name.
We drove out to the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center. There we toured the exhibits and watched two videos about the Lewis & Clark Discovery Corps in Montana.
As all of us Midwesterners know, Lewis & Clark set out on the Missouri River near St. Charles Missouri. Well, did you know that the origin of the Missouri River is Three Forks, Montana? Three Forks is southwest of Great Falls near the Continental Divide.
The Missouri flows through downtown Great Falls. It is a wide, beautiful river. There are two large falls that have had dams built and are now power plants. We saw two of the other falls. The Lewis & Clark Discovery Corps had to portage 18 miles to go around the five falls in this area.
We also went to the Giant Springs and Fish Hatchery (photos 3 & 4). The Giant Springs delivers water from the Little Belt Mountains into the Missouri River. That accounts for all that water we saw from snow melt as we drove through the Little Belt Mountains.
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