Motoring In

Motoring In. Glacier National Park. … there should be erected at once at every camp, good, substantial, permanent buildings of one, two, three and four rooms for just the 'forgotten man'… There should also be constructed at every camp a building for a restaurant or cafeteria where meals may be obtained at a reasonable price. , The Kalispell Times , October 6, 1932, In the late 1920s, the automobile became affordable for the "Forgotten Man." For the first time, a middle-class American family could see the country without the expense of a railroad trip. Upon completion of Going-to-the-Sun Road in 1932 and Theodore Roosevelt Highway (now US-2) two years earlier, Glacier National Park beckoned a new type of "road-trip" traveler, signaling an end to an era of opulence and the beginning of affordable recreation., To meet the needs of motorists, the Many Glacier Road was extended a mile west from the Many Glacier Hotel, and the Great Northern Railway was asked to build the Swiftcurrent Auto Camp. It consisted of a campstore and 54 small, spartan cabins arranged in tepee configurations. The camp's location was unobtrusive to its natural setting , a significant departure from the design of the park's earlier grand hotels. The camp was immediately popular with the middle-class. The use of automobiles ultimately resulted in a decline of railway travel and an increase in park visitation by the independent motorist., [background image caption] , Gear and 1931 Model A Ford generously provided by John Lawyer of Plains, Montana.