English: Gallatin Lodge No. 6 Building (137 E Main Street), in Bozeman, Montana.

The site is that of the first commercial building in Bozeman -- the Stafford and Rice Hotel. Bozeman itself was founded in 1864 when the Bozeman Trail opened up. Newcomers John Stafford and W.S. Rice saw the need for a hotel, so they erected a one-and-a-half story log cabin structure at the northwest corner of North Bozeman Avenue and East Main Street. Rice quit the hotel biz almost immediately to work in the gold fields, but Stafford hung around long enough to get married in 1865. He sold the hotel to Caleb Fitz, who in turn sold it to J.J. Parham the same year.

The Freemason fraternal organization first came to Bozeman in 1866. Like many pioneers of the mid 1860s, they were Southerners looking for gold and silver. These men, most of them ex-Confederate soldiers, formed Gallatin Masonic Lodge No. 6 on October 4, 1866, in a room on the upper floor of the Stafford and Rice Hotel (137 E. Main, at Main and Bozeman Avenue). Lodge No. 6 purchased the hotel later that year for $500 -- using the upper floor for the lodge, and renting the first floor to Willson & Rich's General Store, then the Empire Corral, and later Osborn's Drug Store. But they refused to admit blacks (a common problem in Freemasonry at the time), and they also refused to admit any whites who had fought for or supported the Union side.

In 1870, Nathaniel Langford was Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Montana. When he learned about the restrictive membership practice of Lodge No. 6, he suspended the lodge's charter. The following year, a committee met to review Langford's action. They upheld his suspension of the charter, and furthermore discovered that a mere six members of Lodge No. 6 were the ones stirring up trouble between North and South. However, the committee also recommended that the charter be restored, and that if there were any Masons who wanted to form their own lodge -- them them do so.

Thus, on October 8, 1872, Bozeman Lodge No. 18 was formed. By this time, relationships between the Northerners and Southerners were easing. Lodge 18 rented space for its meetings from Lodge 6. In time, both lodges agreed to allow dual-membership, and as of 2010 about a dozen men held memberships in both lodges.

The Stafford & Rice building was torn down in 1882 and the curent building erected at a cost of $19,000. Two more structures (131 East Main and 129 East Main) were also erected by the lodge just to the west of meeting house.

Lodge No. 6 still occupies 137 E. Main, although the exterior has been partially altered since the day it was built.

Lodge No. 6 is a contributing property to the Main Street Historic District, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places on December 21, 1987.