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  U.S. Department of Health and Human Services | National Institutes of Health

Canyon Creek Schoolhouse Laboratory 100th Anniversary

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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.

Images: Rocky Mountain Laboratories, 2715


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Dr. William Jellison’s museum exhibits featured science, Native American artifacts, natural science, local artists, and the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Jellison was an entomologist at Rocky Mountain Laboratories who saved a good deal of its history.

Read his oral history.

Image: Rocky Mountain Laboratories, 2715



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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. But the passage of time had done its damage, and the upper floor and attic had to be 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. [link to Hamilton Players].

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The former schoolhouse became a one-story building. While the upper floors had to be taken down, the Hamilton Players eventually added a lobby, office, Green Room, and back stage.

Image: Courtesy of photographer Jon Rounhaus
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