The Daily Inter Lake has a story about boom and bust oil exploration in Montana, including its beginnings in 1901 near Kintla Lake . . .
The history of oil in Montana began in an area that never had any substantial development of the natural resource — the Flathead Valley.
The state’s first oil well was drilled by Butte Oil Co. in 1901 in the Kintla Lake area that’s now part of Glacier National Park.
American Indians and fur trappers knew about oil seeps in that area and early-day prospectors wondered about the potential for oil when bear hides sold at Tobacco Plains smelled of kerosene, according to a historical overview of mining in Montana compiled by the U.S. Forest Service.