Thirty minutes off the interstate, Southeast of Butte, Montana, is Twin Bridges. In Twin Bridges, nobody’s a stranger, and kids trade beater cars like Pokémon cards. It stands now as a typical rural Montana town with ranches sprawled out on either side and a bar, the Blue Anchor, that doubles up as the cafe. However, just a couple of blocks away from the Blue Anchor, you can see Twin Bridges’ vacant Montana State Orphanage, or the Montana Children’s Center, which resembles a small college campus. Local teenagers commonly refer to it as the “abandoned orphanage.”
After the closure of the Children’s Center in 1975, there has been a scarcity of childcare in Twin Bridges. But it’s not the only place in the state facing that scarcity. Rural Montana towns are in a childcare desert, with 59% of the state facing a lack of providers compared to the number of children in need. Twin Bridges High School reporters in-training focused on the only daycare and how it serves the town of about 400 residents.
