The bronze sculpture along Ft. Benton’s Missouri River shoreline salutes a sheep herding dog that has become Montana legend. In 1936 a sheepherder arrived at the Ft. Benton hospital accompanied by his faithful companion. The man died a few days later. His family living in the east requested that his body be shipped to them for burial. A dog followed the casket to the train station  and watched as the body was placed on a train.

For five-and-a-half years the same dog met incoming trains watching for his master to arrive. No one knew the dog’s name so he soon became known as Shep to the Great Northern Railway employees who fed him and allowed him to make the station his home. 

When Shep died he was buried on a hillside above the town. The local Boy Scout Troop served as honor guard and pallbearers with hundreds of Ft. Benton citizens attending the funeral. The railway erected a stone obelisk. A book, Shep Forever Faithful by Stewart H. Beveridge and Lee Nelson relates the story.

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SHED “Forever Faithful” sculpture by Bob Scriver

Dedicated June 26, 1994