Culture of Missoula

galleries, such as that of Monte Dolack. There is also New Year's Eve's First Night Missoula celebration, which includes food and live entertainment. The Humanities Montana Festival of the Book is held every October to celebrate the literature of the West, and Missoula's two historic theatres both hold annual film festivals: the Roxy hosting the International Wildlife Film Festival, established in 1977 as the first juried wildlife film festival in the world; and the Wilma accommodating the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival since 2003, the largest film event in Montana. In performance arts, the Missoula Community Theatre has held performances of musical and non-musical plays since 1977, with its affiliated Missoula Children's Theatre also acting as an international touring program that visits nearly 1,000 communities per year around the world.

The Montana Museum of Art & Culture, which officially became a state museum in 2001 and housed in a former Carnegie library, is one Montana's oldest cultural reserves with its permanent collection of more than 10,000 original works begun in 1894. Historic Fort Missoula is home to the Historic Museum, dedicated to preserving the history of Western Montana, and to the Rocky Mountain Museum of Military History and the Northern Rockies Heritage Center. It was announced by the National Museum of Forest Service History in 2009 that it plans to build a National Conservation Legacy and Education Center in Missoula as well.

Opened in 1987, Missoula's Bayern Brewing, Inc. is the oldest active brewery in Montana and bills itself as "the only German microbrewery in the Rockies". Big Sky Brewing was opened eight years later and, with a production of over 38,000 barrels, is by far Montana's largest brewery and produces the best-selling beer brewed in Montana, Moose Drool Brown Ale. Missoula has also been home