Marias Pass

Mountain pass in Montana

Marias Pass (elevation 5213 feet (1589 m)) is a mountain pass in the Rocky Mountains in the western US state of Montana. Lying on the southern border of
Glacier National Park, it is traversed by US Highway 2 and by the BNSF Hi Line Subdivision. The pass is the lowest crossing of the Continental Divide between Canada and central New Mexico

, and is the northernmost pass in the US open to automobile traffic year round.

Marias Pass traverses the Continental Divide in the Lewis Range, along the boundary between the Lewis and Clark National Forest and the Flathead National Forest. The pass forms the southern limit of the Continental Ranges, a major grouping of the Rocky Mountains which extends as far north as McGregor Pass in the Northern Rockies of the Canadian province of British Columbia. The Great Bear Wilderness in Lewis and Clark National Forest is south of the pass and Glacier National Park is to the north.

As a low pass through the Rocky Mountains, Marias Pass was undoubtedly known to Native Americans for countless years. And while the pass was likely known by early fur trappers,

its potential for use beyond foot traffic wasn’t recognized until the middle of the nineteenth century.

Marias Pass was finally explored and charted in December 1889 by John Frank Stevens, principal engineer of the Great Northern Railway (GN). The location of the pass had been rumored for decades beforehand, but it took Stevens and a Flathead guide named Coonsah, who had been hiding out with the Blackfoot in Browning, to discover it. The pass proved ideal for a railroad, because its approach was broad and open, within a valley ranging from one to six miles wide, and at a gentle grade that would not require extensive excavation or rockwork. Construction of the railroad through the pass began on August 1, 1890, starting east from Fort Assinniboine toward Marias Pass. The railroad followed the Middle Fork of the Flathead River west of the Continental Divide. Stevens also discovered the pass across the Cascades in central Washington which bears his name.

A memorial to President Theodore Roosevelt was constructed along the Continental Divide at the top of the pass. Designs for the memorial were made by Kimball, Steele & Sandham of Omaha, Nebraska. Construction began in 1930, with the original intent to produce a granite archway across the highway, and a cornerstone was placed to the southeast of the highway. Eleanor Roosevelt was later on hand to place a small copper box filled with a copy of the bill that appropriated funds for the memorial as well as some other documents into the cornerstone. The obelisk is 60 feet (18 m) in height and extends 19 feet (6 m) into the ground. It has a tapering cement core covered on all sides with slabs of Montana granite quarried near Helena. It was later decided to build an obelisk instead of an archway; it was completed in 1931. Today, U. S. Route 2 uses the pass, along with the BNSF Railway, a successor to the Great Northern Railway. The railway line, which sees freight traffic, as well as Amtrak's Empire Builder, is part of BNSF's Northern Transcon line linking Chicago and the Pacific Northwest. A statue of Stevens stands at the summit of Marias Pass.