FORT BENTON

city, seat (1865) of Chouteau county, north-central Montana, U.S., on the Missouri River. A well-known American Fur Company outpost, it was founded (1846) as Fort Lewis by Major Alexander Culbertson and was renamed in 1850 for Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri. As the head of steamboat river navigation on the Missouri River, it became a boomtown as gold seekers and cattlemen, on their way west, used it as a supply point. With the building of the railroads, its importance as a transit point diminished. Cattle, sheep, and wheat are the economic mainstays of the modern city. Ruins of the old fort are along the riverfront. Inc. 1883. Pop. (1990) 1,660.