Gary Montgomery attended elementary school in Pennsylvania, high school in Florida, and college in Colorado, where he earned a bachelor's degree in wildlife biology. Returning to Florida to pursue graduate studies in marine ecology, he became sidetracked as a science teacher and an environmental educator. It was 1973 and young couples were taking seriously the advice to drop out and return to the land. With his wife and two children he set out across the United States in a van pulling a home-built trailer, destination Montana. The plan was to purchase ten acres, build a cabin, eat a lot of peaches and raise their children in a fairy tale lifestyle. Fate required that there would also be plans B, C, D, ...and so on. Another child, two marriages, and a host of new jobs unfolded over the years in Montana. Working in the woods provided most of the opportunity in the early years which included logging, both conventional and helicopter; firewood and Christmas tree cutting; U.S. Forest Service fire, thinning and timber crews; and lumber mill work. In the late 1970s Gary managed a cattle and hay ranch, and by the mid-1980s he was operating a small printing and photo processing business. The printing business led him into publishing. Not only did he distribute a weekly flyer for 20 years, but he has published The Trail, a quarterly historical journal for the last 29 years. He and Theodora live on eight acres where they work to weed the garden, gather eggs, feed the sheep, and play with goats. With Teddy's line of hand-crafted herbal products, a vacation rental, and Gary's freelance writing, they thrive in their cozy log cabin with its million-dollar view of the Montana Rockies.
