By MICHAEL MOORE of the Missoulian
FLORENCE - Back in 1964, when Dave Hurtt came down the Eastside
Highway in the evening, he would see three, maybe four lights
in the distance.
One was his own, on the new ranch he'd just bought. Just over 230 acres, some dryland pasture, some falling away toward the Bitterroot River.
Now, when Hurtt turns east off U.S. Highway 93 at Florence a city of light rises up before him - Hidden Valley, Paradise Acres, Meadowlark Estates, Bull Run.
"It's just like a city when you come over the bridge, just lights everywhere," Hurtt said this week. "I guess I'm a little bit responsible for that, but it wasn't just me."
Jostling in his old pickup over the roads that trace his newest subdivision, the Maverick, the 70-year-old Hurtt is history on wheels, giving life to Ravalli County's census figures.
"That one is a single woman from Missoula with kids, that's a barber from Lolo, that's a retired guy from Minnesota, there's a couple of schoolteachers," Hurtt said. "Folks from out of state, in state, just all over."
In almost every way, the subdivisions that have blossomed in the old cattle pastures of the Bitterroot Valley bear out the figures of the 2000 Census. They are a diverse group, working in a wide variety of jobs, a far remove from the valley's history of agriculture and timber.
Ravalli County experienced the largest population growth in the state from 1990 to 2000, rising 44 percent to 34,000 people. Much of that growth has come in places like Florence, where people moved because it was an easy commute to Missoula and Hamilton, and a little cheaper to boot. It's still an easy commute, especially with the new four lane between Florence and Lolo. But Florence's median home price, at $135,300, now eclipses with Missoula's, at $132,500, or the $97,000 price in Hamilton.
Many people, like Thayne Orton, have moved onto subdivided ranches like Hurtt's. Orton and his wife Dianne lived in Lolo for about 20 years before moving to the Florence area six years ago.
"Our kids were about to go to high school, and we really wanted them to stay in a small school," Orton said this week as he took a break from tending his immaculate one-acre yard. "We just wanted a little room between us and the neighbors, and it's worked out really well for us."
Orton's was the first home built in the Maverick subdivision, 23 acres of dryland pasture with 16 lots.
"We knew there'd be other homes," said Orton, who runs a hairstyling business in Lolo. "We weren't looking to move to the country. We just wanted to have a little room between us and the neighbors."
Orton's commute is quick on the new four-lane that links Lolo and Florence, and Dianne has another 10 to 15 minutes to get to her job with Tamarack Management.
Orton built in 1996. Now all but one of the Maverick lots are sold, at prices around $30,000 per lot.
"What's funny is now they're getting $45,000 an acre," Hurtt said.
Dave Hurtt came to the Bitterroot i n 1957, working for another rancher before buying his own place in 1964. He paid $40,000 for 233 acres. He wanted to raise purebred Simmental bulls, and the word subdivision had never crossed his mind.
In those days, a rancher could make a living on cows. Now, Hurtt said, the Bitterroot "really isn't cattle country."
Back then, Hurtt's ranch was surrounded by two larger ranches, the 6,000-acre Antrim ranch and a 5,000-acre property leased and ranched by the Mikesell family. In 1970, a California rancher named Bill Cook paid $350,000 for the Antrim ranch, then turned around and sold it seven years later for more than $1 million, Hurtt recalled.
Cook, Hurtt said, had seen California's farm country turn into subdivisions, and that same smell was on the wind when he sold in 1977.
"He said he'd seen that change in California and he didn't want any part of that," Hurtt said.
Cook had surely seen the future. His ranch went to Missoula owners, who began piecing off the property, punching in roads. Now it's a massive subdivision called Hidden Valley and sprawls across the low hills in a decidedly unhidden way.
Hurtt, too, had sold some property, first about 80 acres to pay off some costs accrued when his wife died in 1974. But Hurtt, who later remarried, didn't seriously consider subdividing any of his property until 1989, when a man made a pitch to buy 10 acres near Antrim Point.
Hurt sold the land for $43,000, more than he'd paid for the entire property in 1964.
Over the next two years, Hurtt laid out a subdivision of 16 two-acre lots on the same hillside.
"We sold those for $16,000 to $18,000, timber and a view of the Bitterroots," Hurtt said.
The subdivision was called Bull Run, fitting for a cattleman's first subdivision. By 1995, all the lots were sold.
"What was great was they couldn't see me and I couldn't see them because of the trees and the hill," he said.
The sale of the lots mirrored the growth in the county, and Hurtt saw a broad cross section of people move into Bull Run. White-collar professors, blue-collar train engineers, retirees, you name it.
"You get the out-of-state people just looking for a different lifestyle and thinking that two acres is living in the country, and then you get somebody who wants a little more property for a little less money than he can get in Missoula," Hurtt said.
The numbers tell the story. Only 48.1 percent of Ravalli County residents in 2000 lived in the county in 1995. Of the new folks, about 31 percent moved to the county from elsewhere in Montana, while about 21 percent came from out of state.
"Seems about right to me, as I drive around and look at the place," Hurtt said.
Most recently, Hurtt is selling five one-acre parcels along a road he built to access his Maverick subdivision - the price is $45,000 per lot.
"That much money for a single acre of knapweed flat," said Hurtt, shaking his head in wonder.
A part of Dave Hurtt is sentimental for the days when the Bitterroot was big ranches and Forest Service. It was quiet, full of wildlife, dark at night, no traffic. The Eastside Highway was so slow he'd graze his cows in the barrow pit along the road.
"Last time I tried to move cows on the road, a couple years ago, we damn near killed some cows and people," he said.
Now the fields are alive with the sound of backhoes, dogs barking, cars on the road.
"You asked what I hear now, well that's it, what you heard just now," he said.
In the distance, a 4-by-8-foot piece of plywood sheeting has been plunked down on the floor of a new house going up.
Whumpf.
"It took me a month to figure out what that sound was," Hurtt said with a laugh. "Whumpf!"
Another part of Hurtt figures that change just comes. You manage it best you can, try to make sure you've planned ahead, taken care of your family, maybe left a little something good behind.
"I don't know, it's progress, I guess. We're not going to go backward. It's not going to be like it used to be. I'd like to keep the 60 acres I've got left here intact. Maybe some rich guy will get it. Maybe I'll put a little horse operation on here ... You know, if you want it to be like the old days, move to Winnett or Jordan. It'll always be the old days over there."
Reporter Michael Moore can be reached at 523-5252
or at mmoore@missoulian.com.