[1] Malcolm Clarke was murdered by a band of Piegan Blackfeet at his Prickly Pear Creek ranch north of Helena, Montana on August 17, 1869, an event that led directly to the Marias Massacre in January 1870.

During the 1869 raid on Malcolm Clarke's ranch, Horace, John's father was badly wounded.

[1][2] At the age of two, scarlet fever left John deaf during an outbreak that killed four of his brothers.

In 1888, while John was at school, the Clarke family moved to Midvale, Montana, which later became known as East Glacier Park Village.

Clarke opened and operated an art studio up until his death in 1970, in what is now East Glacier Park Village, Montana.