Bobby Dent and the Store That Time Forgot
For generations, Robert “Bobby Dent” Smith kept the Montrose Store alive between New Glarus and Belleville, giving neighbors a place to buy a candy bar, warm up by the stove and feel at home.
Long before convenience stores, loyalty cards and self-checkout lanes, there was the Montrose Store, a weathered country landmark between New Glarus and Belleville where Robert Denton Smith kept watch over shelves, stories and a slower way of life.
Most people knew him as Bobby Dent. To many longtime residents in New Glarus and Belleville, he was more than a storekeeper. He was part of the landscape, part of the weekly rhythm, and part of a rural world that has almost completely disappeared.
The Smith family began operating the Montrose Store in 1896, and by the time Bobby Dent closed its doors for good on Jan. 1, 1988, the store had become one of the last reminders of the small country general stores that once served farm communities across southern Wisconsin.
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