Books

Dusting Off the Old Ones

The Toboggan Slide

With summer coming on it is hardly fit to be thinking of toboggan slides, but Miles City had a real one at one time. Undoubtedly, the only ones of our readers who have ever heard of the toboggan slide at the corner of Ninth and Main are those who have read Sam Gordon's "Recollections of Old Milestown," but there was a toboggan slide at that corner during the early or mid-nineties, and while it lasted but one season, it was certainly enjoyed to the utmost while it did last. As Mr. Gordon tells it, the Whiteside Brothers who operated a lumber yard at that time on the present site of the Midland Coal and Lumber Company, sponsored the "slide" and built it. It was a frame structure with a platform nearly fifteen feet high at the corner where the Keefe Auto Supply now stands, sloping north from there and hitting the ground about half way to Pleasant Street. Pleasant Street was closed for the winter as it was mostly a sagebrush flat at that time, and practically all of the business houses were up toward the corner of Fifth and Main. With the impetus gained in the drop from the platform for half a block, the toboggans would run clear up to Palmer Street and sometimes beyond. Nearly every night, practically every young swain in town, accompanied by his "best girl", would be at the "slide" and spend most of the evening there. They were all togged out in the "blanket suits" that were synonymous with toboggoning. Naturally everyone had the jolliest time imaginable. There was a movement on foot to revive this pasttime for another winter season, but for financial reasons, it was found to be impracticable.