Magic City Vol. II

Billings sits on the north bank of the Yellowstone River in South Central Montana as it flows east through the foothills of the Rocky Mountains towards the Great Plains of North America. Hundreds of years ago, Native American tribes such as the Crow, Blackfeet, and Lakota Sioux inhabited this region while fighting for dominance over its natural resources. Remnants of that culture are still prominent today and leave a rich history. Just east of the city is the Crow Reservation, the largest in Montana and where, in 1876, over 2,000 Sioux, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho warriors famously defeated Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and the 7th Calvary in what is known as the Battle of the Little Bighorn--arguably the most decisive and climactic Native American victory against the United States Army. Now, Billings is a blue-collar town driven by railroad and oil industries. Coal trains routinely move through the city and oil refineries speckle the horizon as ranchers work the surrounding landscape. It is also a transient city filled with colorful characters passing to and from the Crow Reservation and other parts of the American West. Locals call it the "Magic City", a nickname that perfectly personifies a peculiar energy that is here today, galvanized by a unique confluence of Native and Western American culture. This series is about the mood, characters and moments that define this undercurrent of life running through a specific enclave of Montana.