Dozens of locals descended on Lewis and Clark County’s newest recreation area May 2 to enjoy the grand opening of Prickly Pear Park and celebrate the transformation of the former ASARCO smelter site into welcoming public wetlands.
“I give so much credit to the citizens of East Helena for being along on what’s been a pretty emotional and tough ride over the years,” Prickly Pear Land Trust Executive Director Mary Hollow said after cutting the ceremonial yellow ribbon to open the park just north of Jefferson County.
Visitors from East Helena, Montana City, Clancy, Helena, and beyond wandered the two-mile loop trail through tall grass and marshes while enjoying hot dogs, burgers, cookies, and soft drinks provided by Prickly Pear Land Trust.
Some recalled the site’s long, winding history, particularly the century-plus when ASARCO ran the smelter and largely took care of the town. “The company used to help schools and the fire department,” said former ASARCO worker Rick Halverson. Members of Halverson’s family worked at the smelter for a combined 296 years, the most of any local family.
This stretch of land southeast of the intersection of highways 12 and 282 has been the center of this community since its birth. A century and a half ago, the area was known as Prickly Pear Junction, a way station for travelers between Fort Benton and Confederate Gulch. In 1888, the Helena & Livingston Smelting Company built a lead smelter and named the town East Helena.
ASARCO purchased the smelter about a decade later and developed it into the town’s largest employer. For decades, the company supported community activities, including a prominent baseball team, which became a point of local pride. The father, uncle, and grandfather of East Helena Mayor Kelly Harris all worked at the smelter.
“When you saw the stacks, you knew you were close to East Helena,” said Prickly Pear Land Trust educational coordinator and long-time East Helena resident Audra Shropshire. “They were always there.”
Until they were brought down in 2009 – but their fall began long before. For decades, ASARCO’s smelter released lead, arsenic, and selenium into the soil and groundwater, causing grave environmental damage. Now in his seventies, Halverson recalled the “horrible” pollution of his childhood: heavy smoke at midday and the creek so polluted it rarely froze in winter.
In 1984, the company partnered with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to declare the area a Superfund site and begin a clean-up. ASARCO worked to curb its environmental impact, but those efforts fell short: the firm went bankrupt in 2001 and shut the smelter. Despite the environmental damage they had wrought, Halverson’s sister, Dee St. Clair, recalled feeling sadness as she watched the smelter stacks fall.
The Montana Environmental Trust Group began remediation efforts in 2011 and granted Prickly Pear Land Trust 240 acres to be developed for East Helena residents. METG’s decade-plus of clean-up and restoration included draining several ponds to eliminate toxic water and diverting the creek back to its original flood plain. METG regularly tests the soil and water for contaminants and visitors face no health risk, according to Prickly Pear.
Helena resident Mike Roberts worked on the clean-up and described the transformation of the former smelter site as “amazing.” Working on quality control years ago, he usually had to wear a protective suit, hard hat, and respirator to protect himself. “Now I’m standing here in a T-shirt,” he said. “It’s night and day.”
City Council member Wes Feist saw the park as a bridge between the community’s past and present and between East Helena and neighboring towns like Montana City. Indeed, Prickly Pear Land Trust’s plans for the park include a link to the Sunderlin Trail, a nine-mile hiking path to Montana City.
For decades, ASARCO united and strengthened East Helena. Feist hoped “this little oasis” could help bring the community together again. Echoing these thoughts, American Chemet CEO and East Helena resident Bill Shropshire said he hoped the community would embrace the park, which he considered a rebirth. “East Helena is proud of our history,” he said.
