Welcome to Raynesford, Montana

Raynesford was the maiden name of a woman who boarded the Great Northern survey crew while the railroad was being built. The new station was between Standford and Belt. Land for the townsite was obtained from Edmund Higgins, who homesteaded the land around here in 1891. In 1907, when the railroad was coming through, supplies for the workers came from Higgins and his wife, for whom the station was named. (from Cheney's Names on the Face of Montana, Mountain Press Publishing Company)

When mining was king in Montana, railroad tracks snaked through mountain ranges to reach small boom towns and haul ore to market. Raynesford is near the small present-day communities of Monarch and Neihart and the ghost towns of Albright and Hughesville. One railroad ran up Belt Creek, and the abandoned railroad bed is now the main component and access route of Sluice Boxes State Park. Soaring cliffs and precipitous ledges mark the Belt Creek Canyon as it slices out of the Little Belt Mountains and winds toward the town of Belt. Sluice Boxes State Park consists of the northern most 8 miles of the Belt Creek canyon. The train bridges have been removed and visitors must ford the creek.