Dry Creek School

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1981.

From the record

“The Dry Creek School in Manhattan, Montana is a balloon-framed one-room schoolhouse that was built in 1902. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1981.”
Wikipedia article Dry Creek School (Manhattan, Montana), CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 104 National Register listings published here for Gallatin County · listed in 1981 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service · the Wikipedia article

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Address. E of Manhattan, Manhattan, 59714
When was it listed? July 1981
Category. building
Also known as. One Room Schoolhouses of Gallatin County TR
Census division. Belgrade
National Register reference number. 81000360 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

10 since 2016

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 10 fires within 5 miles of Dry Creek School between 2016 and 2020, burning about 345 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	7
Equipment and vehicle use	3

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
17 September 2020	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Custer County	201062
31 August 2018	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Central Land Office	not named
15 August 2016	Equipment and vehicle use	328 acres	Central Land Office	SKINNER FIRE
23 July 2017	Equipment and vehicle use	1.0 acres	Central Land Office	MANHATTAN FIRE
20 July 2018	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Central Land Office	not named
9 April 2020	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Gallatin County	201014
25 April 2020	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Gallatin County	201027
24 April 2019	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	15 acres	Gallatin County	FRONTAGE

Every fire recorded in Gallatin County

Mines and quarries near this property

1 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 1 working within 5 miles of Dry Creek School: 1 past producer. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Flagstone. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where	Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
	Picture Flagstone Quarry	Flagstone	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Gallatin County

Storms near this property

6 since 1998

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Manhattan, the town this property stands in, in 6 storm reports between 1998 and 2024: 3 hail, 2 thunderstorm wind, 1 funnel cloud. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
August 2024	Hail	Manhattan	-	Public report of quarter sized hail 2 ENE of Manhattan. Wheat fields were damaged by the hail. Time and location was estimated.
April 2017	Funnel Cloud	Manhattan	-	Broadcast media posted a Facebook story with a funnel cloud picture.
August 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Manhattan	-	Strong winds measuring 77KT (89MPH) were reported 5 miles E of Manhattan, MT.
August 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Manhattan	-	Strong winds measuring 52KT (60MPH) were reported 8 miles S of Manhattan, MT. Numerous large tree limbs around 2 feet in diameter reported down.
August 2013	Hail	Manhattan	-	Hail measuring 1.50 inches (ping pong ball sized) was reported 8 mi S of Manhattan, MT.
August 1998	Hail	Manhattan	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Gallatin County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

3 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Reese Creek School	7.0 miles	1981
Thomas Quaw House	7.2 miles	1991
Belgrade City Hall and Jail	7.2 miles	1982

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 81000360 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Gallatin County	All 104 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.