Thursday night, at the Kalispell Chamber of Commerce’s annual banquet, the celebration of our forward-looking community was mixed with a sense of history.

When the Great Chief Award was given out to Pete Larson early in the evening, it was a reminder of where Kalispell started and where it is going.

Larson comes from a great local timber family. His grandfather Hans came to the Flathead Valley a few years after immigrating from Norway. He started American Timber Co. in 1928, and in 1946 built a sawmill in Olney that operated for the next 54 years. Hans passed on the family trade to his son Lawrence, who in turn passed it on to Pete. Other Larsons also made their living with timber, including Lawrence’s youngest brother Hollister, who was in the audience Thursday to see his nephew honored.

Logging was a way of life in the Flathead Valley for more than a century, but with new intensive regulations making the business less profitable, Pete finally closed the Olney mill in 2000.

Reflecting on what had been and what had come to pass, Larson told Inter Lake reporter Jackie Adams in September 2000, “For months, I went through a lot of emotional turmoil, wondering if the failure was mine, wondering why this had to happen on my watch. Then this summer, my wife and I and a Nigerian friend came out and held a prayer. I gave thanks for what we had here for 50 years. We were blessed, but it was time to give it back and let the Lord do with it as he saw fit.”

What the Lord did with Pete Larson had as much or more to do with why he was named Great Chief than anything to do with his business ventures.

You see, with more time on his hands, Pete became a devoted volunteer and community servant, working hard to make sure that the next 100 years in the Flathead would be as good as the last hundred.

He has served terms on the boards of Kalispell Regional Healthcare, Glacier Bancorp and Semitool, and has worked to strengthen the Lighthouse Christian Home for Developmentally Disabled, the Flathead Valley Community College Foundation, Immanuel Lutheran Home, Mission Builders International, New Covenant Fellowship Church.

Listening to his many accomplishments that were not for his own good, but for the good of others, it was not hard to see Pete Larson as the very model of a community-minded leader. That makes him a Great Chief indeed.

 Frank Miele is managing editor of the Daily Inter Lake. If you don’t like his opinion, stop by the office and he will gladly refund your two cents. E-mail responses may be sent to edit@dailyinterlake.com