“I think 90 percent of our success will be because of APR,” Horse Capture said of the reservation’s tourism goals. “I hope people get over the fear and quit listening to the rumors and see what’s going on for themselves. This is going to be one of the biggest game reserves all over the world. Livestock and farming are very unstable markets. The rumors they’re forcing people out aren’t true. The question is how Malta is going to help itself to benefit from APR. What can I get ahold of as far as tourism goes?”

State and federal data show most of northeast Montana fading while the rest of the state exceeds national trends. From 2000 to 2015, Phillips County's population fell 9.4 percent while the state grew 12.4 percent. Farm and ranch jobs have shrunk. That’s due in part to mechanization replacing people, part to needing larger properties to support fewer workers.

Big paychecks once went to energy workers who enjoyed wages between $69,000 and $107,000, but that boom employed less than 1,000 people and has pretty much faded. The Pegasus gold mine at Zortman paid well, too, but it ran out of gold in 1996 and left the state with a massive environmental cleanup task.