Helena seeks help restoring rare 1909 trolley No. 3

Helena’s trolley No. 3 has spent about 20 years in a warehouse, and the city still needs help to finish restoring the rare 1909 Cincinnati Car Company streetcar before it can be displayed again. Historians believe only two of Helena’s old trolleys survive, with one already visible on the Walking Mall and the other still waiting in pieces for the last stage of work.

Lewis & Clark County preservation materials say No. 3 ran between Fort Harrison, the State Nursery, Helena and East Helena from 1909 to 1927, when the automobile era and pressure from the auto industry helped end service. The county describes Helena’s trolley network as an interurban system that began in 1883, when Helena Avenue was planned to connect the Northern Pacific Railroad Depot in the 6th Ward to downtown. Horse-drawn cars were operating by 1886, electrified service arrived by 1890, and the line served places that shaped daily life in and around town, including the Broadwater Hotel, Fort Harrison and East Helena.

The car itself carried a long and unusual history. County materials say it survived as a ranch bunkhouse until the early 1950s, was later purchased by a collector, passed to a restorer in 1994 and donated to the City of Helena in 2005. It was spotted in Big Sandy and returned to Helena around 2006, where volunteers began restoring it piece by piece. George Hoff led much of that work, and a Capital High School class also helped before Hoff died in 2009 and progress slowed.

Since then, the project has remained in limbo in a warehouse, with restored and recreated parts waiting to be assembled. The Helena-Lewis and Clark County Heritage Preservation Office says grants, donations and city funds have already paid for materials, but the trolley still needs people willing to help complete the puzzle. County preservation materials also say Capital High School students have taken part since at least 2007 as an interactive learning project, with classes in carpentry, welding, clothing and textile design, photography, computer science and art contributing to the effort.

The trolley is not Helena’s only reminder of that era. A 1974 marker at Last Chance Gulch Mall says the original streetcar there was donated by Mr. and Mrs. Charles Bovey and restored by the Helena Rotary Club and Helena Fire Department. For now, No. 3 remains the city’s larger unfinished artifact, a rare transit relic that still needs hands, money and assembly before residents can see it back in public.