K. Ross Toole

These views frequently came into conflict with those of the Anaconda Copper Company and some Montana politicians, most notably Governor J. Hugo Aronson (served 1953–1961).

In this belief, Toole was expanding on ideas first published by Joseph Kinsey Howard, another of the state's leading historians, in his 1943 book Montana: High, Wide, and Handsome.

Following a heart attack and a physician's recommendation to avoid ranch work, Toole returned to the profession of history in 1965, accepting the position of A.B.

He remained at the University until his death, and is best remembered there for teaching a class titled "Montana and the West," which drew several hundred students each year.

Toole also gained notoriety of a different sort in the late 1960s, when his frustration with student radicalism of the era resulted in his publication of a book with the cumbersome title, The Time Has Come to Say the Things that Need to be Said About Campus Violence, the Tyranny of a Minority, the Crusade of the Spoiled Children, the Parental Abdication of Responsibility, and the Lack of Courage, Integrity, and Wisdom on the Part of Our Educational Leaders.

Though undergoing treatment for the lung cancer that ultimately killed him, he spent the first months of 1981 living in Helena, writing and "keeping an eye on the Legislature."