In Missoula there has always been a ton of night life and fresh markets. But there’s never been any way to truly bring Asian culture into the picture. However, a  new night market named the Missoula Moonlight Market will bring music, food, and  arts and crafts. from Asian cultures. This market is set to begin in the spring of 2026.

Although Missoula has tons of markets including the Missoula Peoples Market, Missoula Farmers Market, and the Clark Fork Market, a new market centered around Asian culture seemed to be the right move. These markets are places people can go take a nice walk and look at all the crafts, produce, fresh picked flowers, handmade clothing, and enjoy delicious treats that people have made. These come from local businesses and local farmers all based in Montana, and all though this includes all sorts of cultures, but when it comes to the Asian market, this is going to make space for Asian based local businesses.

For the Asian community in Missoula this means bigger things are ahead. Making up 1.5% of the Missoula population, the Asian community isn’t very large here in Missoula, and overall in Montana the Asian community makes up 0.7% of the population. Compared to California where over 14.8% of the population is a part of Asian descent.

In Missoula Asian representation has never been very talked about or easy to find. For example, a grave site was built in the 1800s and early 1900’s  in the Rattlesnake area that is a burial site for over 50 people who were a part of Missoula’s historic Chinese community. This site was there primarily due to the fact that white members of the community did not want to be buried next to the Chinese population of Missoula. You can now visit the site and see a memorial that has been left in honor of the people buried there.

Other than that, Missoula was also home to an internment camp for members of Japanese descent during World War II. It was used as an ADC (Alien Detention Center). Here they would hold and house over 120,000 Japanese Americans. During their time here they would wake up, have breakfast, do their assigned chores, take English classes, do arts and crafts, and play various sports. They would also take time to do fun activities but they only would earn a limited amount of each product they needed for each activity. The ADC here at Fort Missoula is the largest internment site that is still somewhat in use and open to the public to tour. 

During a completely different war, The Vietnam War,  tons of immigrants travelled to the U.S. These immigrants were specifically Laotian, Vietnamese, Hmong, and Cambodian people. In Missoula, however, there was a spike in Hmong people during the 1970s. Before Hmong people arrived here in Montana none of them knew truly what to expect. They didn’t want wealth, or friendships, they just wanted to survive.  At the beginning of the Hmong refugees arriving in Missoula, there were 600 members of their community. However now it has shrunk to at least 250. This is no surprise as once they arrived here and started their lives out in the U.S they slowly started to expand to other places in the country.

In more recent years, the U.S has been no stranger to Asian hate. In 2020 when Covid-19 hit, there was a huge spike in Asian hate all over the world. This was specifically targeted towards those of Chinese descent as that is where this disease had appeared from. In fact one in five people from the Asian community report hate acts by others because of racial bias. Most hate acts would involve harassment or maybe even physical abuse.

In August of 2021 at least 9,000 anti hate acts had been reported, this was all during and beginning at the time of the pandemic. In one case a man had harassed and kicked her and shoved her while he called her “diseased”. This was documented in February of 2020, there was and still is no evidence that people of Asian descent are more likely to contract and spread the Coronavirus. It is saddening that just because a single virus sparked from China, it takes a toll on a whole community and causes physical and emotional pain.

Even in Missoula Asian hate during the pandemic was prominent, according to the Missoula Current there have been many instances where racist remarks have been yelled at many Asian people around the town. The amount of scapegoating going on towards Asian Americans has always been present and to see it in Missoula is no shock as this is a given in any community.

There are many things that people apart of any community can do to make a difference in the sense that this hate may never end but there is a way rates can go down. This will only happen if Asian owned businesses are supported and hate towards a person of Asian descent is reported to Stop AAPI Hate. Here in Missoula it is a super proud moment for the Missoula Moonlight Market to open as more Asian representation in the town of Missoula has never been this prominent.

This first step to starting the market is a huge step for Missoula. Currently the organizers of the market are searching for vendors and do not yet know an opening date but it is to begin in the spring of 2026. By reaching out to speak about our Asian community here in Missoula the community gets closer to the rich history of all the different Asian ethnicities in Missoula and how they originated here and what can be done to make the community feel seen.