Snow-Butte/Silver Bow TB

Please drop this item in rural OR Premium Member Only caches.  Do not place it in an urban cache or abandon it at a caching event.  Transport the bug in the original plastic bag for as long as the bag lasts; the bag keeps the trackable clean and prevents tangling with other items.  Otherwise, take the travel bug anywhere you wish.  No permission is needed to leave the U.S.

Photos in the travel bug logs are appreciated.  I will be re-post them here, where they can be seen by other cachers.

This series of “snow” travel bugs each commemorates a cold US city.  I am not sure how one determines the coldest US cities in the winter.  Does one rank the record lows, lowest monthly averages or lowest winter averages?   Many of the cities would appear on all three lists.  Rather than try to assign a ranking, I will simply include some cities or hamlets from each of the criteria.  Regardless of ranking, we have to  acknowledge that all of the locations identified in this series are really, really cold places in winter.

Butte is a city in Montana, and the county seat of Silver Bow County, United States.  In 1977, the city and county governments consolidated to form the sole entity of Butte-Silver Bow. As of the 2010 census, Butte's population was approximately 34,200. Butte is Montana's fifth largest city.

Butte began as a mining town in the late 19th century in the Silver Bow Creek Valley.  At first only gold and silver were mined in the area, but the advent of electricity caused a soaring demand for copper, which was abundant in the area.  The small town was often called "the Richest Hill on Earth".  It was the largest city for many hundreds of miles in all directions. The city attracted workers from Cornwall (United Kingdom), Ireland, Wales, Lebanon, Canada, Finland, Austria, Serbia, Italy, China, Syria, Croatia, Montenegro, Mexico, and all areas of the U.S.  Among the migrants, many Chinese workers moved in, and amongst them set up businesses that led to the creation of a Chinatown in Butte. The Chinese migrations stopped in 1882 with the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act.

Winters in Butte are long and cold, January averaging at 18 °F.  The record low is -48 F.