The Obit Project

Obituary for a Small Town

Dagmar, Montana, is way up there in what’s almost Canada and almost North Dakota. She was very Danish and had a rebellious youth – at one point, she was kind of a Communi

Climbing Out of the Dark Hole

When Bea Burnham walked up to her house one day, she saw her husband of 30-plus years lying dead in the lawn. That stopped her world from spinning for a while, but she pu

Deciding to Say Goodbye

Clifford Marion was a jokester and a lover of card games and gambling. He was a force where he worked for a decade at the Town Pump. And then he got sick. At the end, sur

The Farmer Who Never Left His Land

Wayne Boyes was the de facto mayor of the unincorporated town of Tarkio off Interstate 90, though he’d never want that title. He was too busy with his cows. Wayne was bor

Off the Grid by Choice

A lot of people in Billings, Montana, knew Stanley Littleboy by sight. He was that homeless guy with the great face you’d see downtown or in South Park. But he had people

An Imperfect Parent

Darrel Johnson was someone people thought they knew. Maybe they worked alongside him at a high school dance. Maybe they knew him from Boy Scouts or through the camp he ra

The Ghost Lady Is My Neighbor

When she was in high school, Lotus Porte-Moyel interviewed her neighbor, Ellen Baumler, about being a successful woman. Ellen’s success was measured in history books – sh

Vanished in Vietnam

In 1965, Montanan pilot Dean Pogreba pulled up into the clouds over North Vietnam and was never heard from again. That left his wife and kids to always wonder: Was he sti

Friends Till the End

Brendon Galbreath’s death was covered by most major news stations in Montana. He died after being pulled over. At first, it wasn’t clear if a cop shot and killed a 21-yea

The Elephant Under Dillon

Everyone from Dillon knows about the elephant struck by lightning and buried on the spot in what’s now the fairgrounds. But few are as obsessed with telling and rememberi

For Ruth

The headline on Ruth Anderson’s obit in the New York Times defines her as a pioneering electronic composer. In certain circles, she was a famous artist and professor. Her

A Very Responsible Dude

In his obit picture, Terry Holo looked like The Dude from The Big Lebowski and, for a time, he kind of was that guy. But when reporter Izaak Opatz  joined Terry’s brother

The Obit Project - Coming April 02, 2026

Stories about the lives of real Montanans after they die. Young journalists reinvent the obituary, creating a form that explores universal truths, legacies and reckoning