By 1912, competition among the Northern Pacific, Soo, and Milwaukee railroads led Louis W. Hill, president of the Great Northern, and his father, James J. Hill, to pursue a vast new service area in west central North Dakota and the plains of Montana, believing that a successful farming population on railroad territory was essential to the company's survival. From 1907 through 1912, the Hills and other investors planned a line west from New Rockford to the Missouri River near Elbowoods, then northwest past Schafer and west to Amegard, Alexander, Charbonneau, and Cartwright, with a tunnel on the east bank of the Yellowstone and a bridge across the river, before continuing through Fairview, Sidney, Richey, Circle, Jordan, and Lewistown, then roughly northwest using some existing track between Great Falls and Lewistown and passing Vaughn across the continental divide. The new route from New Rockford to Lewistown was projected to cover 550 miles. On November 19, 1912, the Executive Committee of the Great Northern Railway Company organized the Montana Eastern Railway Company, a corporation wholly owned and controlled by the Great Northern Railway, whose officers were responsible for financing, constructing, completing, and operating the railway. Between 1912 and 1917, track was laid from Fairview to Watford City, Fairview to Sidney, Newton Junction to Richey, and from Mondak across the Missouri near Snowden down the west side of the Yellowstone to connect with the New Rockford-Lewistown cutoff at Fairview. Only 108.27 miles of the envisioned 550 miles of main track were laid, and although surveys were completed and grade construction occurred on several portions, no work followed World War I. The main line was never completed, and the company was dissolved on June 26, 1935. Its failure to be completed resulted from a prolonged construction period, an uncertain economic future, unreliable rainfall, cost, technological uncertainties, incursions of other railroads into the area, and the opening of the Panama Canal. The last train to Richey, Montana, ran on February 6, 1985, and the last train to Watford City on June 5, 1966. The only segment still in operation is the short connecting line between Snowden, Montana, and the former Northern Pacific branch, important as a connection between the lines of former parent companies.