This is the first of a three-part series on the status and future of high-speed Internet and cell service in rural Montana.

Vape-shop owner Ron Marshall has high-speed Internet at his stores in Hamilton, Bozeman and Belgrade, but when he wants to do business electronically from his home near Corvallis in the Bitterroot Valley – good luck.

“When our shops close and we need to get on a computer and check numbers or look at inventory – simply doing that on your phone doesn’t cut it,” he says. “I can fire up my computer, turn on my hot-spot, and I’ll go to the kitchen and make dinner and eat, and I’ll come back, and maybe, just maybe, one of the pages may have loaded.”

Marshall is one of hundreds of thousands of Montanans – the real number isn’t precisely known, which is part of the problem — without access to high-speed Internet service at their home.