Dave Eckroth

I grew up in Sheridan, Wyoming, near the Bozeman Trail, Fort Phil Kearney and the Wagon Box Fight – all of which sparked my love for local and regional history.  I graduated from Montana State University with a history degree and a love for research.  I followed in my father’s footsteps and joined the Army National Guard – ultimately serving for 34 years, including a year-long deployment to Afghanistan. I am currently in my 30th year as a teacher and am married and have two sons. My Montana heritage stretches back to 1874. My passion and a timely meeting with Howard Boggess and Mike Penfold in 2000 led me to work on battlefield preservation. In conjunction with Frontier Heritage and later Our Montana, I authored five American Battlefield Preservation Program grant projects. These projects focused on compilation of the history of the events and suggestions for preservation. In 2005, I received the Eugene T. Carroll Historic Preservation Award.  I also wrote a number of historical journal articles. Native American Rock Art captured my interest for the last twenty years. I’m passionate about archeological fieldwork and have visited, located, documented, photographed, and GPS’d a large number of Native American Rock Art sites in Northern Wyoming, Eastern and Central Montana.  I co-authored a cultural survey of Canyon Creek, and co-authored an update on the Pillar Creek Site, as well assisted Lawrence Loendorf, Doug Milton, and Tim Urbaniak, all prominent archeologists on a variety of projects.  I delivered several presentations to historical groups ranging from Huntley to Harlowton. Unrelated to the above passions, I’ve discovered a love for genealogy and published an article during March 2023, which won the Joseph S. Height 2024 Award for significant cultural contribution to the history of Germans from Russia.