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The history of Whitefish and neighboring Glacier National Park is intermingled with the history of the Great Northern Railroad. Great Northern was founded in 1889 by James J Hill and ran from St. Paul, MN to Seattle, Washington. Hill’s business strategy was to develop the areas the trains ran through in order to attract tourism and trade.

The Whitefish Depot was built in 1928 in the same alpine style as the GN-built National Park Lodges. The Stumptown Historical Society purchased the station and restored it in the 1990s. Today it houses a museum with exhibits on local history and is once again an active railway station for Amtrak.

With some time to kill before our dinner reservations at nearby Abruzzo, we walked around the depot.

There is a vintage Great Northern locomotive on display, an antique bus that was used to transport passengers from Kalispell to Whitefish stations and a park across the street from the station.

Location: 500 Depot St, Whitefish, MT 59937

Designation: National Register of Historic Places

Date designation declared: 7/11/2002

Date of my visit: 6/22/2018