Columbus grew out of frontier trade and transportation along the Yellowstone River. In 1874, whiskey trader Horace Countryman built a trading post a few miles west of the future town, serving mainly Crow Indians because the Crow Reservation then lay on the south side of the river. In 1876, his post became the stage station Stillwater, and in 1877 he opened a post office there. In 1879, Mithoff and Kaufman established the rival trading post Eagle's Nest opposite the mouth of the Stillwater River, with a hotel, blacksmith, harness shop, telegraph station, and a few dwellings, but its harsh whiskey earned it the nickname "Sheep Dip," and it soon disappeared. By 1881, Countryman had moved Stillwater and its post office to the present site of Columbus. After the Northern Pacific Railway arrived in 1882, the settlement prospered as an important shipping and trade center. Countryman later became a respected businessman and was remembered for his 200-mile ride to Helena with news of the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876. In 1894, the community's name changed from Stillwater to Columbus to avoid confusion with a similarly named place in Minnesota. In 1899, the Montana Sandstone Company began quarrying stone north of Columbus for buildings across Montana, including the State Capitol in Helena, and in 1913 Columbus became the seat of newly created Stillwater County. For a short time in the 1860s, the Yellowstone River near this region also carried Mackinaw boats taking passengers and cargo downstream to the States. Built near the Great Bend of the Yellowstone by present Livingston, these flat-bottomed craft could be 50 feet long and 12 feet wide, with crews of five. The first boats left in September 1864, and more passengers followed in 1865, including territorial judge Hezekiah Hosmer and his family. His son Allen later recounted the journey and the travelers' fear of Northern Cheyenne and Lakota attacks during warfare along the Bozeman Trail. Although some trips were uneventful, violence in 1866 and 1867 made the route increasingly dangerous, and by 1868 Yellowstone boat traffic had nearly ended.