Undaunted optimism yields few riches – There’s no "Big Rock Candy Mountain" along the Lewis and Clark Trail.

Two hundred years after Lewis and Clark passed this way, their expedition is yielding yet another discovery. It’s this: Not everything can be commercialized.

The Lewis and Clark Expedition bicentennial celebration is a veritable orgy of history, full of opportunities to learn about or reconnect with an important part of our heritage. Commemorating the expedition also serves as a springboard for interesting discussion about what followed in the explorers’ wake – good and bad – leading, perhaps, to clearer understanding of what we’ve got, what we’ve lost and what we owe future generations. The bicentennial has been cause to spruce up aging facilities and improve infrastructure – for all of us, not just tourists. And it’s turning out to be more than a little fun.

But as a money-making venture? It’s a bust. The hordes of tourists expected by event organizers and vendors and other businesses are staying away in droves. Montana’s main event for the bicentennial, the monthlong "Signature Event," a festival of all things Lewis and Clark under the Big Sky, now under way in Great Falls, is enriching in every way but one. If it’s any consolation, none of the 10 other states along the Lewis and Clark Trail have cashed in, either. The bicentennial is many things, but a T-shirt sales opportunity it’s not.

Missoulian Opinion

http://missoulian.com/articles/2005/06/26/opinion/opinion1.txt