Polebridge Ranger Station Historic District

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1986.

From the record

“The Polebridge Ranger Station in Glacier National Park was the first administrative area in the park, predating the park's establishment. The ranger station was destroyed by fire, leaving the residence.”
Wikipedia article Polebridge Ranger Station Historic District, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 168 National Register listings published here for Flathead County · listed in 1986 · category: District.

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

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 6 buildingss as contributing to the listing.
Address. Near the NE end of Henshaw Bridge on Rte. 7, West Glacier, 59928
When was it listed? February 1986
Category. district
Also known as. Glacier National Park MRA
Census division. Glacier National Park
Architectural style. National Park Service rustic
National Register reference number. 86000337 - 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

41 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 41 fires within 5 miles of Polebridge Ranger Station Historic District between 1992 and 2020, burning about 12 acres in total. 34 started naturally. 3 were 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
Natural	34
Arson/incendiarism	3
Debris and open burning	3
Recreation and ceremony	1

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
6 September 1997	Natural	under an acre	Glacier National Park	COVEY
25 September 2008	Natural	under an acre	Glacier National Park	GUEST RANCH FIRE
23 September 1999	Recreation and ceremony	4.0 acres	Flathead National Forest	VANDERSCHAF
12 September 1995	Natural	under an acre	Glacier National Park	QUARTZ RDG
9 August 2006	Natural	under an acre	Glacier National Park	MUD LAKE
9 August 2006	Natural	under an acre	Flathead National Forest	HAWK CREEK
8 August 2009	Natural	under an acre	Glacier National Park	QUARTZ RIDGE
7 August 2017	Natural	under an acre	Glacier National Park	BIG PRAIRIE

Every fire recorded in Flathead County

Storms near this property

9 since 2004

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names West Glacier, the town this property stands in, in 9 storm reports between 2004 and 2015: 2 hail, 2 thunderstorm wind, 2 flood, 2 heavy rain. 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
November 2006	Flash Flood	West Glacier	$7,000,000	The Associated Press reported 7.0 million in damages. Glacier National Park received 9.1 of rainfall in 36 hours. An additional .5 to 1.0 million in damages occurred to the park's trails.
February 2015	Heavy Rain	West Glacier	-	A rockslide was reported along US-2 just east of West Glacier, MT. The eastbound lane was blocked by softball-sized rocks. Road crews cleared debris and the road was usable again an hour later.
July 2014	Heavy Rain	West Glacier	-	The Glacier National Park RAWS reported 0.76 of rainfall in one hour. Other heavy rainfall reports include 0.78 40 min. ending 4:10 pm MDT 3 miles east of Creston and 0.65 in one hour via Hungry Horse RAWS at 6:11 pm MDT.
May 2013	Flood	West Glacier	-	Minor flooding occurred to agricultural lands in the low lying areas adjacent to the middle fork of the Flathead River near West Glacier.
July 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	West Glacier	-	no account filed
July 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	West Glacier	-	no account filed
May 2006	Flood	West Glacier	-	no account filed
June 2006	Hail	West Glacier	-	no account filed
September 2004	Hail	West Glacier	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Flathead 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

6 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
Vance Lodge	0.7 miles	1994
W. L. Adair General Mercantile Historic District	1.4 miles	1986
Bowman Lake Road	1.6 miles	1996
William Raftery Homestead	2.0 miles	1988
Anton Schoenberger Homestead	2.0 miles	1988
Johnnie Walsh Homestead	2.2 miles	1988

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 86000337 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Flathead County	All 168 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.
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.