Introducing 2009 Montana Cowboy Hall of Fame Inductee…
W.E. “Limestone” Wilson (1860-1920)
William E. Wilson, known in later life as “Limestone” or Limerock” was born November 5, 1860 at Berrian Springs, Michigan. At eight years old he moved with his parents to Holt County, Missouri. While living there and at Oregon in the same county he completed a common school education.
Imbued with romantic notions from reading frontier stories while quite young Mr. Wilson yearned to go west, slaughter a few tribes of Indians and to discover a gold mine. When the Black Hills excitement broke out in 1878 his parents moved to Deadwood where his father established a lucrative business as a gardener selling fresh vegetables to the miners and their families.
In 1879 Wilson went prospecting in the Black Hills. He didn’t have much use for his father who had married five times, so in the spring of 1881 at 20 years old, with a companion George Neligh he set out on foot for Montana Territory. Being unfamiliar with conditions and deceived by false reports the nearly starved to death on the way. Hostile Sioux also had something to do with their problems. They finally reached the mouth of O’Fallon Creek near present day Fallon, Montana where they overtook some buffalo hunters loaded with meat for the Northern Pacific railroad camps. This led to Wilson going to work for Brown and Dewey on the Northern Pacific grade near Cabin Creek, about 35 miles above Glendive. Soon tiring of his railroad job, Wilson wanted to go mining and headed down the Yellowstone and Missouri rivers in a stolen boat for Kansas City and New Mexico. He wrecked the boat on ice at or near Bismarck.
Nearly broke and out of a job he headed back for Montana in the winter of 1881-82. After bumming around all winter, Wilson landed in Maiden on April 15, 1882 without a dollar in his pocket. He made a grubstake working at placer mining and then started prospecting. In the fall of 1883 he found an ore lead in limestone around the edge of a ridge and named it the Gilt Edge. Further work disclosed a good-sized ore body. People would not believe there was anything there, and Wilson was unable to raise the money to develop it. Wilson then began a period of ten years of hard work when he had money for his mining development. He had partners at different times. Several of these partners skipped the country and left Wilson with debts to settle. He was snowed in once in the Judiths for two months with nothing but his dog and guitar for company. Wilson’s work was ridiculed and some people even went so far as to call him crazy. During those ten discouraging but hopeful years he laid the foundation for the profitable mining development of Fergus County. He disagreed with the common theory that there was no use looking for gold in the limestone. From this he received his name “Limestone” or “Limerock”, a title he was proud of. In his conversations he called himself Limestone Bill. He eventually succeeded in interesting Helena parties in the Gilt Edge mine and finally sold it to the Great Northern Mining and Development Company for $32,000. A mill was built in 1893 and the town of Gilt Edge was named for the mine. The mill was the second in the United States to use the “cyanide process” on a commercial scale. About $1,250,000 in gold ore was processed at this mill.
Limestone continued to prospect all over the Judith Mountains looking for ore bodies in the limestone. He strongly believed the great mines of the United States would use the cyanide process and that those ores would be found in the limestone. He often stated that ore was where you find it and not were it was supposed to be.
In 1900 Wilson married Margaret E. Wampler of Chicago and settled in a handsomely furnished home in Maiden. Limestone continued to self-educate himself and acquired an extensive library. He could quote many of the classics word-for-word. Wilson was tall, about 6’4”, and slender in build and had a beautiful bass voice. The Wilson’s home in Maiden later burned with the loss of all his possessions including the valuable library and pictures of early mines and miners. In 1912 Wilson’s wife died and was buried in the Lewistown City Cemetery. Sometime after his wife’s death, Limestone moved to a cabin near the mouth of Maiden Canyon not far from Gilt Edge. From there he continued to prospect and develop his claims. He developed a reputation as a gardener which he no doubt developed from his father. His potatoes were widely known and at one time he sold them to the Northern Pacific for use on their liners. However, he wanted to be known as a prospector and not a gardener.
One distinguishing feature of Limestone was his being very particular in everything he did. The tunnels in his mine were a work of art and looked as though they had been laid out with a transit. He insisted that all loose debris be cleaned out at the end of every shift. He must have been hard to work for. In his nearly 56 years of prospecting, Wilson is known to have driven over 2,000 feet of tunnel with his own hands. His last work of any consequence was done in Alpine Gulch in the Judith Mountains in 1927. The tunnel he drove can still be plainly seen.
In intermittently ailing health, he waged a losing fight against the infirmities of age and died in the Deaconess Hospital in Great Falls on July 17, 1938. He was buried beside his wife in the Lewistown City Cemetery. His only known relative at the time was a sister. Like so many prospectors, he died flat broke. His funeral expenses were borne by his friends.
Sources: Lewiston Democrat News (Christmas Edition), December 1937. “Gold in the Judiths” by W. E. Wilson, also “a Buffalo Hunt in ‘81” by W. E. Wilson. (This is one of the best descriptions of Gold Mining in the Judiths.
Fergus County Argus-1901 Pictorial Edition. Page 9-10
“Fergus, A Miniature of the West”. By C. B. Worthen
Lewistown Democrat News, July 18 & 19, 1938.
A History of Montana-Burlingame & Toole Vol. II. Page 156
