Black Eagle Falls

Black Eagle Falls, the uppermost of the Great Falls of the Missouri, lies west of this point. Its modern name comes from Captain Meriwether Lewis's journal entry for June 14, 1805, when he discovered the falls during the Lewis and Clark Expedition and wrote of a beautiful little island below the falls, well timbered and situated about the middle of the river, where an eagle had placed her nest in a cottonwood tree in a spot so inaccessible that neither man nor beast dared pass the gulfs separating her domain from the shores. After viewing the falls, Captain Lewis ascended the hill to the former location of the smelter stack and saw immense herds of buffalo in the plains and especially in the valley below.

Great Falls, Montana · United States