It was a unique breed of people who settled in Montana during the late 1800s. The story of one unique family who not only stayed, but prospered is evident in the Charles M. Bair Family Museum Ranch in rural central Montana.

Charles Bair came to Montana in service to the Northern Pacific Railroad in 1883. By the turn of the century, the railroad was serving Bair who then owned the largest individual sheep operation in the northwest U.S.. Bair ran as many as 300,000 head of sheep on his ranch and lease land. In 1910, his sheep filled a 47-car train with 1.5 million pounds of wool bound for the Boston market.

The property making up the Bair Family Museum Ranch was purchased by Charles in 1913. It is located near the small community of Martinsdale about 110 miles east of Helena, and served as the family's permanent residence from 1934 on. When the last of the family, Alberta died in 1993, the Bair Family Trust contracted with the C.M. Russell Museum of Great Falls to manage the ranch house as a public museum. The facility will begin its first season on May 1, 1996.

Visitors to the Bair museum will find that it is no ordinary ranch house. Its 26 rooms are a rich repository of American Indian artifacts, many of them gifts from the famous Crow Chief Plenty Coups, along with antiques from around the world and paintings by renowned western artists Charlie Russell, Joseph Henry Sharp, Englishmen Herring and Cole, and French artist Edouard Cortes. Montana's wool industry history is also on display.