The schoolhouse was not empty for long. In August 1921, it was announced that the laboratory investigating Rocky Mountain spotted fever would lease the building from the school district. The laboratory would move from its log cabin in Victor, Montana, to the schoolhouse in September 1921.

The laboratory was located in the schoolhouse for only seven years, when a new building constructed especially for research and vaccine production was opened. After the laboratory moved, the Canyon Creek Schoolhouse wasn’t used until Dr. William Jellison bought the building in 1966 and created a museum in it. The exhibits featured science, Native American artifacts, natural science, local artists, and the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Jellison began working at the Rocky Mountain Laboratories (RML) before he had even graduated college and eventually became a Public Health Service officer and entomologist at RML. After his death, the museum’s collections were transferred to the Montana Historical Society in Hamilton. The building sat empty again.

Read his oral history.

It wasn’t until August 1995 that the Canyon Creek Schoolhouse began its fourth life—this time as a playhouse for the theater group called The Hamilton Players, who had bought the building from the Jellison family. The passage of time had done its damage; the upper floor and attic were taken down. Volunteers helped to renovate the building, including a detachment of U.S. Navy SeaBees (the Navy’s construction battalions).

Now you can see a show where children once learned, scientists once produced a life-saving vaccine, and a museum once educated visitors.