Bonner-West Riverside, MT

Bonner-West Riverside is a Missoula County census-designated place that had 1,690 residents in 2020, made up of Bonner, Milltown, West Riverside, and Pine Grove. The communities sit around the confluence of the Blackfoot and Clark Fork rivers, with Missoula to the west and Piltzville farther southeast. The river junction is more than scenery here: it separates neighborhoods, shaped transportation, and supplied the water and timber routes that made the settlements grow.

Bonner began as a company town around Andrew Hammond’s sawmill, where the first logs were cut in 1886. The mill and railroad drew workers from French Canadian, Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, and other backgrounds; Milltown grew for mill workers, while West Riverside and Pine Grove gave families additional places to settle. The industrial story continued through the Anaconda Company, Champion International, and Stimson Lumber. The old dams and mill site also left a major environmental legacy, leading to dam removal, river cleanup, and restoration.

Milltown State Park now covers nearly 635 acres at the restored confluence, with river frontage, trails, an overlook, and interpretive displays. The Bonner Milltown History Center keeps the timber and neighborhood record in local hands, and Bonner Elementary ties the community to Missoula’s wider school system. Restoration also changed how residents move through the confluence: park trails and the overlook bring the rivers into an everyday recreation map, while the Blackfoot and Clark Fork remain working ecological corridors. The history center’s volunteer programs, school walking tour, and local roundtables keep the industrial past connected to cleanup and redevelopment. Roads and trails connect the four named communities, but each still carries a different relationship to the mill, the river, and the hillside it grew on. Interstate 90, local bridges, and river trails keep Missoula close, but the confluence supplies the place’s own geography and history every day.