REED POINT — A windstorm tore the roof off of a historic grain elevator in Reed Point last week, leaving residents heartbroken and uncertain about the future of a structure that has defined the small town's skyline for more than a century.
The grain elevator has long been a landmark in Reed Point, drawing visitors and serving as a reminder of generations of hard work for farmers.
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"I think it's kind of the first thing people see when they come to town," Julie Goold said.
Goold, a longtime Reed Point resident who bartends at the Watering Hole, said she's watched people travel across the region just to photograph the building. She admitted that she will admire it every now and then, as the elevator is visible from the back door of the bar.
"People come from all over to take pictures of them," Goold said. "Kids have had their senior pictures taken against them."
The elevator was still in operation when Goold moved to Reed Point in 1977.
"It was working and running," Goold said. "They were milling wheat or whatever through it, grain, when I moved here in 77, and I want to say it lasted 9 years after that."
Goold said that history is what makes the building a landmark in the community.
"They're standing and something that everyone around here has grown up with," Goold said.
But now, the building's future is uncertain. Last week, powerful winds tore the roof from the top of the building smashing part of the structure below.
Rob Stotts, a painter from Big Timber, witnessed the destruction firsthand. His brother alerted him of the roof, when the two were inside the nearby town hotel right before it happened.
"The wind was just super gnarly that day like everybody knows," Stotts said. "He was like 'Rob, Rob, Rob' and I came running up and he just says 'The roof's coming off.' And then the whole rest of the top of the building came off and smashed the stuff down below it too."
The roof remains on the ground next to the building where it landed after tumbling from above. Its collapse has raised questions about the future of the structure and left longtime residents shaken.
"I was heartbroke to see it happen," Goold said. "We knew that eventually they're going to start coming down and we don't want to see that but it's going to happen."
The Reed Point elevator is not alone.
In December, a fire devastated the grain elevator in Wolf Point.
Just a couple of months before that, two grain elevators were knocked down in Havre.
"They are historic to Montana, to back in the day," Goold said. "That was how they moved transport."
While it is a sign of the building's age, Stotts said the windstorm's force may have been impossible to withstand.
"That wind was unstoppable," Stotts said. "It could have been really well maintained and still happened."
For Goold and others who have spent their lives in Reed Point, the damage is a painful reminder that these structures, once the backbone of Montana's agricultural economy, are fading away.
"They're something of the past," Goold said. "You know, it reminds people of what this country was about at one point."
