Jackson Hole Magazine // Summer 2019 by Teton Media Works, Inc.

SUMMER 2019

Living with Grizzlies The recovery of the grizzly bear population is a conservation success story. The next step is to figure out how we coexist.

OUTDOORS

Paragliding

CULTURE

Public Art

DINING

Farmers Markets

GETTING OUT

Scenic River Floats

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Jackson Hole

Summer 2019

Page

Features

64 JEFF DIENER

Biking has become big in the Tetons.

The recovery of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem’s grizzly bear population is a conservation success story. The next step is figuring out how humans and this apex carnivore can coexist.

Classical music, plein air painting, bluegrass, food, art—local festivals celebrate all of these, and more.

Pedal On

BY MOLLY ABSOLON

Living with Grizzlies

Festival Fever

LILA EDYTHE

BY MIKE KOSHMRL

PHOTO GALLERY

Lessons in the Wild //

KYLIE MOHR • PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRADLY J. BONER

ON THE COVER: Image by Thomas D. Mangelsen Images of Nature Gallery. Jackson-based photographer Thomas D. Mangelsen captured this image, Mother’s Love - Grizzly 399, in Grand Teton National Park. The cubs in the photo are 399’s third set of triplets. (One is hidden behind her.) Grizzly 399 is the most famous mother bear in the world and the subject of Mangelsen’s critically acclaimed, award-winning photography book, Grizzlies of Pilgrim Creek. The evening Mangelsen took this image, he watched the family for about ninety minutes, during which the cubs nursed for about ten minutes. Two cubs climbed up a small pine, otherwise they stuck close to mom as she fed on the fresh grass growth. 12

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

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Jackson Hole

Summer 2019

Best of JH 107 GETTING OUT Paddle Power

20 TETONSCAPES The Magic of Mushrooms, Cheers, Living History, Hearts of Glass

Page

100

28 PIQUED Some of our favorite summer stuff

32 MEET THE LOCALS Q&A Mac Staryk, Leslie Mattson, Bob Hammond 40 ON THE JOB Home in the High Country Big-game hunting guides BY MIKE KOSHMRL

46 BUSINESS Energy Efficiency Made Easy Jackson’s Energy Conservation Works helps local homeowners and businesses see where they’re wasting energy and offers loans to help fix the problems. BY KYLIE MOHR

Page

110

52 DESIGN Living Museum Preservation work on two cabins at the historic Bar BC dude ranch in Grand Teton National Park will be finished this summer. BY DINA MISHEV

96 LOOKING BACK Buried in Jackson A history of some of the valley’s cemeteries BY EMILY MIEURE

100 OUTDOORS Bird’s Eye View Jackson Hole is a paragliding destination. BY LESLIE HITTMEIER JEFF DIENER

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

BY GERALDINE STAL

110 Wild & Mild Take a scenic float on the Snake River. BY CODY COTTIER

116 Take a Ride No experience is necessary to try horseback riding. BY LILA EDYTHE

120 BODY & SOUL Summer Essentials Gear to get you stylishly and safely through the summer BY MAGGIE THEODORA

122 NIGHTLIFE Party with the Stars Hollywood celebrities aren’t Jackson Hole’s best stars. BY DINA MISHEV

126 DINING Eat Local Whether you’re looking for fresh, local produce to cook at home or a quick and easy bite, check out our farmers markets. BY JULIE FUSTANIO KLING

136 ART SCENE Art for All Jackson Hole has a growing public art scene that is accessible to everyone. BY JULIE KUKRAL

144 AS THE HOLE DEEPENS Jackson Hole Coffee Etiquette BY TIM SANDLIN

146 JACKSON HOLE MAPPED 148 CALENDAR OF EVENTS

JEFF DIENER

JH Living

Stand-up paddleboarding is as easy to learn as it is fun.

FOUNDRAE

ANNA PORCU

N I C H O L A S VA R N E Y

GABRIELLA KISS

MONIQUE PÉAN

LUCIFER VIR HONESTUS

V I C T O R V E LYA N

O L E LY N G G A A R D

GURHAN

B I B I VA N D E R V E L D E N

ADAM FOSTER

S I LV I A F U R M A N O V I C H

S E VA N B I Ç A K Ç I

TODD REED

COPENHAGEN REINSTEIN/ROSS

Greetings from the Editor THIS WINTER IT was difficult to imagine that summer would ever get here. Ever. February 2019 was the second-snowiest month ever recorded in the Town of Jackson; 52.9 inches of snow fell in town. (The all-time record snowfall in a month is 56 inches, from January of 1969.) And 2019 wasn’t even a leap year! In March, there were a couple of mornings we awoke to several inches of snow in our driveways that hadn’t been forecast. And then when it all started melting. Ugh. I’ve been here for 20-plus years, and this spring’s puddles—although “puddles” doesn’t really begin to do them justice; there was a small lake on my street in East Jackson—and mud were on a level I don’t remember ever experiencing. For those looking toward summer, I think the melt was harder to get through than the incessant shoveling. But here we are. The three horseback riding outfitters in the valley included in “Take A Ride” p. 116 are taking out riders. And the Snake River welcomes scenic floaters (“Wild & Mild,” p. 110), and stand-up paddle boarders (“Paddle Power,” p. 107). Tandem paragliding flights are offered year-round (“Birds Eye View,” p. 100), but we think summer is the best time of year for them. While we could fill an entire issue of Jackson Hole magazine with stories about things to do and see in the valley, we always

make sure to report articles about interesting and timely issues in the region. This issue, journalist Mike Koshmrl tackles the topic of grizzly bears (“Living with Grizzles,” p. 74). After dipping to a low of about 130, the grizzly population of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem is now around 700. While this recovery is a success story, Koshmrl looks at why the hardest part of the species’ recovery might be right now, as we learn how to live with more and more of them in places the bears haven’t been for hundreds of years. Unlike with grizzly bears, there’s little about the preservation and stabilization of the Bar BC Ranch in Grand Teton National Park that is controversial. It is important though. Read about its history and national significance and how it was preserved in “Living Museum,” p. 52. And then on page 34, meet Leslie Mattson, the president of the Grand Teton National Park Foundation, which helped Grand Teton National Park finance the restoration. Have you ever considered breakfast or dinner at either of the valley’s farmers markets? If not, read journalist Julie Fustanio Kling’s dining story on page 126 to see why you should. On page 22, Emily Mieure shares what she learned while researching the breweries and brewpubs in Jackson Hole and Teton Valley. And that’s not even half of the stories in this issue, which, as always, I hope you enjoy reading as much as I’ve enjoyed putting together. – Dina Mishev @JACKSONHOLEMAG

@DINAMISHEV

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JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

magazine

Jackson Hole

Summer 2019 // jacksonholemagazine.com

What’s your favorite restaurant for outdoor dining?

it’s about connections

PUBLISHER

Kevin Olson

THE ORIGINAL LUXURY EXPERIENCE

ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER

Adam Meyer

I love Streetfood at the Stagecoach for its lawn, the laid-back outdoor vibe and the food—Ramen on Sunday nights and wings!

EDITOR

Dina Mishev ART DIRECTOR

Elise Mahaffie

The food at The Deck at the top of the Bridger Gondola is as good as the views of the valley and Gros Ventre mountains.

PHOTO EDITOR

Streetfood at the Stagecoach in Wilson has some of the best food in town, and you can play cornhole while you wait on your tacos.

You can’t beat the view at the deck at Dornan’s, and it’s perfect for grabbing a beer or COPY EDITOR Nina Resor something to eat after a great day of hiking CONTRIBUTING WRITERS in the park. Molly Absolon Cody Cottier Ryan Dorgan

Lila Edythe Leslie Hittmeier Mark Huffman Julie Fustanio Kling Mike Koshmrl Julie Kukral Calico—the kids can Emily Mieure Kylie Mohr run around and be out of my face Whitney Royster Tim Sandlin while I eat bread. Geraldine Stal Maggie Theodora CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS

The Bird has a great view and nice Amber Baesler Bradly J. Boner atmosphere and it’s dog friendly! Price Chambers Jeff Diener Calico—best lawn!

Dornan’s—that view can’t be beat!

Ryan Dorgan Neal Henderson Henry H. Holdsworth Thomas D. Mangelsen Linda Swope Greg von Doersten Jeff Vanuga ADVERTISING SALES

Alyson Klaczkiewicz ADVERTISING ACCOUNT COORDINATOR

Maggie Gabruk

The lawn of Healthy Being Juicery & Cafe with a Persephone pastry and a smoothie for lunch! I can bask in the sun and roll around on the grass with dogs and kids. There’s nothing better than stopping by Creekside Deli and building a fully loaded sammy before heading out on an excursion.

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© 2019 Jackson Hole magazine. All rights reserved. No part of this production may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher. No responsibility will be assumed for unsolicited editorial contributions. Manuscripts or other material to be returned must be accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope adequate to return the material. Jackson Hole magazine is published semiannually. Send subscription requests to: Jackson Hole magazine, P.O. Box 7445, Jackson, Wyoming 83002. (307) 732-5900. Email: dina@jhmagazine.com. Visit jacksonholemagazine.com. SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Contributors THE BEST STORIES ARE SHARED OVER

A BEER

Whitney Royster (“Local Q&A,” p. 36) moved to the valley in 1993 before people talked on cellphones on the trails. She waited tables and shoveled snow off roofs before leaving the area to earn a graduate degree in journalism from the University of California at Berkeley in 1999. Her interest in natural resource writing led her back to the valley as the environmental reporter for the Jackson Hole News and then the Casper Star-Tribune.

Lawrenceville, Illinois, native Emily Mieure (“Buried in Jackson,” p. 96 and “Cheers,” p. 22) spent most of her twenties working as a TV reporter covering breaking news and crime before moving to Jackson to work the criminal justice beat for the local newspaper, the Jackson Hole News&Guide. Mieure covers search and rescues, valley crime, natural disasters, and immigration issues, among other things.

JACKSON’S BREWPUB SINCE 1994 W W W. S N A K E R I V E R B R E W I N G .C O M

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Bradly J. Boner has directed the Jackson Hole News&Guide’s visuals department since 2004 and has worked as a photojournalist for more than twenty years. His images appear throughout this issue. He is the author of Yellowstone National Park: Through the Lens of Time, a book of rephotography of William Henry Jackson’s photographs from the 1871 Hayden Survey.

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Living

TETONSCAPES

The Magic of Mushrooms Why and how you should hunt for wild mushrooms BY JULIE FUSTANIO KLING

PRICE CHAMBERS

IN JACKSON HOLE, mushroom foraging is a serious hobby. A fly fisherman is more likely to share his honey hole with you than a mushroom forager is to share hers. Morels, chanterelles, and porcini grow around northwestern Wyoming and adjacent lands in Idaho. We’re not going to reveal any secret spots, but generally morel hunters look for silty, sandy soil near south-facing cottonwoods. Areas that burned in a forest fire the prior year can be especially mushroom-rich. “The idea is if there is a bad burn, the spores send a message that this is the last chance to grow before the soil gets depleted,” explains Amy Bryan, who started foraging in 2004 and now goes out every spring—morel season is hard to peg but usually lasts a couple of weeks in the late spring—with her husband, Bomber Bryan, and their three daughters. “The exhilaration is akin to an Easter egg hunt,” Amy says. “You’ve got to get your mushroom eyes on.” Bomber says, “Then you go hogwild. We can never get enough, and we love sharing them with friends.” Of course the Bryans won’t give up the specifics of their stashes, but they will share that they hunt early season along the river banks of the South Fork of the Snake River in Idaho. The family then gradually works its way back east to Jackson Hole and then north to Grand Teton National Park (GTNP). (But they never forage in GTNP; it’s illegal to harvest mushrooms there.) The Bridger-Teton National Forest (BTNF), which manages much of the wild land in and around Jackson Hole, allows people to take up to 1 gallon of mushrooms a day. In Jackson, chanterelles and porcini are rarer than morels, and their season is different. Annie Fenn, of Jacksonholefoodie.com, says to look for them at higher altitudes after August and September rains. Chanterelles often hide near huckleberry bushes, a favorite food source of bears, so bring your bear spray.

PROPER MUSHROOM HUNTING ETIQUETTE INCLUDES: 1

Putting the mushrooms you find into mesh bags (so that their spores can fall out the bottom); 2 don’t ask others where to forage; 3 and leave the bottom of the stem of the mushrooms you harvest.

WHAT TO DO WITH YOUR MUSHROOMS?

RESTAURANT

MUSHROOMS ON THE MENU Glorietta Trattoria serves grilled wild mushrooms done in a cast-iron skillet with rosemary, shallots, and lemon. (gloriettajackson.com, 307/733-3888, 242 Glenwood St.) Bin22’s pulled Mozzerella with wild mushrooms sautéed with white onions and sprinkled with bacon is one of its most popular dishes. (200 W. Broadway, 307/739-9463, bin22jacksonhole.com) At the Snake River Grill, chef Jeff Drew serves New York strip steak with Parmesan risotto, roasted chanterelles, spinach, and pan jus. (84 E. Broadway, 307/733-0557, snakerivergrill.com) 20

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Whether you cook your mushrooms right away, can, dehydrate, or freeze them, the first thing to do is clean them. A toothbrush is a good instrument to get any grit out of the cap. To air dry: Lay mushrooms on a tarp outside in the sun for a day, but make sure to bring them inside before the dew falls. Putting them in the oven at a low temperature works well, too. Once dehydrated, store them in Mason jars. To freeze, fill a Ziploc with mushrooms and then pour broth, preferably a homemade vegetable or chicken stock, over them. Freeze this whole bag. Dried mushrooms are much smaller than fresh ones. The Bryans often harvest about 80 pounds, and by the time they’ve dried them, everything fits into five, 2-gallon Ziplocs. Don’t want to wait? Freshly picked mushrooms taste great in omelets, pizza, and with salmon and steak. Experts recommend seasoning them with thyme or sprinkling them with crispy pancetta. Some chefs dust mushrooms with flour before sautéing them.

FAKE OUT

THERE ARE FALSE chanterelles and morels, some of which can be poisonous. False morels are usually not hinged at the cap and are filled with fibrous tissue (real morels are hollow). Chanterelles are often confused with jack-o’-lanterns, which are more orange than yellow, grow in clusters and sometimes share stems, and have a knife-like gill underneath. (Chanterelles have a fork-like gill that runs down the stem.) Porcini poinsonous lookalikes are hard to distinguish from the real thing; if you’re just starting out foraging, have an expert verify your haul.

NOT ALL MUSHROOMS ARE CREATED EQUAL While all mushrooms are earthy, each has a distinct flavor. Morels are meaty with a honeycomb texture that absorbs whatever you cook them in. Chanterelles are woodsy with a hint of apricot. Porcini are nutty and rich with umami, a savory flavor found in glutamates. JH

CHA

Mother Nature

LIVE WHERE

IS A PERMANENT RESIDENT

NTERELLES

There is something magical about mixing fresh clean air, big skies, magnificent views, hiking, skiing and fly fishing at their best. Add in an abundance of wildlife with Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park as neighbors. I invite you to visit our spectacular little corner of the world and experience the connection… Get that mountain feeling every day.

MORELS

PORCINI

• Dedicated Realtor for 31 years and former Realtor of the Year • Jackson Hole resident for 43 years • Certified Residential Specialist and Graduate Realtors Institute • Officer Teton Board of Realtors and Chairman of Highschool Scholarship Committee • My philosophy is very simple………..It’s all about YOU!!

NANCY MARTINO Associate Broker, CRS,GRI

nancymartino@jhrea.com | 307.690.1022 80 W. Broadway | Jackson, WY SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Living

TETONSCAPES

BREWERIES

ORIGIN STORY Driggs, Idaho, locals Kelly Williams (of Tatanka Tavern) and Christian and Lisa Hanley (of Forage) opened Citizen 33 in May.

The oldest brewery in the region, Grand Teton Brewing was founded in 1988 as Otto Brothers’ Brewing Company. It changed its name in 1998.

Cheers BY EMILY MIEURE

IT WASN’T THAT long ago that local beer lovers could only find light lagers and hoppy IPAs being brewed in Jackson Hole. But in a short amount of time, new breweries have opened and with that has come more creativity. Some of the funkier beers don’t get canned or bottled so this summer is the time to belly up to the bar and try a fruited pale ale, a sour, a malty red ale, a chocolate stout, or a 9.3% Belgian Tripel. Cheers!

Jeremy Tofte founded Melvin in 2009 by brewing small batches of beer in the back of his restaurant, Thai Me Up. In 2015, Melvin opened its Mothership Taproom and dedicated brewing facility. Founded in 2012 by home brewer Colby Cox and restaurateur Gavin Fine, Roadhouse opened a brewery/ tap toom in West Jackson in 2017. Roadhouse Pub & Eatery opened last winter. Touted as “Jackson’s living room,” Snake River Brewing was the valley’s (and Wyoming’s) first brewery. It opened, in the same space it is today (a former Coca-Cola distributor), in 1994. Don and Chaney Hankins opened Stillwest late last summer after relocating to the valley. Don is the brewer and Chaney the chef.

Driggs, Idaho’s first brewery only opened last summer when Teton Thai started brewing beer in a 110-square-foot space behind the restaurant.

Ric Harmon started brewing beer in his garage and founded Wildlife Brewing in 2003.

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

CALLING CARD

SIGNATURE BREWS

LOCAL TIP

WHERE TO FIND IT

The newest brewpub in the area doesn’t just do beer, but also kombucha and cider. The food is made with local ingredients.

It’s a surprise—they weren’t yet The poutine is made with local open at press time. cheese curds.

364 N. Main St., Driggs, Idaho; not available outside the brewery.

The pub’s dog-friendly front yard often has a food truck on site serving tacos, paninis, fried artichokes, fried pickles, and more.

There are free brewery tours The smooth, complex and at 5 p.m. on weekdays and malty Teton Amber has been around since 1989. Sweetgrass 3:30 p.m. on weekends. American Pale Ale is dry and hoppy.

430 Old Jackson Hwy., Victor, Idaho; also available at The Liquor Store, West Side Wine and Spirits, Lucky’s Market, and Plaza Liquors.

Melvin won the brewery group of the year at the 2017 Great American Beer Festival and is the only local brewery to open outposts outside of the area, in San Diego, California, and Bellingham, Washington.

Ch Ch Cherry Bomb, which is both sour and sweet (and, with 8 percent alcohol, strong!), won gold at the 2018 World Beer Cup; Heyzeus, a fresh, flavorful take on a Mexicanstyle lager is refreshing.

Thai Me Up often serves experimental Melvin beers. In January, you could get a sweet stout that came with the option of a scoop of ice cream. Yes please!

Brewery/Mothership Taproom, 624 County Rd. 101, Alpine, Wyoming; Thai Me Up, 75 E. Pearl Ave.; most local liquor stores.

Sixty taps featuring thirty unique beers including Roadhouse’s own brews and beers from several other local breweries. An on-site five-barrel system is for session and experimental beers.

Wilson IPA is Roadhouse’s bestselling beer. Close seconds are Loose Boots Après IPA and the Mountain Jam Hazy IPA rotational series.

Roadhouse’s taproom is super low-key: It only has a few bar stools, you bring your own snacks, and the dogs of locals are often running around.

Taproom, 1225 Gregory Lane; Pub & Eatery, 20 E. Broadway; most local liquor stores.

The family-owned brewery’s ten brewers are not a group that rests on its laurels. They have won hundreds of national and international awards but are always working on new recipes.

Hops fans rejoice over Pakos, which carries a hoppy, full flavor. Jenny Lake Lager is slightly sweet and malty, with a smooth, caramel flavor.

Get your pint for outside: The front lawn here includes a firepit, cornhole, and plenty of benches and chairs. It’s kid friendly, and the firepit is lit all year-round.

265 S. Millward St.; select cans and bottles are sold at the brewery; most local liquor stores.

Location, location, location. The valley’s newest brewery serves great beer (and food) right at the base of Snow King Mountain.

The Irish Red Ale features a big malty flavor with a hoppy finish; Kolsch is light and smooth. The seasonal (winter) King Cake is brewed with habanero peppers.

Skip the ground-floor sports bar 45 E. Snow King Ave.; you can get crowlers to go of all the with big-screen TVs and head beers on draft. to the upstairs bar where a deck looks out on Snow King; order a $5 half-flight to try several beers

This is a legitimate craft brewery: They’ve only got the capacity to brew 31 gallons.

The British pale ale and Mexican lager are both smooth and complement the food at Teton Thai.

Grab one of the dozen barstools and enjoy your beer with a small plate like red curry with naan, wings, or fries.

18 N. Main St., Driggs, Idaho; not available outside the brewery and adjacent Teton Thai restaurant.

The pizza here is as good as the beer. The dough and sauce are Harmon’s own recipes.

The Mighty Bison Brown Ale is malty, with a hoppy finish.

Mug club members get discounts on certain nights.

145 S. Main St. Victor, Idaho; beers also available at Bin 22, Jackson Whole Grocer, Mangy Moose Market, Victor Valley Market, and Broulim’s.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Living

Living History

TETONSCAPES

Downtown Jackson is changing fast, but we still have some historic buildings. BY MARK HUFFMAN

4 1 American Legion Hall The local Legion was founded in 1920, and this building was constructed in 1928-29. In 2002, members—there are about 150—resisted a developer’s proposal to tear it down, build a modern replacement, and put them upstairs. The building was the site of 1933 Senate hearings on expansion of Grand Teton National Park.

The Clubhouse On the east side of the Town Square, this 1896 building is probably the oldest in the valley, and despite multiple remodels, original parts of the building are still recognizable inside. In the late 1890s and through the first half of the twentieth century, this was where just about every public gathering was held. Today it’s home to Hines Jewelers, Wilcox Gallery, and Jackson Hole Resort Store, among other tenants

5 Café Genevieve This 1910 cabin was the home of Genevieve Van Vleck, a member of Jackson’s famous all-women town council in the 1920s (which was the first all-women government in the country). The building and adjacent property have been discussed as the site of a hotel of up to 90,000 square feet.

6 St. John’s Chapel St. John’s Episcopal Church began in 1911, and this chapel was built in 1915. It’s in a log style that would make it seem at home on a dude ranch.

W Gill Ave

E Gill Ave

W Deloney Ave

E Deloney Ave

W Hansen Ave

5 E Broadway Ave

8 Old Teton County Library Officially the Huff Memorial Library, this log cabin was built by the Works Projects Administration between 1938 and 1940. It remained the main branch of the Teton County Library until 1997. It now houses county offices.

E Pearl Ave S Willow St

Teater Studio Archie Teater was a popular artist known for his quirky primitive Impressionistic style and almost always depicted the Tetons and life in Jackson. Teater had this cabin built in the 1930s and used it as his studio and gallery—moving it to different locations around the valley—until his death in 1978. It’s been at its present location and home to JC Jewelers since 1992.

Bruun Blvd

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Cache St

S Glenwood St

“WE DON’T HAVE the historic architecture you see in places like Aspen, Durango, [or] Telluride, [Colorado,]” says Katherine Wonson, the president of the Teton County Historic Preservation Board. Many old buildings here have already been torn down, and there’s little preservationists can do. Robert Gill, owner of the Teton Theatre (built in 1941) and Jackson Drug (1937), says that with economic pressure and government rules, “there’s no incentive to preserve old buildings” in Jackson. He has kept his historic buildings standing with a lot of love and money, and by finding new uses. (The theater is now a restaurant; Jackson Drug reopened last summer as a restaurant and soda fountain after many years as a home design store.) Here, “you have to look a little harder, because much has been nibbled away,” Wonson says. Downtown Jackson has the highest density of historic buildings in the valley. Here’s where to find some. JH

Center St

Jackson Hole Playhouse This building was constructed in 1916 on the former site of a stable. It was built as a garage and was the valley’s first car (Ford) dealership. It’s also been a mercantile, bowling alley, and post office. Since 1957 it has been a theater where live shows are performed all summer.

Glenwood St

Teton Theatre and Jackson Drug The drugstore was built in 1937, and the theater—now Hand Fire Pizza—was built in 1941. Both were constructed from stone quarried near Victor, Idaho. The last movie shown in the theater was in September 2012—End of Watch.

E Simpson Ave

W Hansen Ave

Old Courthouse Building Built in 1933, this was the headquarters of Teton County government until 1968. In the back, on the alley, the original 900-square-foot county jail—built in 1927—still stands, barred windows, and all.

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Living

TETONSCAPES

Hearts of Glass

A new feature-length film shows why Jackson’s Vertical Harvest might be the country’s most interesting and innovative greenhouse. BY JULIE KUKRAL

COURTESY PHOTO

Director/producer Jennifer Tennican, center, with, from left, co-director of photography Melinda Binks, Vertical Harvest employee Amy Linn, co-cirector of photography Blake Ciulla, and Vertical Harvest employee Azeal Karate.

A GREENHOUSE MAY not sound like the most compelling subject for a documentary film, but Vertical Harvest is not your usual greenhouse. It is attached to the side of a city-owned parking garage and sits on just one-tenth of an acre of land, at an elevation of 6,237 feet. And then there’s the whole reason Nona Yehia and Penny McBride founded it: to provide meaningful employment for Jackson Hole men and women with intellectual and physical disabilities. Over half of Vertical Harvest’s 35-person full-time staff have a disability. Jackson-based documentary filmmaker Jennifer Tennican tells the story of Vertical Harvest’s first 15 months of operation (the first seeds were planted in the spring of 2016) in her newest film, Hearts of Glass. Produced with help from Slow Food in the Tetons, the film was finished in 2018 and premiered at California’s Wild & Scenic Film Festival in January 2019. In the movie, which shares the personal and professional lives of Vertical Harvest employees, “You see so many interconnected threads around social entrepreneurship, sustainable local food production, employment, and inclusion,” says Tennican, who has seen the film resonate with a diverse group of audiences at film festivals including the Colorado Environmental Film Festival, American Documentary Film Festival, ReelAbilities Film Festival: New York, Princeton Environmental Film Festival, Ashland Independent Film Festival, Julien Dubuque International Film Festival, and Black 26

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Hills Film Festival. “It’s not this two-dimensional caricature of people with disabilities that we typically see in films.” Johnny Fifles is a 29-year-old jack-of-all-trades employee who is passionate about politics, social justice, and My Little Pony. Fifles earned a B.A. in Fine Arts from the University of Wyoming and preVertical Harvest worked at a hotel helping with cleaning. At Vertical Harvest, he works in the market, does guided tours for the public (go to verticalharvestjackson.com to see the tour schedule and book a tour), and helps on the microgreen floor. The title that captures this wideranging position? “Rainbow Dash,” after one of Fifles’ favorite My Little Pony characters. Vertical Harvest wants its employees to be in jobs that showcase their strengths, so positions are often as unique as the people holding them. Mycha Miller started in the greenhouse’s retail space, but transitioned to packaging and processing, and ultimately to spending more time working on her independent art business, where she can be her own boss. Tennican says the fact that Vertical Harvest is shattering glass ceilings for people with disabilities helped her decide on the film’s name. “It’s this incredible metaphor,” she says. “It’s a barrier, but you can see through it and it’s transparent.” Hearts of Glass will be on the festival circuit through the end of the summer. Tennican then plans to release the film online. To find a screening near you, or to bring it to your town, visit HeartsOfGlassFilm.com. JH

Living

PIQUED

1 / THE MULTITOOL TO RULE THEM ALL The new Leatherman Signal goes to 19. Nineteen different tools, that is. Of course there’s a knife, and then there are also needlenose and regular pliers, wire cutters, a wire stripper, saw, hammer (!), and can and bottle openers. (To name just nine of the nineteen.) The Signal brings you all of these tools in a mere 7.5-ounce package that is 4.5 inches long. $119.95, available at JD High Country Outfitters, 50 E. Broadway, Jackson

2 1

2 / THE PERFECT DAY PACK Gregory is likely proudest of the men’s- and women’s-specific shoulder harnesses, hipbelts, and backpanels on its new Miwok (men’s) and Maya (women’s) day packs. And these do ensure the pack fits us nicely. But we love a little detail: the pack’s quickstow system for sunglasses. On the pack’s shoulder harness, this lets you quickly and securely store your shades where they won’t be scratched. Both the Miwok and Maya come in 10-, 16-, and 14-liter capacities. From $89.95, available at Teton Mountaineering, 170 N. Cache St., Jackson

3 / STAY DRY If you you’re going on an adventure in which you might get wet, it’s better to be safe than sorry, especially when being safe is as easy as SealLine’s new 18-liter SkyLake Dry Daypack makes it. This is the first drybag we’ve found that doesn’t suck to use as a daypack ... as long as you don’t load it up with too much weight (the shoulder straps are comfortable, but there isn’t a waist belt). External mesh pockets are expandable to hold water bottles and extra clothes. A roll-top closure makes the inside of the pack waterproof. Just need a regular drybag? These shoulder straps are easily removed. $99, available at Rendezvous River Sports, 945 W. Broadway, Jackson

4 / DRINK UP

Neither Jackson nor Jackson Hole Mountain Resort has yet to enact a single-use plastic bottle ban (Jackson just banned plastic bags earlier this year), but why not get ahead of the curve with the fits-in-your-pocket HydraPak Stash collapsible water bottle? It comes in 500-mililiter and 1-liter sizes and is made from ultralight and durable Thermoplastic Polyurethane, which is BPA- and PVC-free, leak-proof, packable, and light. It weighs about half of what a traditional hard-sided bottle does and, when empty, rolls up or collapses flat to be pocket-size. From $14, available at Skinny Skis, 65 W. Deloney St., Jackson

5 / SWEET DREAMS Thermarest unveiled its new Ramble Down Blanket as the ultimate #vanlife and backcountry camping accessory. And it’s certainly got the technical specs to succeed at this—it weighs less than 3 pounds and is stuffed with 650-fill Nikwax Hydrophobic down. Is it wrong that we love it just as much when we’re lazing at home on the couch as camping in the van? We haven’t yet brought the brand’s newly improved Air Head Lite Pillow into our bedroom, but in the backcountry, its 4-inch thickness and ability to fit into a pants pocket gives us nothing but sweet dreams. Blanket $259.95, pillow $29.95, available at Skinny Skis, 65 W. Deloney St., Jackson 28

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Living

6 / ULTIMATE EYE PROTECTION

PIQUED

It seems like everything Smith has been doing the last decade or so has been leading up to its new Caravan MAG sunglasses. These shades feature the interchangeable technology of ChromaPop lenses with a magnet-based fastening system that enables quick and easy lens swapping. Use the Bright Sun ChromaPop lens on sunny days and a secondary ChromaPop lowlight lens on cloudier days. From $249, available at Shades of Jackson Hole, 28 E. Broadway, Jackson

6 7

7 / STAY COOL, OR HOT

Stay hydrated while showing your love for Yellowstone National Park (or Grand Canyon, Olympic, Joshua Tree, or Great Smoky Mountains) with Hydro Flask’s National Park Foundation Collection bottles. The National Park Foundation, the official charity of the National Park Service, gets a royalty from the sale of every bottle. You get a 21- or 32-ounce double-wall bottle that looks as good as it insulates. The bottles keep beverages cold for twenty-four hours or hot for twelve. Or maybe you’ve got a can you want to keep cold? The company’s new 12-ounce Cooler Cup is pretty ingenious. As its name implies, it is both a cooler (for a can) and a travel-friendly, insulated cup. From $39.95 (bottle), $24.95 (cooler cup), available at Jackson Whole Grocer, 1155 US 89, Jackson, hydroflask.com

8 / EASY TO DRINK, EASIER TO CLEAN We thought hydration reservoirs might have reached peak innovation. Platypus shows us how wrong we were with its new Big Zip EVO. Available in sizes between 1.5 and 3 liters, the Big Zip EVO has a noticeably higher flow rate over other reservoirs and a slide-lock close and shut-off valve that are truly (finally!) leak-proof. Other features include a center baffle that makes cleaning (and drying) easier and embedded silver ion technology that protects clean water from mold and bacteria. From $36.95, available at Teton Mountaineering, 170 N. Cache St., Jackson

9 / THE ULTIMATE E-BIKE

We resisted. And now it’s time to admit we were being silly. Because who likes biking home carrying 45 pounds of groceries on their back? Or trying to stuff the same groceries in saddlebags meant to carry half that weight? And doing either sweating up a storm because biking with that much weight is hard. Meet Yuba’s new Supermarche cargo bike which offers an electric assist (in the form of a Bosch Performance Line CX motor) and 300 pounds of cargo carrying capacity. $5,559, available at The Hub, 1160 Alpine Ln. #1F, Jackson

10 / CARRY EVERYTHING, EASILY Eagle Creek’s new Migrate Duffel comes in sizes from 40- to 130-liters. Because 110- and 130-liter duffle bags are likely to be pretty heavy, these two sizes, the largest in the collection, come with treaded wheels. All Migrate Duffels have wide-mouth openings, convert to backpacks, fold flat when not in use, can be cleaned with a quick hose off, and have a water-repellent coating. The latter was developed by harvesting windshield plastics from landfills in Asia, so these duffels aren’t just good for you, but also the planet. From $79, available through JD High Country Outfitters, 50 E. Broadway Ave., Jackson

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

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Living

LOCALS

Mac Staryk

“MY DAD ENCOURAGED me to try cross-country; he said I’d get in super great shape,” says recent Jackson Hole Community School grad Mac Staryk about why he joined the Jackson Hole High School (JHHS) cross-country team his freshman year. This past year, Staryk, along with teammate and fellow recent grad Wyatt Sullivan, were among the state’s—and country’s—fastest distance runners. Last fall, they helped the JHHS boys’ cross-county team win the state championship. In March, despite JHHS not having an indoor track team, the two qualified for and then traveled to New York City to compete in the New Balance Nationals Indoor meet. “I’m glad I took my dad’s suggestion about cross-country,” says Staryk, who this summer hopes to do for the second time a classic Jackson Hole endurance test piece called The Picnic. It involves biking to Jenny Lake in Grand Teton National Park (GTNP) from the Town Square, swimming across Jenny Lake, running/climbing to the 13,770-foot summit of the Grand Teton and then doing everything in reverse. The first time Staryk did it he was 16. “I’m in even better shape now, and now that I’ve done it once, I want to see how fast I can do it.” (His first attempt took 19.5 hours.) 32

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

RYAN DORGAN

Q: Did you love running from your first cross-country practice?

MS: I didn’t fall in love with it at first, but midway through the season. When Wyatt and I started to place well in races I liked it more and more.

Q: Now are you more competitive with yourself or with others? MS: With myself I’d say.

Q: But it was winning against others that helped you first come to love running?

MS: That was at the beginning. Now I like seeing the kind of shape I can get in and how fast I can get. But winning is nice, especially in cross-country, because that’s

Your Guides to the Jackson Hole Lifestyle

SPACKMANS & ASSOCIATES

such a team sport. To win state, everyone has to be on board and working hard.

Q: About how many miles do you run a week? MS: About 45 miles in six days and then one day off.

Q: How do you spend your rest day?

MS: I’ll maybe go for a swim, but usually I like to sleep and lay around as much as I can.

Q: Do you get flak from your friends about running instead of skiing or snowboarding?

2.62 Acres

MS: Most of my friends are Nordic skiers, so they understand the whole runningin-the-winter thing.

Q: What’s the coldest temperature you’ve run in?

MS: About minus 10 degrees [Fahrenheit].

Q: Where do you run in the winter? The track is buried beneath feet of snow.

MS: Wherever we can find roads that aren’t snowy or icy. We do speed workouts one day a week in the Snow King tunnel, which is really crucial.

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Q: What about during cross-country season?

MS: We run mostly around the high school, but then do one long run up in [GTNP]— around Jenny Lake or String Lake.

Q: Are any of the cross-country races as scenic as running in the park?

MS: Not even close. Most are golf courses in the middle of nowhere. But that’s good—there’s no scenery to distract me.

Q: What do you think about when you run?

MS: If it’s a race I’m pretty focused and thinking about being relaxed, but aggressive. On training runs, I usually think about random things, not about running.

Q: What were you thinking about on your last training run? [Editor’s note: this interview was conducted in early March, during a week when temperatures were between 0 and 15 degrees.) MS: Summer in general—about hanging out on Jackson Lake and being warm. I’m really looking forward to being warm. INTERVIEW BY MAGGIE THEODORA

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SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Living

LOCALS

Leslie Mattson EVEN THOUGH SHE grew up skiing with her family, the idea of moving to the West never occurred to Leslie Mattson. “I grew up in New England thinking I wasn’t ever going to move anywhere else,” she says. But, when Mattson was 31 and on a ski vacation in Jackson with her boyfriend, he announced he was moving here. At that time, she was working in the development office at Tufts University, where she had earlier earned a Bachelor of Science degree. “I had a nice life back East,” she says. “And as an Eastern skier I had no idea what you were supposed to do in powder!” Mattson, now 60, eventually changed her mind about the move. “I decided I could try it for a year,” she says. That was 1990. She is still here today, and Jackson Hole is a better place for it. Mattson first waitressed at The Wort Hotel, but quickly found her way back to development. From 1992 to 2004, she was with the Jackson Hole Land Trust, where she oversaw the “Campaign for Our Valley,” which raised $26.5 million for private land protection. Since 2004, she has been the president of the Grand Teton National Park Foundation (GTNPF) and has raised more than $75 million in private donations that have improved visitor experiences in Grand Teton National Park (GTNP), including a $14 million remodel/revival of Jenny Lake that, after five years of construction, is finished this summer. 34

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

BRADLY J. BONER

Q: Did you ever think of leaving the valley? LM: Yes, but not after one year. It was when we were trying to buy our first place in the late 1990s. I know it’s so much worse now, but even back then, for us to get a mortgage and find a condo, it was difficult. I remember my parents visiting and my mom saw the real estate ads. She said, “For this kind of money you could live on the ocean.” My response was that I didn’t want to live on the ocean. I wanted to live in Jackson.

Q: So you never regretted the move? LM: Moving here was the one of the best things I ever did in my entire life.

Q: That’s high praise. Why? LM: I’m in an amazing place doing work that makes a difference with incredible people. I can meet with donors and not have a dress on. I can even meet donors skiing or hiking. I’m really lucky.

Q: Do you have a favorite part of the Jenny Lake revamp? LM: The new Chasm Bridge is awesome!

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Q: What project that you’ve worked on do you feel has had the biggest impact on the valley? LM: It’s hard to choose. At GTNPF, I think raising the money so that the National Park Service (NPS) could purchase 640 acres of state land called Antelope Flats that was at risk of auction and development was important. The development of eighteen 35-acre home sites in the middle of GTNP near Mormon Row would have been terrible.

Q: How much did 640 acres in the middle of GTNP cost the NPS? LM: $46 million. We raised $23 million,

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and these funds were matched by $23 million from the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund.

Q: How long did that take to raise? LM: It was a nontraditional campaign. We did it in nine months.

Q: That’s super fast. During that time did you have time to do anything but fundraise? LM: It was hectic, but—and this wasn’t planned, of course—it didn’t impact ski season at all. We kicked it off in the spring, and it ended in November. Right when it was ending, it started dumping. I thought that worked out nicely.

Q: How many days a year do you ski? LM: About fifty, which is pretty good for someone with a job. It’s the right amount for me. I couldn’t ski every day (not that I’ve ever had the opportunity). I love my job too much.

Q: What was more difficult—learning to ski powder or raising $23 million in nine months? LM: Ha! Definitely raising $23 million in

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SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Living

LOCALS

Bob Hammond BOB HAMMOND, 50, moved to Jackson Hole in 1991 after graduating from Tufts University. “I had been here on vacation once before,” he says. While he arrived in the valley with an engineering degree, his first job was in Park Place Market (which has since morphed into Creekside Market). “My brother-in-law wanted to buy some businesses out here and run them and eventually retire, but he didn’t want to retire yet,” Hammond says. “So I volunteered to run [the market].” Hammond worked the cash register, placed orders, and made sandwiches for one year. “I think that’s pretty normal for a lot of people who come to this valley—they start with a job that’s not really their career and work into their career,” he says. In 1996, he got closer to his career when he started as an engineer at Nelson Engineering. He later took a temporary position as an engineer with the Wyoming Department of Transportation (WYDOT). “They said they’d hire me for a week’s worth of work, and that lasted three years,” he says. Hammond has now been WYDOT’s resident engineer for seven years. For twenty-six years he’s worked on Snow King’s fireworks displays, first just on the Fourth of July and, more recently, on New Year’s Eve and at the start of the annual Pedigree Stage Stop Dog Sled Race. 36

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

PHOTO CREDIT AMBER BAESLER

Q: What does a resident engineer do?

BH: The new roundabout at the Gros Ventre Junction, the truck arrestors on Teton Pass, and the new, wider highway south of town are all under my watch.

Q: What about fielding angry phone calls from people upset by these projects? BH: I get them and do my best to explain why we did it.

Q: Are building and maintaining roads in Jackson more challenging than other places? BH: Definitely. It is more interesting and more challenging. We have a wonderful place to live that we want to try to maintain the character of, and we also have a very active and knowledgeable group of

people that live here, and we also have rapidly growing traffic counts. It’s difficult to balance all those.

Q: What’s more stressful—your work with WYDOT or being responsible for the town’s major fireworks shows? BH: The fireworks are relaxing for me.

Q: How did you come to help with the fireworks shows?

BH: As a kid in Rhode Island, I played with fireworks. It was illegal there, but we would light off bottle rockets and Roman candles. Before that, we lived in Michigan and my dad and neighbors would launch fireworks at each other over a pond. I could throw smoke bombs. When I got [to Jackson] the Jaycees were a group of good people who also did the fireworks, so it made perfect sense for me to join.

Elevate

YOUR EXPECTATIONS

Q: Have fireworks changed since you’ve been involved with them here?

BH: We used to hand-light our shows, then [we] went to an electric show. You still manually fire it, but you are at a distance using electricity to light the fuse. Now we’re back to a hand-fired show.

Q: So you’re back to where you started?

BH: I swear Snow King is a Bermuda Triangle of electronics, and [they] don’t work very well up there. Also insurance required that the shell size [of the fireworks used] had to be reduced.

Q: How big are the smaller shells?

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BH: Six inches, typically.

Q: And the big ones? BH: Up to 12 inches.

Q: Do you light each fuse and then run away?

BH: You don’t get to run away. You need to light the next one a couple seconds after the first one goes off.

Q: How’s your hearing?

BH: What? I wear earplugs.

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Q: What happened to your brother-inlaw’s plans to retire off Park Place Market?

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SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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Living

ON THE JOB

Home in the High Country

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Big-game hunting guides flock to the subalpine each September, and often don’t pack it up until the snow stacks up. BY MIKE KOSHMRL

INCESSANT CUPS OF Jetboiled coffee color Carlton Loewer’s memories of his first time leading clients to a bull elk. The scene played out for the veteran hunting guide more than a decade ago, but it’s crystallized in his mind like it was just the other day. Loewer, who is Louisiana-grown, had a few years under his belt working out of C4 Outfitters’ backcountry Granite Creek camp on the southern flank of the Gros Ventre Range, but he had been relegated to horsepacking and grunt work. Employed by his late father-in-law, Sam Coutts, Loewer

“MY FIRST SOLO GUIDING TRIP I FILLED BOTH OF THEM OUT IN A SPAN OF ABOUT 45 SECONDS,” LOEWER SAYS. “IT’S SOMETHING I WILL ALWAYS REMEMBER.”

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climbed from the bottom of the ranks, and by year five was staring down his first day of solo guiding, which came in the aftermath of an early-season snowstorm. The fresh sheet of white in the high country allowed him to spot with his binoculars a “whole big ole group of elk” bedded down on a mountainside bench over a mile away. The two, coffee-slurping North Carolinian clients Loewer was leading weren’t exactly Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett. One of the men was underprepared, underdressed, and chilled to the bone. He broke out his portable Jetboil stove to heat water for coffee every time they stopped, even as the elk—their whole point for being there—were in view. “I let them finish their cup,” Loewer says. Coffee down the hatch, the hunters

Hunting outfitter Carlton Loewer SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Trish Williams, of Jackson, shot her record bull elk near Bondurant with C4 Outfitters.

COURTESY PHOTO

45 seconds,” Loewer says. “It’s something I will always remember.” Loewer got hooked on guiding early in his outfitting tenure. “Once it gets in your blood, it kind of stays there,” he says. The 45-year-old’s path to residing in Hoback and guiding hunters in pursuit of buck mule deer and bull elk each fall is objectively atypical. Standing a sturdy 6’6”, Loewer is a former professional athlete—he was a starting Major League Baseball pitcher for the Philadelphia Phillies and San Diego Padres. He ended up in northwest Wyoming after meeting Coutts’ daughter, Cathy, while playing ball in Southern California. He and Cathy began dating in the early 2000s and moved to Wyoming while he was recovering from an injury, but still trying to mount a comeback in baseball. A lifeLoewer with his six-point bull elk killed while hunting Spring Gulch outside Jackson. long hunter—Loewer grew up chasing whitefollowed their rookie guide on horseback, tailed deer at his family farm in southern finally dismounting to gain a ridge on Louisiana—he quickly began helping foot for a sneak attack from above. Unseen Coutts as a “packjack” for C4. He slowly by the elk, they closed to within 150 yards, eased into managing the outfitting busibut discovered only a “raghorn”—hunt- ness, before taking it over entirely when ing lingo for a smaller-than-desirable bull Coutts died in 2015. whose rack has fewer than six points on Because the primetime season for each side. But the client who had been most professional hunting guides is only freezing for three days because he didn’t about two months long, Loewer filled the bring enough clothes didn’t care. He other ten months of his year first with killed it and, at the sound of his rifle, a odd jobs like carpentry. Now he is a whole group of nearby elk stood up, in- Realtor with Sotheby’s, which he got into cluding a 6-by-6-point bull of trophy pro- through Cathy, who is also a Realtor. “We portions. (Trees had obscured it.) The had a kid, and she had to refer a client to other client’s rifle barked, and, just like another agent in the office,” he says. “She that, Loewer’s first two clients had notched goes, ‘If you had your license you could their tags. “My first solo guiding trip I have taken that.’ ” Soon after, he filled out filled both of them out in a span of about the paperwork. 42

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

LOEWER’S C4 OUTFITTERS is one of a couple dozen outfitters that set up camp each fall in the highlands that surround Jackson Hole. The Wyoming State Board of Outfitters and Professional Guides lists seventeen accredited outfitters with a Jackson, Wilson, Kelly, Moran, or Moose address. Still other outfitters come from outside of the valley and set up shop here every fall. Statewide, the outfitter business is thriving, Wyoming Game and Fish Department commissioner Mike Schmid says. “I just saw some posts that said guides are already booking hunters in 2021 and 2022.” Some Wyoming regulations are specifically geared toward helping outfitters, including one that requires out-of-state hunters to hire a licensed outfitter for any hunt in designated wilderness. In a place like Teton County, where there are parts of four wilderness areas—Teton, Gros Ventre, Jedediah Smith, and Winegar Hole—this means that if you’re a nonresident and want to go backcountry hunting, you have to hire a guide. BY ALMOST ANY measure, hunting outfitters have a tough gig. Clients can be needy, picky about the size of animal they’ll settle for and—as with any other high-dollar client—can demand tip-top customer service. (A week of backcountry hunting is often $5,000, and can be much more.) “I try to think about it like, ‘This is this guy’s vacation,’ ” Loewer says. “He’s typically taking days off, he’s been saving up preference points or saving up to be able to afford the hunt for years and years. So I want to make it everything it can be for that person.” A day in pursuit of elk or mule deer in the backcountry typically starts around 3 a.m. for breakfast. Then there’s often a one-hour-plus, predawn horseback ride so clients can be positioned in honey-hole basins and drainages known to hold game as the sun rises. Aside from the early hours, there’s also the inherent danger of being around horses—Loewer has had a few clients injured in accidents over the years—and the hazards that come along with sharing a landscape with species like grizzly bears. It’s extremely physical work,

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too. Although mules and horses do the bulk of the heavy lifting by hauling guided hunters’ meat out of the backcountry, the task of gutting and quartering (removing the limbs) a 500-plus-pound elk can make anybody sweat, even when temperatures are below freezing. Then, of course, there is the knowledge base that’s a prerequisite to even attempting to guide. Guided hunters typically kill something. Loewer doesn’t keep a running calculation of his clients’ success rate, but says their odds of shooting an elk or deer are higher than do-it-yourself hunters. But the nature of Mother Nature is that not every client gets an animal. Sometimes it just doesn’t work out. When a hunter does harvest, it’s redeeming. “When you see that smile, and the pictures and the hunter gets to go home with the meat,” Loewer says, “that’s the beautiful part of the job.” Some of the elk C4 Outfitters clients have tagged are true memory makers—and even record holders. One of Loewer’s former guides, Terry Fieseler, once led Jackson resident Trish Williams to a bull elk whose rack’s beams and tines scored out at a 395 typical animal using the Boone and Crockett Club scoring system. That score easily surpasses the 360 points necessary for an entry into the club’s awards books, and the animal’s antlers were far larger than 44

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

WHEN A HUNTER DOES HARVEST, IT’S REDEEMING. “WHEN YOU SEE THAT SMILE, AND THE PICTURES AND THE HUNTER GETS TO GO HOME WITH THE MEAT, THAT’S THE BEAUTIFUL PART OF THE JOB.” — OUTFITTER CARLTON LOEWER those of an average-size mature bull elk. This burly elk had frequently shown up on remote game cameras set on private land in the Bondurant area that C4 Outfitters monitored. The cameras caught this elk several summers in a row, but then, each fall during rifle-hunting season, he always became a ghost. Williams—with the help of Fieseler—finally got lucky. “It was like the No. 2 bull ever killed by a woman in Wyoming,” Loewer says. “Anytime you get to take a trophy of that magnitude, it’s a pretty special experience.” Loewer also cherishes the experience when his clients harvest more typical animals, and even the times when luck isn’t on his and his clients’ sides. “The guys that have hunted before are usually understanding,” he says. “I’ve had great hunts where we don’t kill anything.” What makes it easier is that most of C4 Outfitters’ clients are known commodities. “I have the luxury of being a little bit picky and being able to choose the hunters I want to take,” he says. “A lot of my clientele are return clients just because I

like hanging out with them.” C4’s clients are predominantly out-of-staters who come from places like the Midwest, Texas, California, and Florida. “I’ve got one woman who’s been hunting with us ever since I moved here,” Loewer says. As C4’s client base has aged, it has adapted. At the turn of the century, some forty hunters cycled through the Granite Creek backcountry camp in a season that ran from early September through the end of October. “That’s when we had five guides and a cook,” Loewer says. “Now it’s probably down to fourteen, sixteen clients and right now it’s just me guiding.” The backcountry camp was sold to another outfitter, and now Loewer exclusively uses leased private land in the Bondurant area. One of Loewer’s standout memories from this past season had little to do with hunting. He was with an archery hunter and on a lunch break in Pinedale when the Roosevelt Fire near the Hoback Rim flared up, severing their route home. The duo did the slow-going, mountain drive over Union Pass—a first for Loewer—to Jackson Hole, but, even once back in the valley, they couldn’t get to C4 Outfitters’ lodges, where the client’s gear was: The highway between Jackson and Bondurant was closed because of the fire. “He ended up having to fly out in his camo,” Loewer says with a laugh. JH

COURTESY PHOTO

Loewer packing a bull moose out of the woods.

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Living

BUSINESS

Energy Conservation Works Executive Director Phil Cameron at Jackson’s South Park solar array.

PRICE CHAMBERS

Energy Efficiency Made Easy Jackson’s Energy Conservation Works helps local homeowners and businesses see where they’re wasting energy and offers loans to help fix the problems. BY KYLIE MOHR

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

KATIE DAHLGREN, 36 and Josh Mickelson, 37, peered into a thermal camera while juggling their toddler. “Wow! Oh!” they murmured as Scott Paulson, the owner of Resource Efficient Solutions, showed them exactly where their house leaked heat. Dahlgren and Mickelson hired Paulson to do an energy audit of their home. They wanted to be informed homeowners and hoped the

audit would reveal where and how they starts with me getting an understanding could make their home more energy ef- of why homeowners are doing it,” says ficient. Increased energy efficiency would Paulson, who does about one hundred both save them money on their heating audits annually. “The typical reasons are bills and help out the Earth. to improve comfort, improve energy efEnergy Conservation Works (ECW) is ficiency, and help with building durabila local partnership between the Town of ity issues.” After talking with the couple, Jackson, Teton County, and Lower Valley Paulson got to work. Over several hours Energy (LVE). It works he conducted a blowto implement and ader door test and asvocate for energy consessed the property’s servation and emisgrading, venting, in“GO BUY SOME TUBES OF CAULK, sions reduction in sulating, heating, and WEATHER STRIPPING, AND A CAN Jackson Hole and enoverall structural duOF SPRAY FOAM AND YOU’LL HAVE courages local homerability. SPENT FIFTY BUCKS AND HAVE A owners and businesses A couple of weeks to sign up for energy later, a detailed report NOTICEABLE IMPROVEMENT.” audits. The cost of an and analysis of what energy audit depends Paulson found ap— SCOTT PAULSON, OWNER OF on the specifics of the peared in Dahlgren RESOURCE EFFICIENT SOLUTIONS house, the size, the and Mickelson’s email complexity, and the inboxes. Also includheating systems ined in Paulson’s report volved. They start at $100, and ECW re- was a cost/benefit analysis of things the funds that to homeowners if they complete couple could do to make their home any of the recommendations. more energy efficient. Last fall, Paulson started his energy While Paulson’s report includes what audit of Mickelson and Dahlgren’s, who he calls “sexy” improvements like solar is a sustainability engineer and has panels, it also includes numerous less served on the Wyoming chapter of the costly options, and he almost always recU.S. Green Building Council, home near ommends people start with one of these: the base of Snow King by talking to them sealing. He says, “Go buy some tubes of about what their goals are. “Every audit caulk, weather stripping, and a can of

BRADLY J. BONER

Scott Paulson of Resrouce Efficient Solutions explains the workings of his thermal camera during an energy audit of Katie Dahlgren and Josh Mickelson’s home.

Paulson’s process during an energy audit involves sealing up a building and using a blower door to find air leaks.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Paulson’s thermal camera shows precisely where heat leaks from a home.

BRADLY J. BONER

spray foam and you’ll have spent fifty bucks and have a noticeable improvement.” Phil Cameron, ECW’s executive director, says, “Energy and emissions are currently our most pressing environmental issues. ECW’s mission addresses these on both the small scale and at the large scale—helping support home and business owners to address the small, uninteresting aspects of saving energy in their buildings, while also supporting the community in making broad, sweeping choices about how to do more with less energy and to acquire it from more sustainable sources.” IT WAS FORMER World Bank chairman Jim Wolfensohn who planted the seed that became ECW. At a 2009 fundraising dinner here, Wolfensohn used his keynote speech to challenge the Jackson Hole community to lead the world when it came to energy conservation and renewable energy. At that time,

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Energy Conservation Works has been working to expand its public outreach, with events like Green Drinks and a booth at the Jackson Hole People’s Market.

WHILE STARTING A CONVERSATION ABOUT ENERGY EFFICIENCY ISN’T ALWAYS EASY IN WYOMING, THE LARGEST COAL-PRODUCING STATE IN THE COUNTRY, “IT DOESN’T NEED TO BE DIVISIVE. [ECW’S] CORE PHILOSOPHY IS AROUND USING LESS. THE CHEAPEST, CLEANEST KILOWATT HOUR IS THE ONE YOU DON’T USE.”

Mark Barron was Teton County commayor of Jackson and missioner, LVE’s CEO, accepted the challenge an LVE board memon behalf of the town. ber, and five citizen Barron quickly formed members. a committee, orgaCameron, who nized a summit that has been ECW’s execfocused on sustainable utive director since energy, and laid out 2014, says that startthe 10 x 10 challenge, a ing a conversation friendly competition about energy efficienbetween the Town of cy isn’t always easy in — ECW EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Jackson and Teton Wyoming, the largest PHIL CAMERON County to see if each coal-producing state could reduce its energy in the country. But, “it consumption 10 percent by 2010. doesn’t need to be divisive,” he says. “Our It was during the energy summit core philosophy is around using less. The that the Town of Jackson, Teton County, cheapest, cleanest kilowatt hour is the and Lower Valley Energy, an energy co- one you don’t use.” operative that serves northwestern Wyoming and parts of Idaho, signed a TO HELP IMPLEMENT the changes memorandum of understanding that recommended in the energy audits ECW served as the foundation for Energy subsidizes, the group has a home effiConservation Works. While ECW was ciency loan program. It offers homefounded in 2009, it wasn’t until two owners loans of up to $20,000 to puryears later that an executive director chase energy efficient windows, solar was hired. Also in 2011, an official ECW panels, solar water heaters, ground board was created to manage the orga- source heat pumps, and more; improve nization. The ECW board includes a their home’s insulation; weatherize their member of Jackson’s Town Council, a home; or install an electric vehicle SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

The Horse Butte Wind Farm southeast of Idaho Falls, Idaho, provides green energy to Lower Valley Energy customers.

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Jackson Hole News&Guide, and the Jackson Hole Daily, also got an ECW loan. It was for $60,000 and covered about one-third of the cost of a new

IN TOTAL, ECW HAS LENT ABOUT $1.2 MILLION TO LOCAL HOMEOWNERS AND BUSINESSES FOR ENERGY EFFICIENCY PROJECTS.

press machine that prints the Daily in one press run. (The company’s former press machine took two press runs to print the same number of daily newspapers.) It is estimated that the new machine will reduce up to 38 percent of the energy consumption used to print the Daily. And thanks to an ECW loan, Dahlgren and Mickelson are starting to tackle some of the projects suggested in their energy audit. They have switched from forced air heat to baseboard heat. After the switch, “there’s been a definite difference in our energy usage,” Dahlgren says. She uses Lower Valley Energy’s app to track the difference. “It’s pretty fun to go back to last year at a similar temperature compared to this year and see how much we’re spending,” she says. “It’s

BRADLY J. BONER

charging station, among other things. These loans’ terms are favorable: They are paid back over five years on borrowers’ LVE power bill; loans of up to $7,500 have no interest, loans between $7,500 and $10,000 have a 1.5 percent interest rate, and loans between $10,000 and $20,000 have a 2.5 percent interest rate. There is also a zero percent interest loan program for local businesses that make energy efficient improvements. In total, ECW has lent about $1.2 million to local homeowners and businesses for energy efficiency projects. Roadhouse Brewing Co., which has a 100 percent renewable energy footprint, built a 100 panel solar array atop its brewery on Gregory Lane. It was able to do that at a cost of $75,000, thanks to a combination of Wyoming Business Council grant money and a loan from ECW. Without the ECW loan, Roadhouse co-founder Colby Cox says, “Most certainly we would have scaled it back. We’re running a business, and we have a duty to our employees and our shareholders and it’s got to make [financial] sense. Unless it was a purely passion project there’s no way you could make it work without ECW.” Teton Media Works, the owner and publisher of Jackson Hole magazine, the

Production manager Chuck Pate welcomes a new press unit to the Jackson Hole News&Guide last spring.

ZACH MONTES / ORIJIN MEDIA

awesome.” The couple has had a contractor price out some of the other suggestions. It may take time, Dahlgren says, but they’re working on it, and thanks to their energy audit, they know exactly how much any changes are worth to them. JH BOzEMAN

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ECW has been so successful that cities around the world have invited Cameron to travel to speak to them—and he’s accepted, visiting places from Cheyenne to China. “We also share what we’ve learned with groups visiting here, ranging from university students to regional and national professional and government associations, along with foreign State Department-hosted visitors,” Cameron says. “We are frequently contacted by other NGOs [nongovernmental organizations] and governments in the state and region for guidance and lessons learned on specific projects and/or organizational methods.”

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Living

DESIGN

Living Museum A historic dude ranch hidden in what is now Grand Teton National Park was a prototype of the genre; this summer, preservation work on two of its historic cabins will be finished. BY DINA MISHEV // PHOTOGRAPHY BY RYAN DORGAN

“WE BUILT FOR fifteen [people]—and have been enlarging ever since. This is what we have today: forty-five buildings, ranging from single room and double room sleeping-cabins through cabins designed for all kinds of use, to the central cabin with its two dining rooms, its kitchen, its two big sitting rooms, and its two smaller sitting rooms, a cabin ninety feet long one way and sixty feet the other way. We have a blacksmith shop, a garage, a saddle-shed, a granary, a camp storehouse, three ordinary storehouses, a root-cellar, an office, an icehouse, an outfit dining room, five bunkhouses, a store, a laundry, four houses in which live the partners and the upper ranch foreman, and a dance hall, or recreation hall, or whatever you choose to call it.”

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

The Bar BC was the second dude ranch in Jackson Hole, founded by Struthers Burt and Dr. Horace Carncross.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Burt and Carncross chose land along the Snake River for their ranch so that the winds would drive away mosquitoes. By 1917, they had expanded to 600 acres and 26 ranch buildings.

Joan Wierzba, of Alberta, Canada, volunteering for her sixth summer with HistoriCorps, which helped with the Bar BC’s preservation.

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Struthers Burt wrote this about the Bar BC dude ranch in his 1924 memoir, The Diary of a Dude Wrangler. Burt and Dr. Horace Carncross opened the Bar BC in 1912. It was the valley’s second dude ranch. During its peak years, as many as fifty dudes were guests at the Bar BC. They each paid about $300 a month. Many Bar BC guests returned year after year, and a number went on to establish their own operations elsewhere in the valley, including the White Grass Ranch, Sun Star Ranch, and the STS Ranch. (According to the Jackson Hole Historical Society & Musuem, twelve Jackson Hole dude ranches can trace their origins to a stay at the Bar BC.) Bar BC guests Cissy Patterson and Maud Noble established personal retreats in the valley. (Patterson’s former retreat actually operates as a guest ranch today; it is now called Flat Creek Ranch and is open to the public for multinight stays.) Sometime during World War II, the Bar BC stopped its dude operations, but continued to welcome guests who were looking for a rustic place to stay in Grand Teton National Park (GTNP). In 1987, when Margaretta Corse, the last surviving family member (the wife) of the last of Burt’s partners (Irving Corse) died, the Bar BC became part of Grand Teton National Park. Despite its addition to the National Register of Historic Places in 1990, between 1987 and last summer the ranch’s

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Fresh timber is cut and staged, ready to replace rotting logs in the Bar BC’s two main cabins.

buildings and structures were left to molder. But last summer, funded by money raised by Margaretta Corse’s grandson, Charlie Ross, who grew up spending summers at the Bar BC, and the Grand Teton National Park Foundation, the Western Center for Historic Preservation (WCHP), in partnership with Grand Teton National Park, began preservation work on two of the Bar BC’s most important cabins: the Corse Cabin and the Main Cabin. The former was Margaretta’s summer home almost until her death, and the latter was the 90-foot by 60foot cabin Burt described in his memoir. “I’m so excited SOMETIME DURING WORLD WAR II, THE BAR [about the Bar BC presBC STOPPED ITS DUDE OPERATIONS, BUT ervation] that I can’t CONTINUED TO WELCOME GUESTS WHO WERE even articulate it,” says LOOKING FOR A RUSTIC PLACE TO STAY IN Katherine Wonson, the WCHP’s director. “The GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK. Bar BC is the mother of all dude ranches in this valley. Families who came to it were so enamored with their experience they came back in subsequent years to create either a family ranch or their own dude ranch. As they were building these, it was the Bar BC that was the prototype in their mind of

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what a ranch was and looked like.” Aside from serving as an unofficial design guide for more than one dozen other ranches in the valley, the Bar BC is historically important for other reasons. Burt and his wife, Katharine Newlin Burt, were both prolific writers who popularized the idea of dude ranching in the West through their writing. “They were the greatest promoters of ranch tourism in their day,” Wonson says. “They really put dude ranching in Jackson Hole on the

THE GOALS OF THE STABILIZATION WORK DO NOT INCLUDE ALLOWING THE PUBLIC TO ENTER THE CORSE CABIN, BUT WHEN THE MAIN CABIN IS FINISHED, IT WILL BE POSSIBLE TO ENTER IT AND EXPLORE.

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map.” Wonson also says that it was Burt who turned the tide of where other dude ranchers stood on the idea of Grand Teton National Park. (The formation of Grand Teton National Park was very controversial, and most locals were initially against it.) Burt went from anti-park to pro-park himself. “If he hadn’t changed his stance and brought others along with him, I don’t know that we’d have a park today,” Wonson says. WORK TO STABILIZE the Main and Corse Cabins started last summer and is slated to be finished this summer. It is

MIDDLE: Some of the Bar BC’s foundation logs now crumble to the touch. RIGHT: Reinforcements inside the Bar BC’s Main Cabin.

important to note that the Bar BC cabins are being stabilized, which is also known as “preservation” work, rather than rehabilitated. “Preservation work arrests something in its current state of decay and tries to keep it in that form as long as possible,” Wonson says. “Rehabilitation is bringing buildings up to new. A historic building that is preserved won’t look as pretty as a rehabilitated one when it is done, but a preserved building is an authentic experience.” WHCP Bar BC project manager William Grenier says, “We had to use new material in places, but we try to use in-kind replacements wherever possible.” For example, to match the original logs used, Grenier sourced new logs from the same species (lodgepole) and the same size. (Last summer the WCHP crew replaced twenty-one logs during their twenty weeks working on the site.) The two cabins’ roofs were trickier. “Traditionally these cabins had rolled roofs,” Grenier says. “But the roofing product we installed is an adhesivebacked rolled roof, which is different than one you just nail. It is a new material that sticks better and has a longer

27TH ANNUAL

LEFT: Last summer more than 72.5 tons of trash and debris were removed from the Bar BC.

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HistoriCorps project supervisor Jon Williams replaces decking outside the Bar BC’s Corse Cabin.

lifecycle; however, it looks exactly like historic rolled roofing.” And then there was the roof color. “There was, I believe, three generations of roofs on the Corse Cabin,” Grenier says. “We had green rolled roofing, red rolled roofing, and cedar shingles.” After much deliberation, the WCHP decided to go with green roofing on everything. “At no point would everything have been all cedar or all red, but everything together was once all green,” Grenier says. (The Main Cabin did not have this problem: “It had deteriorated to the point where its roof was pretty much gone,” Grenier says. Its new roof is also green.) The goals of the stabilization work do not include allowing the public to enter the Corse Cabin, but when the Main Cabin is finished, it will be possible to enter it and explore. Also, the former dining room floor will be converted to an outdoor picnic area. “The Bar BC is my favorite place on the planet,” says Ross, who still lives in the valley. “I don’t want it to become overrun and Instagrammed to death, but I love the idea of these two cabins now being preserved for the people who randomly happen upon it.” Directions: The Bar BC is not signed from the Park Loop Rd. (which is part of what makes it special). Drive north from Jackson to Moose Junction. Turn left at the junction onto Teton Park Road and enter Grand Teton National Park. Drive about 4 miles—passing the Bradley/Taggart Lakes trailhead and the Cottonwood Creek Picnic Area. About one-quarter mile past the latter, turn right onto River Road and drive for 2 miles. Park in a small lot near where the road begins to turn north. Walk down the rocky bench to the remaining ranch structures. This drive is recommended for high-clearance vehicles. If the road is muddy, four-wheel drive is also recommended. nps.gov/grte/learn/historyculture/bcran.htm JH 58

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

The Bar BC’s Main Cabin was reinforced and boarded up before last winter’s snows fell.

The Diary of a Dude Wrangler ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN 1924, Struthers Burt’s memoir of his life as a conservationist and dude rancher running the Bar BC, The Diary of a Dude Wrangler, was republished in January by Sastrugi Classics. With a forward by Katherine Wonson, the director of the Western Center for Historic Preservation, the book is beautifully and humorously written and provides insight into life at the Bar BC and into dude ranching in general. For example: “If you want to sum up the dudebusiness in a sentence, it consists in giving people home-made bedsteads but forty-pound mattresses. … A dude-ranch is not a summer hotel, nor is it a summer boarding-house, much as it may seem like one or the other to the ignorant.” And “People hate to be directed, but they get excessively angry if they aren’t. … The dude-wrangler is a ranch-owner, a cow-man, a horseman, a guide, a wholesale chambermaid, a cook, and storekeeper rolled into one.” Between tales of life at the Bar BC, Burt offers evocatively written descriptions of the landscape and also wry observations of life and people in general: “No man should be judged by what he doesn’t know, he should be judged only by how quickly and sensibly he assumes new duties.” The Diary of a Dude Wrangler is available at Jackson Hole Book Trader.

To make a gift toward the preservation of historic structures in Grand Teton National Park, contact Cathy Wikoff (cathy@gtnpf.org) at the Grand Teton National Park Foundation.

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SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Special Interest Feature

MOOSE CREEK RANCH, VICTOR, IDAHO

Peak Properties THE FACTOR THAT makes the Jackson Hole real estate market so unusual is the relative scarcity of private land. Ninety-seven percent of Teton County, Wyoming, is publicly owned—either national park, national forest, or wildlife refuge. This computes to just 75,000 privately held acres in a county spanning 2.5 million acres. The guaranteed open spaces and unobstructed views these surrounding public lands afford make the remaining private land a real treasure. Add the abundance of recreational opportunities found in and around the valley, and the quality of life one can enjoy in Jackson Hole is simply unbeatable. Moreover, many of the properties featured here are secluded, scenic retreats located in the midst of prime wildlife habitat. Most existing and prospective property owners in Jackson Hole cherish this notion, and serve—or will serve—as stewards of nature. One cannot put a dollar value on waking to the Teton skyline, skiing home for lunch, or listening to a trout stream gurgling through the backyard. In Jackson Hole, “living with nature” is not a fleeting, vicarious experience a person has while watching TV. Here it’s a fact of life, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

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5,900,000 dollars

18-1572 MLS#

At the forefront of the Grand Tetons in all their glory, the Trapper’s Peak Ranch is comprised of 768 acres of the Packsaddle Bench, an exclusive group of private ranches near the Western boundary of the Yellowstone Plateau overlooking Teton Valley, Idaho. Trapper’s Peak is one of the most diverse ranches on the Bench, with open grasslands, areas of old growth pine trees, groves of aspen, and the ranch’s canyon which forms its Western boundary.

Teton Valley Realty William Fay - (208) 351-4446 tetonvalleyrealty.com bill@tetonvalleyrealty.com

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

19,495 square feet

bedrooms

baths

3,000,000 dollars

18-3332 MLS#

Once in a lifetime opportunity to own and operate a prestigious Idaho retreat. Offering unparalleled amenities, Moose Creek Ranch is a turn-key operation that promises significant ROI for the right buyer. Property includes multiple cabin types and stylings with full amenities, a gorgeous ranch house large enough for twelve guests, a lodge featuring two meeting spaces, and the highly sought-after historic barn used for a variety of events including weddings and corporate retreats.

Teton Valley Realty Sam Lea - (208) 351-7211 tetonvalleyrealty.com info@tetonvalleyrealty.com

3 CREEK BUILDING SITE

.62 acres

—

bedrooms

360 degree views overlooking the Snake River Range and 3 Creek Ranch. Surrounded by larger estate sites. In a private community setting with 24 hour security, blue ribbon fly fishing and a Rees Jones golf course. 10 minutes from the town square.

—

baths

1,375,000 dollars

18-1878 MLS#

Berkshire Hathaway Doug Herrick (307) 413-8899 - dherrick@jhrealestate.com Jack Stout (307) 413-7118 - jack@bhhsjacksonhole.com

EXQUISITE MOUNTAIN MASTERPIECE

12,847 square feet

bedrooms

Experience mountain living at its best with breathtaking natural surroundings from this gorgeous hand-crafted log lodge. Features include a home theatre, wine cellar, game room, sauna, steam shower, exercise room, gourmet kitchen and butler’s pantry, lots of storage for your toys including a 3-car oversized garage. This is one of Jackson Hole’s best values for location, square footage and acreage. www.2200bannock.com

baths

9,900,000

Brokerage of the Tetons Jamie Turner - (307) 203-9055 www.homeinjacksonhole.com jamie@brokerageofthetetons.com

dollars

18-2734 MLS#

TETON VIEW CABIN

4,934

square feet

bedrooms

5.5

Enjoy views of the Grand Tetons and Fish Creek from this log cabin on nearly two acres in the rugged luxury of Crescent H Ranch. Owners will enjoy indoor and outdoor living areas, a mainfloor master suite, a wine cellar, a wet bar and a meticulously-landscaped yard. Other amenities at Crescent H include fly-fishing and trails for hiking, biking and riding. You’re just minutes from Wilson and skiing at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort.

19-363 MLS#

3.07 acres

—

bedrooms

—

baths

1,695,000 dollars

19-322 MLS#

Spackmans & Associates Jackson Hole Sotheby’s International Realty 307.739.8156 - spackmans@jhsir.com www.spackmansinjh.com

Located in a small subdivision of newer luxury homes on par with some of the most exquisite homes in Jackson Hole. This Grand View Estates property must be walked to fully appreciate the protected views and water features. Boasting 2 large ponds, stone bridgeways, and bespoke landscaping, this lot includes infrastructure investments upwards of $250,000. The building envelope is situated to maximize the view corridors, which span from the Grand Tetons, the Sleeping Indian, and JH Mountain Resort.

Jackson Hole Real Estate Associates Budge Realty Group - (307) 413-1364 Budgerealestate.com budgerealtygroup@jhrea.com

GRANDEUR AT BAR-B-BAR RANCHES

acres

—

bedrooms

—

baths

UPON REQUEST dollars

GRAND VIEW ESTATES

7,295,000 dollars

— MLS#

This blank canvas is primed with postcard views in all directions and private access to the Snake River. This property is located on the Bar-B-Bar Ranch, 8.5 miles north of town and a stone’s throw from Grand Teton National Park. A private 2.5-acre pond mirrors reflections of the mountains and wildlife drink from multiple streams on the property. Design and build your own piece of paradise with views of Sleeping Indian sunsets and Grand Teton grandeur.

Live Water Jackson Hole Latham Jenkins - (307) 690-1642 livewaterjacksonhole.com latham@livewaterproperties.com SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

POWDER HORN GOLF COMMUNITY, SHERIDAN, WY

3,800

square feet

bedrooms

baths

1,250,000 dollars

—

MLS#

4 Killeen Circle, located in scenic Sheridan, WY, at the foot of the Big Horn Mountain Range in Wyoming’s #1 Golf Community. A serene setting with Little Goose Creek and pond frontage on a 3/4 acre lot, this beautifully crafted home features a great room with floor to ceiling windows and mountain views, gourmet kitchen, spacious master suite with den, and access to creek from each bedroom. The Powder Horn Club is privately managed by Troon Prive’ with a 27-hole golf course, full-service clubhouse, pool, fitness & tennis center, fishing and hiking.

Powder Horn Realty, Inc. 161 Hwy 335 Sheridan, WY 82801 Karen Chase (307) 674-9545 Karen@thepowderhorn.com • PowderHornRealty.com

THE HOME ON LOT 48 AT SHOOTING STAR

7,966

square feet

bedrooms

8.5 baths

14,300,000 dollars

—

Nestled on Fish Creek, this extraordinary estate sits on 1.3 acres and offers mountain modern living at its finest. The home features 8 spacious bedrooms all with ensuite bathrooms and a media room. Large timbers frame the great room, gourmet kitchen and formal dining. The master bedroom suite provides fireside comfort, a spa-sized bathroom, and a huge boutique closet. Owners/ members will enjoy Shooting Star amenities including on-call shuttle service to and from the Mountain Resort.

TCCG Real Estate John L. Resor - (307) 739-1908 JResor@ShootingStarJH.com

MLS#

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

EUROPEAN STYLE MOUNTAIN CHALET

2,000

square feet

bedrooms

Completely remodeled, modern styling, on a very private 1 acre lot. Sold together with two additional 1 acre lots, making the perfect setting for a family legacy property, capable of having 6 individual structures, all within one mile of Wilson at the base of Teton Pass with incredible access to mountain biking, hiking, and skiing.

baths

3,200,000 dollars

—

MLS#

RARE Properties of Jackson Hole LLC Richard Armstrong - (301) 413-4359 rick@rarejh.com rarejh.com

TETON SKYLINE, YOUR JACKSON HOLE SANCTUARY

8,636

square feet

bedrooms

baths

6,950,000 dollars

—

MLS#

Some neighbors didn’t know this special property existed! Located end-of-the-road on nearly three acres without rooftops or roads in sight, this easily accessible property is centrally located between Jackson and Teton Village. Breath taking 270-degree views with the Grand Teton front and center. Master suite, junior master, three guest bedrooms in the main house plus a guest apartment, caterer’s kitchen, theater, office, four fireplaces, terraced yard, decks/balconies, hot tub, three garages. Sold furnished including artwork. TetonSkylineJH.com

The Clear Creek Group Phil Stevenson - (307) 690-3503 www.tccgre.com phils@tccgjh.com

EAST JACKSON HOMESITE

.86 acres

—

bedrooms

—

baths

Looking for an exceptional East Jackson building site? This is a perfect building location for your new home on a .86 acre lot, one of the largest lots in Snow King Estates. This unique setting offers privacy at the end of a cul-de-sac, mature trees and elevated Teton views, and is conveniently located minutes from the town square, schools and shops; a very special place for a special buyer.

—

Jackson Hole Real Estate Associates Nancy Martino - (307) 690-1022 nancymartino@jhrea.com

TOWNHOMES ON THE GREEN, RHODE ISLAND

square feet

2-4

bedrooms

3.5 baths

FROM 1.2M dollars

—

MLS#

bedrooms

11,750,000 dollars

— MLS#

MLS#

2-3,000

6329

square feet

baths

660,000 dollars

ELEVATED LUXURY ATOP SPRING CREEK RANCH

The Preserve Club & Residences is a four-seasons sporting club and luxury residential community. Set within 3,500 protected acres, The Preserve uniquely offers homeowners an incredible array of year-round activities and luxury amenities. Our Townhomes on the Green offer new luxury residences with 2,000 – 3,000 sf, 2 – 4 beds, up to 4.5 baths, elegant open floor plans, custom cabinetry, stone fireplaces, top-tier appliances, spa-like bathrooms, balconies and expansive front porches, garages and optional private in-home elevators. By appt.

The Preserve Club & Residences 87 Kingstown Road, Richmond, Rhode Island 401-539-4653 www.ThePreserveRI.com

Sweeping views, space and beauty define this luxury property located at the top of Spring Creek Ranch. Built in 2016, this 5 bedroom home was designed with meticulous attention to detail and the highest quality finishes. Dramatic views of the entire Teton Range greet you from the moment you step through the foyer and follow you through every room, bringing the captivating outdoor environment into this chic, contemporary residence.

Jackson Hole Sotheby’s International Realty Huff | Vaughn | Sassi - (307) 203-3000 www.mercedeshuff.com theteam@jhsir.com

SIGNATURE RESIDENCES - MAYFLY I, RHODE ISLAND

2,500

square feet

2-4

bedrooms

3.5 baths

FROM 1.6M dollars

—

MLS#

Introducing the Mayfly, a new custom home in the exclusive Preserve Club & Residences, New England’s finest 4-seasons sporting club and residential community set within 3,500 pristine acres providing homeowners an unparalleled array of world-class sporting and luxury amenities. The Mayfly features vaulted ceilings, stunning floor to ceiling stone fireplace, first floor master-suite, gourmet kitchen with oversized granite island, fireplace studio with generous windows, and wraparound deck providing freshwater views. By appointment.

The Preserve Club & Residences 87 Kingstown Road, Richmond, Rhode Island 401-539-4653 www.ThePreserveRI.com SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

PEDAL BRADLY J. BONER

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Biking has become in the Tetons

BIG

BY MOLLY ABSOLON

THE FIRST PAVED PATHWAY

in Jackson Hole was built in 1996. That 4-mile section of asphalt connected neighborhoods in West Jackson with High School Road and gave kids a safe way to ride their bikes to school. The only mountain bike trails you could find in those days were converted hiking routes that tended to head straight up and straight down, meaning that only a mighty few could actually ride their bikes over many sections. But those days are long gone. Today you can ride from downtown Jackson to Jenny Lake in Grand Teton National Park (GTNP) along what is arguably the most scenic bike path in the country. On the Idaho side of the Tetons, an 8-mile paved bike path connects the towns of Victor and Driggs, while further north, the old railroad grade for the Teton Valley Branch of the Union Pacific Railroad has been converted into a 30-mile gravel path that connects Tetonia and Ashton. It passes over three historic trestle bridges while winding through fields of barley rimmed by the western foothills of the Teton Range. And then there are mountain bike trails. In Jackson Hole there are trail networks in East Jackson, on Teton Pass, and south of Wilson. In Teton Valley, Idaho, there are trails east of Victor, in the Big Hole Mountains, and in Horseshoe Canyon. Both Jackson Hole Mountain Resort and Grand Targhee Resort have miles of cross-country and downhill trails accessed via lifts. All these options can be overwhelming, and visitors to the area may want to consider taking a guided bike tour, something else you couldn’t find around here 20 years ago. Now several companies lead rides, from leisurely tours on the bike paths in GTNP to rugged mountain bike rides in the Bridger-Teton National Forest (BTNF). It used to be said that Jackson was a skier’s town with biking, but that’s changing quickly as more and more people take up cycling. Read on to discover how it’s changed and how to enjoy the changes.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

The Right Path

BRADLY J. BONER

Jackson Hole might have one of the best pathway systems in the country.

Jackson Hole Community Pathways Coordinator Brian Schilling and Friends of Pathways Program Director Jack Koehler remove the bollards separating bike lanes and vehicle traffic last fall on Snow King Avenue. Schilling said the project was meant as an inexpensive, impermanent trial run for protected bike lanes along the busy thouroughfare.

1999, 13-year-old Gabriella Axelrad was struck and killed by a van while riding her bike in GTNP. The driver was changing a CD and never saw the young girl despite the fact that she had an orange flag on her bike and was riding in a group. Two years later, Jackson resident Jeff Poole was killed by a car while riding his bicycle along US Highway 89 just south of GTNP’s Moose entrance. “Gabriella was doing everything right, and still she died. Jeff was on a section of road that was supposed to be for shared use, and he was killed,” Schilling says. “Gabriella and Jeff died because of inadequate infrastructure and driver inattention.” Many in the Jackson area saw Poole and Alexrad’s deaths as a wake-up call and began demanding more separated paths for cyclists. But there was some pushback. “There was this thing called ‘pathway fatigue,’ ” says program director for Friends of Pathways (FOP) Jack Koehler.

JACKSON’S FIRST PAVED pathway, the Garaman Path—a 4-mile separated trail connecting the Jackson Hole High School to neighborhoods in West Jackson—was built in 1996. Since then the Town of Jackson and Teton County have constructed 53 more miles and Grand Teton National Park has added 16 miles. But these pathways— “I love riding in Jackson. It’s hard to be down on which are extremely popular a place with this much access. It’s natural to want more (user counts taken along the trails, especially close to home, but we are lucky to have Garaman Path in 2018 showed what we already have.” 173,000 trips that year)— — PAUL SMITH, TETON FREEDOM RIDERS BOARD MEMBER weren’t always seen as a good way to spend money. (Biking is just one of the many uses the pathways see. The “People questioned why we were building all 2018 Garaman Path count found 112,000 bikers these pathways, saying they are just for an elite and 61,000 people on foot, whether running, group.” Schilling says there are people in the comwalking, or rollerblading.) munity who oppose pathways on principle. These Pathways are funded by Specific Purpose people believe it is not the role of government to Excise Taxes (SPET), town and county capital build separated bike and walking paths. But the funds, federal money and grants, lodging tax in- fans outnumber pathway opponents: Local votcome, and private donations. Since 1996, about ers continue to pass SPET taxes that fund new $35 million have been spent on pathways. The pathways and repairs to existing pathways. original pathway was the result of years of careAdditional proof for pathways’ popularity is ful planning led by then-pathways coordinator the fact that in 2018 Friends of Pathways refor the county Tim Young. According to today’s ceived more than 500 gifts through the annual pathways coordinator, Brian Schilling, Young’s community-wide fundraiser Old Bill’s Fun Run plan was strategic and insightful. “Tim picked for Charities. “That made us one of the top two something small enough to get it done,” Schilling organizations after [Teton County] Search and says, “Yet large enough to make a difference.” Rescue,” says Lauren Dickey, FOP’s communicaThe Garaman Path’s success was easily demon- tions director. Future plans for pathways around strable, and quickly won support for pathways, Jackson Hole include creating a paved pathway according to Schilling. over Teton Pass that will connect Old Pass Road to pathways in Idaho. In the long run the dream TWO BICYCLE-MOTOR vehicle crashes is to have a pathway that creates a loop through helped pathways gain additional momentum. In Yellowstone National Park from Jackson.

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Commuters

Dedicated

Neither snow, rain, heat, or cold stops the Smith siblings from riding their bikes to school. “I SET A goal in my brain that I was going to ride my bike to school every day,” says 11-year-old Ruby Smith. “Sometimes I think about wanting to take the bus, and then I remember I have this goal, and so I ride.” Ruby and her brother, Oliver, 12, ride from Rafter J to school and back home or to ski or bike practice Monday through Friday. They ride regardless of wind, rain, snow, or sleet. Their mother, Heather Smith, says there have been times when she looked out the window at sideways blowing snow and, knowing her kids were biking home in the storm, wondered if she was a bad mother for letting them ride in such conditions. “One time I actually got in the car and went to look for them,” she says. When Smith got to the kids, “Oliver looked at me and said, ‘What are you doing here?’ ”

Oliver Smith

TWO YEARS AGO, it was Oliver who first started commuting to school by bike. He’d been riding with the Jackson mountain biking team affiliated with the National Interscholastic Cycling Association

and so was already on his bike all the time. It just made sense for him to keep riding, even if it necessitated finding a trailer that allows him to pull his French horn behind him on those days when he needs to practice at home. Ruby quickly jumped on board, although because she attends a different school from her brother, they usually don’t ride together. Oliver figures their commute comes out to about 4.5 miles a day. Over the 170-day school year they ride roughly 765 miles a year. This doesn’t include the additional miles Oliver puts in on his bike riding recreationally or training with the mountain bike team. This past winter the kids did miss a couple of days. A ski injury kept Ruby off her bike for about one week. On the day after Jackson received 4 feet of snow in fortysix hours, massive snow drifts defeated Oliver. He pushed his bike home and got a ride to school. But once plows cleared the pathways, he was back on his bike. The kids don’t carry phones when they ride, but know how to ask for assistance if they need it—like the afternoon Oliver’s chain broke. “He’s pretty resourceful,” his mom says. “I don’t really worry.”

RYAN DORGAN

Sita Yeomans and Ruby Smith bike to school together two to three days a week.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

RUGILE KALADYTE

Erin Burnham speeds along single-track during the annual Cache Creek Mountain Bike Race.

Aof Mountain BriefBikingHistory in the Tetons Mountain bikes got here long before mountain biking trails did. “I MOVED TO Jackson in 1983, and there were a total of maybe three or four mountain bikes in town,” says Koehler, who still rides today and has been program director at FOP, a nonprofit bicycling advocacy group, since 2012. “We basically rode game trails.” About today’s riding, local mountain biker Paul Smith says, “The trails on Teton Pass are a huge part of why I live here.” How did mountain biking in the Tetons get from game trails to great? “Mountain biking started in Marin County, [California],” says Linda Merigliano, the recreation wilderness manager for the Bridger-Teton National Forest. “It came to Jackson in the ’80s. Ninety percent of the trails in the forest were closed to motorized use, but open to mountain biking. It was a free-for-all.” But the number of riders—and of forest users in general at that time—remained low so Merigliano says the impacts were negligible until the ’90s, when mountain bikes began to improve and more people began riding them. “We began to see bike tracks infringing into wilderness,” Merigliano says. “We started thinking, why not start developing trails outside wilderness so there would be no trespass?” In 2000, the BTNF signed an agreement with Friends of Pathways to begin community planning of bike trails. “We wanted to get people involved in stewardship—to be involved in taking care of their backyard,” Merigliano says. “We wanted to work with the community to decide what the trail system around Snow King would look like.” According to Merigliano, at that time trail design was a foreign concept and trail maintenance meant little more than clearing trees, but, with the growth of mountain biking, land managers recognized that in order to be sustainable, trails needed to be well-designed and well-planned. To guide its work, the BTNF adopted a motto: “Sustainable trails, respect for people, respect for land and wildlife.” EARLY TRAIL-BUILDING efforts focused around Cache Creek and Snow King in East Jackson. But despite this development, mountain bikers—impatient with the limited 68

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

number of options available—began constructing illegal, “pirate” trails in other parts of the Bridger-Teton and Caribou-Targhee National Forests, which include much of the public land in Jackson Hole and Teton Valley. “People were scratching in illegal trails to find new things to ride,” says Scott Fitzgerald, who, with wife Janine, founded the boutique bike shop Fitzgerald’s Bicycles in 2002. Because these trails were illegal, no one kept track of the number of miles built, but it was enough to create friction between riders and the national forests. In 2004, the U.S. Forest Service brought together various groups to come up with a plan for trails on the Pass. At that meeting, Merigliano says they came up with the concept of separated trails—some for bikes, others for hikers and horses—to prevent conflicts, and decided to allow downhill trails to be developed if a nonprofit group agreed to take on maintenance. “We took a big risk,” she says. “We faced a lot of criticism. People felt like we’d condoned illegal activity by accepting some of the illegal trails, but it’s a two-way street. We accepted two trails and closed others. Teton Freedom Riders (TFR) was created to maintain the downhill trails. We developed hiking and horse trails. The model of Teton Pass is not going to work everywhere, but it has worked for us.” A similar story unfolded a few years later in Teton Valley and the Caribou-Targhee National Forest. “Outlaw trail construction happened because mountain bike user groups felt like the forest service wasn’t providing enough use,” says Scott Bossell, the trail program manager for the Caribou-Targhee. “There are great opportunities in our ranger district due to the partnerships we have with Teton Valley Trails and Pathways (TVTAP), Mountain Bike the Tetons (MBT), and [Grand] Targhee,” Bossell says. “With the trails we’ve built up now, there is no longer a sense of urgency to get more miles built. Now we can relax and do the best job we can do. It’s better to make sure the trails are good than to build them fast. I’m excited to have the opportunity to create trails. In most places they are just trying to hang on to what they’ve got. We aren’t just trying to hang on thanks to the trail community we have here.”

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Cyclists cruise along the pathway connecting Moose Junction to Antelope Flats.

road; the rest of the ride is on the North Pathway. Start at the Gros Ventre Junction and pedal east on Gros Ventre Road toward Kelly. Continue on the road as it swoops north at Kelly. Before it rejoins Highway 26/89 one mile north of Moose, the road passes Mormon Row and the famous Moulton Barn. Return to the start on the North Pathway.

BRADLY J. BONER

Hit the Road

3 Fall Creek Road is a classic out-andback with a moderate amount of climbing. From downtown Jackson it’s 36 miles to the end and back. From Wilson it’s a 21-mile ride. The ride passes lush green hayfields, stands of cottonwoods, working ranches, exclusive subdivisions, grazing cattle, and riparian areas thick with willows. The farther you get from Wilson, the more rural things get, until finally, after a 2-mile climb up 700 feet, the road turns to dirt. At the top of the climb, catch your breath and then turn around and enjoy your prize: 2-miles of arcing turns back down to the flats.

TRAVIS J. GARNER

Our votes for the area’s most scenic road rides

The ride from Driggs to Grand Targhee Resort climbs Ski Hill Road and offers fantastic Teton views. 70

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

1 DON’T PLAN ON doing the North Pathway and Grand Teton National Park pathway quickly: You’ll be stopping every few minutes to take a photo. This ride starts at the Greater Yellowstone Visitor Center in downtown Jackson, goes along the edge of the National Elk Refuge and past the National Museum of Wildlife Art. It eventually enters GTNP and passes through the tiny community of Moose before ending at Jenny Lake. If you ride it all the way from downtown to Jenny Lake, it’s 20 miles (one-way). If you’re not up for a 40-mile round trip, the ride to Jenny Lake from the Craig Thomas Discovery and Visitor Center (in Moose) and back is about 16 miles. 2 The 16-mile Antelope Flats Loop includes 11 miles on a little-trafficked

4 The 26.8-mile rolling Cedron Loop through farmlands on the west side of Teton Pass offers impressive views of the Grand, Middle, and South Tetons along its entire length. Start in Victor and pedal north to Driggs on the bike path that parallels Highway 33. In Driggs, turn left (west) at the traffic light onto Bates Road. After several miles, the road arcs to the south and turns into S 5000 W. Continue along this road until it turns back to the east and becomes Cedron Road., which takes you back to Victor. 5 The climb to the base area of Grand Targhee from downtown Driggs (we recommend parking at Peaked Sports) on Ski Hill Road is 2,200 vertical feet and 12 miles. And it’s worth every ounce of effort. Just past the Wyoming state line and the small town of Alta, Teton Canyon opens up ahead, offering a jaw-dropping view of the Tetons’ high peaks … just as the climbing begins in earnest. (Still, unlike riding up Teton Pass, these grades rarely exceed 6 percent.) For the next 6-ish miles, you’ll wind your way up past open meadows, aspen glades, and spruce and fir forests, and then turn around for a fun, fast descent back to Driggs.

Electric Pedal ACCORDING TO THE market research firm NPD Group, electric bike (e-bike) sales worldwide jumped 95 percent between July 2016 and July 2017. They now constitute a $65 million industry, and are changing the way people get around. “Ninety percent of e-bikes are used for commuting,” says Chris Borgert, the head mechanic at Jackson’s Hub Bicycles. “E-bikes are about car replacement, and with our traffic scene in Jackson, they are the way to go.” E-bikes aren’t without controversy, though. Jackson resident John Clark wrote a Guest Shot in the Jackson Hole News&Guide in the spring of 2018 saying, “[E-bikes] are vehicles. They use a motor. They are motor vehicles. E-bikes are great but they belong in the slow-moving motor-vehicle lane.” Still, in 2018, the Teton County Board of County Commissioners and the Jackson Town

Council voted to allow e-bikes on town and county pathways. E-bikes can also be ridden on any trails that allow motorized use. They are not allowed on GTNP pathways, on nonmotorized mountain bike trails, and in areas designated as wilderness. Because e-bike classification is a gray area, especially as the bikes vary in terms of power and speed (but most max out at 28 mph), a county ordinance requires that e-bikes be inspected by Town of Jackson police before they can be ridden on pathways. It’s still too early to call the introduction of e-bikes onto pathways a resounding success, but, so far, it seems to be working. Still, Schilling told the News&Guide in May 2018, “This is not immutable. The electeds reserved the right to change their policy in the future if e-bikes prove incompatible with pathway usage.”

The Long Haul

Jay Petervary rules at riding routes that are hundreds, sometimes even more than 1,000, miles long.

that included everything from biking to running, boating, rappelling, and navigation. He turned out to be a natural long-distance biker: He won and set a new record—15 days, 4 hours, and 18 minutes. “The bicycle is my crutch,” Petervary said in an interview posted on the website of bike manufacturer Salsa, one of his long-time sponsors. “It’s where I Endurance racers Jay and Tracey Petervary ride their tandem develop my best ideas, mountain bike on Fall Creek Road. get away, have fun, spend time thinking, solve world prob- held in 2000. Since then more races have lems. It’s the one thing I do where I sprung up. But many of the classic races, don’t do ten other things at the same including the Tour Divide, have no entry time. It allows me to clear my head but fees or prizes; they aren’t really even also focus. … I learn a lot of life lessons sanctioned events, but rather “friendly from the bike.” rides.” (Although there’s nothing particularly friendly about the level of compeLONG-DISTANCE MOUNTAIN bike tition.) Even the sanctioned races don’t racing, aka “bikepacking” is a relatively offer much prize money to winners. A young sport. The Tour Divide route was very few top riders like Petervary are first mapped in 1997, and it wasn’t long sponsored by various companies. before bikers, carrying camping gear, re- “Sponsorships have made it possible for pair kits, and food, began informally rac- me to brand myself so I can make a living each other from Canada to Mexico. ing—can eat and breathe bikes every The first Iditarod Trail Invitational was minute,” he says. BRADLY J. BONER

AT 47, JAY Petervary is among the most decorated ultra-endurance bicyclists of all time. His list of championships and records is long. He’s won the 1,000-mile Iditarod Trail Invitational bike and endurance race, which follows the route of its more famous cousin, the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, multiple times and is its current record holder (16 days, 23 hours and 53 minutes). He’s won the 2,490-mile Tour Divide Race eight times and Italy’s 560-mile Divide Race twice. In 2018, Petervary won the inaugural Silk Road Mountain Bike Race, a 1,050-mile ride in the mountains of Kyrgyzstan that included icy, thigh-deep river crossings, grueling climbs and frightening descents, mechanical failures, sickness, and unrideable sections where competitors hiked and carried their bikes. Oh, and temperatures ranged from 14 degrees to 90 degrees. Petervary, who is married to fellow endurance racer Tracey, discovered his talent for pushing himself to extremes on his bike in 2007. Looking for something hard to do, he signed up for the Tour Divide, which follows the Continental Divide from Canada to Mexico. He didn’t really know what he was getting himself into, but had experience suffering and pushing himself: He’d been an adventure multisport racer for about a decade— competing in early Eco-Challenge events

E-bikes are (almost) everywhere.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

take it easy

Our four favorite mellow(ish) mountain biking trails.

RYAN DORGAN

Jackson Hole Babe Force members meet for a ride up Game Creek.

1 South of Wilson, Munger Mountain offers a figure-eight-shaped network of single-track trails that can be linked for a total of 8.4 miles. Also here? Some of the best Teton views in the valley, spectacular wildflowers (summer), and golden aspen groves (fall). A couple of stout climbs and some rocky sections along the Wally’s World trail give the network an intermediate rating, but most of the riding is fast, flowy, and fun. TO GET THERE: From Wilson, turn south onto Fall Creek Road and take it for approximately 12 miles. At the top of a steep hill right before Red Top Meadows, you’ll see a parking pullout on the right (with a map of the trail network). Park here. The trail starts on the opposite side of the road.

2 The Southern Valley Recreation Project trail network is the dream child of the late, local bike rider and advocate AJ Linnell. Here you’ll find several miles of beginner/intermediate trails that roll through lodgepole forests, aspen groves, and open meadows, and have banked turns, rideable, switchbacked climbs, and fast, flowy downhills. There aren’t any huge climbs, which makes the area popular with families. TO GET THERE: Head west over Teton Pass. Just past the Idaho state line, turn left into the Mike Harris Campground, which doubles as the trailhead. 3 Voted the No. 2 Best Bike Park in the Northwest Region on MTBparks.com for three years running, Grand Targhee Resort has more than 70 miles of cross-country and downhill mountain biking trails, a bike patrol to assist riders, a skills practice area where you can try your hand at technical riding, group clinics, and private lessons. Trails are at all levels, from gentle, banked cruisers to tight, twisty single-track. Downhillers can bring their bikes up 2,200 vertical feet on a chairlift. TO GET THERE: Drive west over Teton Pass on Wyoming Highway 22/Idaho Highway 33 to Driggs, Idaho. Turn right at Driggs’ only stoplight onto Ski Hill Road, which ends at Grand Targhee. It’s about a one-hour drive from downtown Jackson.

4 You can ride for one or four hours on the 46-mile network of single-track trails connecting Cache Creek, Game Creek, and Snow King Mountain. Ferrins, one of the first mountain bike the ultimate gift for your favorite angler—the gift of handmade. trails built in the valley, is in this area, explore our selection of handmade rod tubes, fly boxes, nets & cigar boxes, and while it climbs about 800 feet, it has crafted from carefully selected hardwoods, and inlaid with exotic wood, metal & shell. MonograMMing & The ultimate gift for your favorite angler—the gift of handmade. a mellow custoM orders grade and is in the shade. The order by december 1 for holiday delivery on most items. www.alswanson.com available Cache Creek Sidewalk Trail and Puttour gift selection of handmade rodangler—the tubes, fly boxes,gift netsof & cigar boxes, the Explore ultimate for your favorite handmade. Putt Trail are also beginner-friendly. crafted from carefully selected hardwoods, and inlaid with explore our selection of handmade rodmetal tubes, fly boxes, nets & cigar boxes, Because of its proximity to downtown exotic wood, & shell. Jackson, expect to run into many other H e l e n a ,and M o n tinlaid a n a crafted from carefully selected hardwoods, with exotic wood, metal & shell. users (and dogs) in this area. Consider www.alswanson.com riding with a bell to avoid surprising order by december 1 for holiday delivery on most items. www.alswanson.com others on the trails. TO GET THERE: From downtown Jackson, take Broadway to Redmond Street. Turn right on Redmond and after about three quarters of a mile, a left onto Cache Creek Drive. The trailhead is at the end of Cache H e l e n a , M o n t a n a Creek Drive, less than 2 miles from its intersection with Redmond. JH MonograMMing & custoM orders available

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THE RECOVERY OF THE GREATER YELLOWSTONE ECOSYSTEM’S GRIZZLY BEAR POPULATION IS A CONSERVATION SUCCESS STORY. THE NEXT STEP IS FIGURING OUT HOW HUMANS AND THIS APEX CARNIVORE CAN COEXIST.

“I hate myself for killing her, I really do,” says Noah Kolis, who shot a grizzly sow last May after it had charged to within 15 feet of him while on a hike near New Fork Lakes.

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

RYAN DORGAN

BY MIKE KOSHMRL

OAH KOLIS REACHED for his Smith & Wesson Model 460V revolver before setting off for a hike from his childhood home with three Midwestern college buddies visiting for his friend’s bachelor party. The 24-year-old Jackson Hole resident, who grew up in Cora, about a 75-mile drive from Jackson, and his friends were hiking in wild country that he knew contained grizzly bears—he’d even seen tracks that same morning. Normally Kolis carries bear spray, but this time, he eschewed that nonlethal deterrent. “I honestly don’t know what made me grab a gun as opposed to bear spray,” he says. “I remember thinking multiple times, ‘Just grab a can of bear

A grizzly sow and her cub JEFF VANUGA

spray.’ I didn’t, and just grabbed the revolver instead.” The group’s hike up to some chimney rocks north of New Fork Lakes was going swimmingly, until the home stretch when they headed off-trail up a steep pitch. It was Lily, Kolis’ dog, who alerted the group that something was up. The retriever mix started acting funny, as if she was checking out a large animal like a moose. And she was intrigued by an animal, but it wasn’t a moose. Kolis saw Lily was unnervingly close to a sow grizzly bear with two young cubs and began screaming to recall his dog. Lily didn’t respond, though, and the protective mother did what grizzly bears do

when they perceive their offspring are threatened: She charged. The bear flew downhill after Lily and toward the four strungout men. “I was exceedingly surprised how fast that bear could move,” Kolis says. The groomsman nearest Kolis sprinted away from the charging bruin, a mistake that could have further inflamed the big bear’s inkling to attack. Kolis knew better and stood his ground. With just a dozen feet of separation, he was face to face with a member of the Ursus arctos horribilis clan, and she wasn’t happy. Kolis’ last memory before making the decision to fire was glancing down at the at the sow’s finger-length claws curling off

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

JEFF VANUGA

A grizzly bear and her cub pass through a group of tourists at a bear jam in Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone and Grand Teton require people to stay at least 100 yards away from bears at all times.

her paws. He thought, “Those will kill you.” Kolis’ bullet struck the stationary bear in the cheek, and she fell, though he had to fire three more times to end her misery. Immediately, Kolis was cursing up a storm and livid—not at the bear, but himself. “With the pull of my finger, I just killed three bears,” he says.

The Endangered Species Act worked. The grizzly population slowly swelled to more than 700 animals, where it’s remained for about the last decade. Although wildlife managers do not attempt to tabulate grizzly numbers at the fringes of their range, and the grizzly range is expanding. Today, grizzly bears are found from the southern Wind River Range north all the way to the mountains rimming Bozeman, Montana. GRIZZLY BEARS AREN’T UNUSUAL IN WILDLANDS AROUND CODY, BUT While the species’ recovery in the area is a conservation success HAVING THEM WANDER INTO GALLAGHER’S CORN MAZE AND PUMPKIN story, its presence in new places can also be problematic. With PATCH, IN CLARK, NORTH OF CODY, IS. LAST FALL, GRIZZLIES VISITED more grizzlies in more places, THE MAZE AND PUMPKIN PATCH ON THREE SEPARATE OCCASIONS. there has been an increasing number of conflicts between them and humans (and our domestic ani“When I called my parents afterwards, and when the mals and infrastructure). “It’s a function of more game wardens were walking through the scene, I was bears on the landscape, and especially more bears in crying. Not due to shock, or the adrenaline, but due human-dominated areas,” says Wyoming Game and to the fact that I felt like a monster for killing her and, Fish Department large carnivore supervisor Dan in effect, her cubs, too.” Thompson. “Really in the last four to five years, we’ve really seen things ratchet up to this critical HISTORICALLY, TENS OF thousands of grizzlies mass level as far as what we’re seeing with conflicts fanned out across a native range that covered most of throughout Wyoming and the GYE.” the American West, from the western Great Plains to Last summer a grizzly family was seen further California. Clashes between the species, whose scien- east than any other time in decades, near Byron in tific name is Ursus arctos horribilis, and Lewis and Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin. Another boar bear in the Clark’s 1804-06 expedition foretold a deadly century area drowned in a fast-flowing, cement-sided canal. ahead for the bears. By the early twentieth century, Grizzly bears aren’t unusual in wildlands around trappers and settlers in the Lower 48 states had suc- Cody, but having them wander into Gallagher’s cessfully exterminated grizzlies from all but six iso- Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch, in Clark, north of lated and mountainous areas. The largest of these Cody, is. Last fall, grizzlies visited the maze and were in and around Glacier and Yellowstone National pumpkin patch on three separate occasions. “It’s Parks. By 1975, fewer than a couple hundred grizzlies ecologically and philosophically fascinating to see remained in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem bears expanding into these areas where they haven’t (GYE), mostly confined to Yellowstone itself. That been for hundreds of years,” Thompson says. “But year the species was afforded protections by the there’s also a much higher potential for very negaEndangered Species Act, which was new at the time. tive things to happen, including human injuries and 76

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LONGTIME GRIZZLY BEAR activist Louisa Willcox, of Livingston, Montana, says the states unfairly attribute grizzly bears gaining new ground on the landscape as the only explanation for why lethal conflicts are up. Grizzlies are generalist eaters—one study found that bears here consume 266 species of animals and plants—but the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem’s population is particularly carnivorous, federal scientists say. As choice backcountry food sources like whitebark pine seeds have declined, they’re shifting to a more meat-based diet. Some forms of meat are relatively innocuous, like winter-killed elk and, in the spring, elk calves and deer fawns. But two other sources of meat grizzlies are taking a liking to are not: livestock and gut piles and carcasses left by human hunters. “With openrange cattle and hunter conflicts, there are not clear solutions,” veteran bear conflict specialist Steve Primm says. An annual summertime clash between grizzlies and cattle occurs all around the ecosystem, but nowhere is it more chronic than in Upper Green River country, specifically on BridgerTeton National Forest grazing leases that start about 30 miles east of Jackson. Albert Sommers, a fourth-generation cattle rancher and Wyoming state representative who presides over the Upper Green River Cattle Association, recalled one midsummer morning last year when his riders were tasked with driving cattle from one fenced allotment into the next. “There were 1,700 cattle in a 40-acre area, and there were three grizzly bears in there,” he says. The bears’ presence made the cattle jumpy and difficult to move, but that’s not his foremost concern. Every year, grizzlies (and wolves) kill dozens of cattle. “We’re sick of it,” Sommers says. “It’s hard to watch your animals get eaten. Our confirmed loss numbers were pretty high

last year, in the eighty-something range between bears and wolves.” Last year, in response to these depredations, which cattleman are reimbursed for by the state of Wyoming, carnivore biologists caught nineteen grizzlies in traps in the Upper Green. Most of these bears were relocated to a wilder environment and released, but seven repeat offenders were killed. Hunters encountering and, at times, defensively shooting

RYAN DORGAN

deaths, that could put a quick damper on all the work that we’ve done.” Last September, a grizzly fatally mauled Jacksonbased hunting outfitter Mark Uptain in the Teton Wilderness. The bears that killed Uptain, as well as the Byron and pumpkin patch bears were caught and killed by authorities. In total, 69 of the hump-backed bruins are known to have died or been killed last year. This gives 2018 the distinction of being the deadliest year for grizzly bears in recent history, and perhaps since early Americans settled the West and made a concerted effort to eradicate the species. (Still, the states of Wyoming and Idaho deemed the grizzly population high enough that both planned to hold the first hunting season for the species in the Lower 48 states in 44 years. Days before the season opened, though, U.S. District Court Judge Dana Christensen ruled from Montana that federal wildlife officials had violated the Endangered Species Act. The states’ jurisdiction, and ability to hunt grizzles, was gone. Wildlife activists celebrated, but the ranching and outfitting communities—and the states—loathed what they perceived as judicial overreach. This grizzly nonhunt is a whole separate story. If you want to read more, search the online archives of our sister publication the Jackson Hole News&Guide at jhnewsandguide.com.)

The Greater Yellowstone Coalition gave people a chance to test their reaction time deploying bear spray at last year’s ElkFest with a decoy charging bear.

Bear spray best practices Not all informational pamphlets about the proper use of bear spray are created equal, says Chuck Bartlebaugh, a Missoula, Montana, resident who founded the Be Bear Aware campaign (bebearaware.org). “The agencies keep looking for a way to get hunters using more bear spray, and the way is simple: A clear, concise, and consistent message,” Bartlebaugh says. “We do not have that. We don’t even come close.” Bartlebaugh says bear spray users should rehearse accessing and using their canisters to the point where it’s muscle memory, because the likelihood is that they will have two seconds or less to respond. A grizzly bear charging at 30 miles an hour that first comes into view from 20 yards away will close the gap in 1.4 seconds. “You deploy your bear spray by pulling it out of the holster, and as it’s coming out of the holster you’re pulling [the safety] with the front of the curled-up lip,” Bartlebaugh says. “Deploy the bear spray downward toward the charging bear. You just spray, don’t aim for the bear. Continue spraying until that bear says I’ve had enough. Do not use a short burst to see if it works.”

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

MIKE KOSHMRL

grizzlies, is also becoming really big effect on how more commonplace. In an people perceive our future average year, around ten with grizzly bears,” grizzlies are defensively or Primm says. “If it seems mistakenly shot and killed like they’re really, really in the Greater Yellowstone dangerous and there’s Ecosystem, but this numnothing we can do about ber is increasing and there it, we’re going to be pretty Wyoming Game and Fish Department large carnivore biologists Mike are places where conflict Boyce, Brian Baker, and Dan Thompson keep their heads low as a discouraged and have a has become routine. The helicopter descends at a staging area near the Buffalo Fork River. really limited sense of Teton Wilderness and Minutes later, the trio of biologists was inserted onto the slopes of the possibility.” Absaroka Front (west of Teton Wilderness’ Terrace Mountain, tasked with checking foothold snares that were set to trap the pair of grizzly bears suspected of killing Cody) are perhaps the two hunting outfitter Mark Uptain. BUT THERE ARE bluemost conflict-ridden prints in the Greater nooks of the region. During the big-game hunting seasons, Yellowstone Ecosystem for making major headway on consightings of grizzlies should be expected in both areas, and flicts with the species. In the early days of the twentieth centhe bears here have learned to rely on hunters’ harvests as an tury, rangers in Yellowstone National Park recorded nearly important source of food. “These are places that have really fifty bear-caused human injuries in the park each year, and high densities of bears,” Primm says, “and they’ve had a few now they’re exceedingly rare. Most years grizzlies don’t inbear generations learning that [gut piles and carcasses] are jure any of the park’s four million-plus visitors. What really good ways to get a meal.” Frequently, grizzlies find changed? The park modified the behavior of the animals and feed on hunter-killed elk and deer that have been and of people: After decades of bears relying on open-air cached overnight. (Hunters would cache their kill because garbage dumps for food and of people thinking grizzlies they don’t have enough daylight to transport it out.) When walking up to their cars was cute, Yellowstone kept bears the hunters return to their cache the following day, they en- away from trash and fined visitors who fed them or left food counter a bear. Less often the encounters are reversed, and in their car (that the bears could break into and get). grizzlies aggressively approach a kill regardless of who’s alMore recently, some of Yellowstone’ gateway communiready on the scene. ties have turned the tide on what were once chronic conflict Such was the case with Uptain, a longtime Jackson Hole issues. In the late 1990s, Cooke City, Montana, had a reputaresident, hunting guide, and father of five who was helping tion as a grizzly “black hole.” Bears got into the municipal his Floridian client, Corey Chubon, clean up and pack out a dump and/or residential garbage and came to think of hubull elk atop the Teton Wilderness’ Terrace Mountain. As man trash as a food source. They lost their fear of humans. the men worked, an adult female with a cub came pounding Because of this habituation, grizzlies were often eventually euuphill at a full charge. thanized. But then Montana Investigators determined the state biologists visited the meat-seeking sow would have community with a couple decome into view with only cades of conflict and dead about 10 yards of separation, bear data. “Putting that map KNOWING HOW TO PROPERLY USE BEAR SPRAY which would have given up and talking about what IS JUST ONE PART OF SAFELY Uptain less than one second was going on brought peoto respond. There wasn’t ple who were ideologically SPENDING TIME IN GRIZZLY COUNTRY. enough time to unholster on opposite sides of the isand engage the canister of sue together,” Willcox rebear spray slung from his hip, members. “People had their let alone grab his 10-millimeter Glock handgun, which was arms crossed and their eyes were rolling. But that conversastashed a few yards away. Eventually, Uptain was able to repel tion pretty quickly went to a community commitment to the bruin with a blast of bear spray, but not before he sus- do something, in that case about garbage.” tained lethal injuries. His body was found the next day 50 Willcox wishes that wildlife managers today would dupliyards from the carcass. cate this effort by dissecting the data and having a solutions“This one I think hit home a lot closer to a lot of people,” based discussion about grizzly bear-hunter conflict. “Hunters Thompson says of the guide’s death. “It really brings home are coming from all over,” she says. “What kind of informathe reality of grizzly bears on the landscape. Mark knew what tion are hunters getting before they get here? How can we he was doing.” Primm worries the incident will erode toler- make sure that the guy who’s in his hotel room in Dubois or ance, and make hunters more fearful. “That one has [had] a wherever is actually seeing some material about the mindset 78

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

STEPHANY SEAY

HELP SAVE THE YELLOWSTONE BISON OUR NATIONAL MAMMAL

There are over 500,000 bison in North America. Nearly all of them are livestock or “beefalo” a hybrid of cattle and bison raised for food. From 11,000 to 13,000 remain in the public trust as wild. The wild herds in Yellowstone are unique: they are not landlocked, or living behind fences, or domesticated as livestock They are the direct descendants of the 30 million bison that roamed wild across North America. • Prior to the arrival of Europeans, bison inhabited and roamed vast stretches of land covering one-third of North America’s land mass. Hornaday 1889.

• No self-sustaining herds of wild plains bison exist on National Forest System lands. U.S. Forest Service Region 2 Warren 2011b.

• Bison currently occupy <1% of their historical range. Sanderson et al. 2008.

• Bison are near threatened with few populations functioning as wild. Aune, Jørgensen & Gates 2018.

•

• Traill (2010) and colleagues found that populations of endangered species are unlikely to persist in the face of global climate change and habitat loss unless they number around 5,000 mature individuals or more.

o-American contact with the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem, bison were “spectacularly abundant in lower river valleys and prairie habitats and were all but exterminated” by 1882. Schullery & Whittlesey 2006.

• Because of the severe curtailment and loss of range historically and currently (>99%), bison are “ecologically roles in the wild. Freese et al. 2007; Sanderson et al. 2008.

• Just 200 years ago, plains bison numbered 30–50 million in herds of up to 10000 animals (Redford & Fearn 2007). By the late 1800s, massive overhunting and land use change reduced the population to roughly 1,000 individuals, <1% of the historical population size. Giglio et al. 2016.

Please help BFC protect Yellowstone bison under the Endangered Species Act. More info BuffaloFieldCampaign.org SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

HENRY H. HOLDSWORTH

challenging and a big inof going into grizzly bear vestment. (The GYC spent country?” Hunting—essen$600,000 on the project and tially creeping silently partnering agencies and oraround the woods—and ganizations contributed annaturally protective, aggresother $1.3 million.) “The sive grizzly bears are an incampground project for us herently problematic mix, was a really good template, and some hunter-grizzly inbecause we’re also working teractions will likely always on trying to increase hunter result in bears getting shot. safety and reduce conflict “They’re surprise encoun- Grizzly 399’s third set of triplets plays with traffic cones near with livestock producers,” ters,” Primm told the Jackson Pilgrim Creek in Grand Teton National Park shortly after they Colligan says. “We’ve got Hole News&Guide in 2015. emerged from their den in 2013. pilot projects started around “The person is walking along with a rifle in their hands and here comes this those things, but the question is how do you take them Pleistocene carnivore barreling at them at 35 miles an hour. to scale?” Hunter education is key. Knowing how to properly use They’re probably going to take a shot to protect themselves, bear spray is just one part of safely spending time in grizzly whether they consciously wanted to or not.” The Greater Yellowstone Coalition (GYC), a nonprofit country (see the sidebar on page 77). Knowing to watch for founded in 1983 to protect the lands, waters, and wildlife of ravens and magpies, telltale signs of a carcass nearby, can help the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, has installed 1,194 avert close encounters. Bear-smart hunters also steer clear of bear-proof food storage boxes and also bear-proof dump- thick timber in places where grizzlies are likely to be bedded. sters and informational kiosks at every public campground Colligan has changed his hunting habits significantly over his in the ecosystem. Avid big game hunter and GYC employee 15 years in the valley because of grizzlies. Today he does not Chris Colligan spearheaded this effort, which was logistically hunt solo or hunt after work. (He does the latter to limit the

redefining conservation at its core

We promote a modern day wildlife management narrative to value and protect: Wildlife as vital contributors to the health of our public landscapes.

The significant impact of wildlife watching on tourism — Wyoming’s 2nd largest industry.

Make trapping reform a reality — WyomingUntrapped.org Red Fox Photo: Ashleigh Scully

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

The intrinsic character and worth of all furbearing animals.

chance that he shoots an animal late in the day and has to cache catch up. It just takes time.” Willcox’s take is that the sticky meat in the field overnight.) Last season, he began carrying two remnants of the settler mentality—when large carnivores canisters of bear spray. Just like with backcountry skiing, were the sworn enemy, and largely wiped out—are still Colligan says, people need to be aware of the risks that come handicapping efforts to coexist. “We don’t tell the stories of with hunting in grizzly country, and make intentional decisions coexistence with grizzly bears, because we got rid of them to minimize those risks. “It’s part of what makes the Greater except for these isolated, tiny postage stamps,” Willcox says. Yellowstone Ecosystem really special,” Colligan says, “to be a “Bears are asking us to transform ourselves, and they’re askpart of an ecosystem where you’re not the top of the food chain, ing us for a little humility, because they don’t have anywhere and you have to change your behavior.” else to go. This is about us transforming. The tools are fine, There are also blueprints for reducing conflict with live- but this is going to take a broader cultural commitment.” JH stock, though no obvious approaches that promise to slow the bovine and ursine bloodshed in the Upper Green. Stockmen in Montana’s Blackfoot and eTon ines ounTry lub Centennial Valleys have made great strides toward grizzly coexistence on large privately held ranches by using electric fences around pastures where cows are calving and getting rid of livestock bone yards. It’s hard to duplicate those efforts on the Bridger-Teton allotments where Sommers runs his cattle because of the enormity of that grazing complex, which encompasses hundreds of square miles and spans the entire national forest from north to south. Sommers partnered with the Greater Yellowstone Coalition and People and Carnivores, Primm’s former employer, on an experimental herding technique Lunch | 19th Hole | Dinner | Outdoor Seating | Public Welcome | 307.733.1005 designed to keep cattle bunched up and away from grizzlies. It didn’t work, though, and the project ended. For better or worse, Sommers says he’s become inured to the conflict. “We’re going to lose some cattle, and there’s going to be some bears lost,” he says. “I guess in the end we’re the experiment, right? I hope we can figure out a way to get a handle on it, but we just haven’t done so yet.” Coexistence is also instilled through culture. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service grizzly bear recovery coordinator Hilary Cooley’s prior job was working with polar bears in Alaska, where there are also grizzly bears (and where grizzlies were never almost wiped out like TM they were in the Yellowstone region). e re ACkson ole o A ee “Of course we’re never going to stop all Welcoming, sociable, family-friendly and Wyoming-relaxed; with grizzly bear mortalities, but I definitely superior activities and amenities, exceptional service, delicious cuisine, think that as people get used to living dramatic views, and a casually-elegant Western atmosphere. Join Us! with bears it will get easier,” Cooley says. “There’s lots of work being done eMbershiPs vAilAble to secure attractants and teach people. 3450 Clubhouse Dr. | tetonpines.com | membership@tetonpines.com A lot of that is ongoing, but as bears move into new places people have to

W A

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

// PHOTOGALLERY

LESSONS 82

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Rocky Mountain lodgepole pines are adapted to fire with both ordinary cones that open seasonally and serotinous cones, which need heat, often from fires but sometimes strong, direct sunlight works, to open. Individual pine trees will have predominantly one type of cone or the other, and such variation will exist in a single stand of trees. Once a fire or harsh sunlight has melted a serotinous cone’s waxy exterior, seeds disperse to germinate. Other trees with these heat-loving cones include the Jack and Table Mountain pine trees.

Thirty-one years after wildfires burned about one-third of Yellowstone National Park, the recovering landscape is a classroom for scientists, and for park visitors who know what to look for.

P H O T O G R A P H Y B Y B R A D LY J . B O N E R

IN THE WILD BY KYLIE MOHR

THE SUMMER OF 1988 in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem was very dry. By September of that year, forty-two lightning-caused fires had burned approximately 1.2 million acres of lodgepole pine forest—a swath the size of Rhode Island—impacting roughly 36 percent of Yellowstone National Park. But fire is a paradox—destructive and regenerative at the same time. Today, the scars on the landscape from the 1988 Yellowstone fires are still visible, but also visible is the fact that the landscape (and the wildlife that lives in it) is recovering. A team of scientists, including University of Wyoming zoology professor Scott Seville, University of Oklahoma biology professor Hayley Lanier, and Laramie County Community College biology professor Zac Roehrs, has been researching how plants, small mammals and insects recover. “We’ve got data from the same sites back to 1989,” Lanier says.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

// PHOTOGALLERY

After the last embers of a wildfire are snuffed out, some species bounce back quickly and others need more time. Deer mice do really well initially. Canadian thistle, a noxious weed, can sprout only a month after a fire. Red-backed voles only begin to appear again after fungi and shrubs have grown back. It is usually several years after a fire before forbs, grasses, and seedlings of aspen, pine, and spruce make their first appearances. “It’s so easy to think of everything [after a fire] as being set back to zero,” says Roehrs. “It’s not like that at all. It’s a very dynamic process.”

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Seville, a zoology and physiology professor who specializes in parasitology, taxonomy, and evolution, joined the study almost 30 years ago. After working at the Triangle X Ranch as a river guide and in a fall hunting camp prior to starting graduate school, Seville says he “never could pass on a chance to get back to the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.”

01 02 02

The rate at which small mammals like deer mice are recaptured helps scientists model population size. They can even see how they move around the landscape by dusting the mice with fluorescent powder and following their trails with black light. Researchers are interested in deer mice because theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re often the first small mammals to return to a burned area.

Numerous projects studying everything from soil chemistry to invertebrates were initiated after the 1988 fires. Researchers on this particular study, which evolved over the years to focus on small mammals and plants, test plots three weeks every summer. They observe changes in vegetation and live-trap small mammals and invertebrates so that they can record everything from skull size to diet and genetic information.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

// PHOTOGALLERY

05 86

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

When a forest burns, snags first remain upright but, over time, fall down. When they fall, they become woody debris, adding structure to the forest floor and providing cover for small mammals and ground-feeding birds like voles, shrews, and grouse. Large animals also like the cover for restingâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;scientists see elk bed down and hide in downed timber.

Researchers call deer mice, catalogued here, “colonizers” because they quickly take hold again after a fire sweeps through. Other species are more specific in their habitat requirements. The mice are found throughout North America, from alpine habitats to the desert.

A longitudinal study with scientists coming in and out over decades isn’t an easy feat to organize. Students from Laramie County Community College, University of Wyoming’s Casper and Laramie campuses, Casper College, and even the University of Oklahoma have helped researchers in Yellowstone like Jordan Ness, pictured here. JH

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

BY LILA EDYTHE

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LOCAL FESTIVALS CELEBRATE ALL OF THESE, AND MORE.

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Fans gather on the slopes of Grand Targhee Resort for one of its two annual music festivals. SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

JACKSON HOLE’S

F E S T I VA L S C E N E ISN’T AS BUSY AS TELLURIDE’S, WHERE, IN 1991, LOCALS FED UP WITH THE NUMBER OF FESTIVALS AND THE CROWDS THEY DREW, FOUNDED THE NOTHING FESTIVAL. ITS TAGLINE WAS “THANK YOU FOR NOT PARTICIPATING.” AN ARGUMENT COULD BE MADE THAT JACKSON HOLE HAS JUST THE RIGHT AMOUNT OF FESTIVALS, AND THAT THERE IS A FESTIVAL FOR EVERYONE. HERE ARE SOME OF OUR FAVORITES, A COUPLE OF WHICH YOU’LL LIKELY WANT TO PARTICIPATE IN.

Jackson Hole Food & Wine

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June 20-22

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Food & Wine guests enjoy wine with a view outside Jackson Hole Mountain Resort’s Rendezvous Lodge.

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

YES, THAT COULD have been celebrity chef Daniel Boulud you saw fly fishing on the Snake this morning. Or Michael Voltaggio, who won Bravo’s Top Chef, riding down Snow King’s scenic chairlift. “The talent wants to come here,” says Megan Gallagher, who co-founded Jackson Hole Food & Wine in 2016. “The chefs and winemakers go fishing, horseback riding— there are so many different activities we can set them up with.” Jackson Hole Food & Wine, which added a winter event in 2018, uses this valley’s appeal to bring in some of the country’s most exciting chefs, importers, and vintners with the goal of them collaborating with local restaurateurs and chefs “to showcase our local talent and highlight exciting culinary ideas from across the country,” Gallagher says. Food & Wine events are at Rendezvous Lodge at the top of Jackson Hole Mountain Resort’s Bridger Gondola and the Mead Ranch, a working cattle ranch a short drive from downtown Jackson, among other places. At the former—the event there is June 20 this year—about 20 local chefs and restaurants prepare and serve their signature dishes. The event at the latter (June 22) is in a field at the Mead Ranch. “We explain [to visiting chefs]: ‘This day you’re going to be cooking on a cattle ranch,’ ” Gallagher says. “They’re not quite sure what to make of it, but then they get out there and they love it, both for the scenery and intimacy. They’re delighted to prepare food for 300 guests rather than 3,000. They can cook something they are really proud of and excited about instead of designing their dish around something they can easily feed to masses of people.” Tickets start at $150; jhfoodandwine.com Donald Runnicles is now in his 13th season as the Grand Teton Music Festival’s music director.

July 3–August 17

“ONE OF THE world’s great orchestras is hidden in a small town in Wyoming,” Zubin Mehta, the former music director of the New York Philharmonic once said. The small town he was referring to is Teton Village and the orchestra is the Grand Teton Music Festival (GTMF). For seven weeks every summer—early July through mid-August—the GTMF brings together the country’s finest orchestral musicians, guest conductors, and soloists. This summer marks the orchestra’s 58th season. Orchestra concerts are Fridays (8 p.m.) and Saturdays (6 p.m.); Tuesdays (6 p.m.) and Thursdays (8 p.m.) are chamber music concerts; Wednesdays are a grab bag and this summer include pianist Stephen Hough (July 10) and the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet (July 17). Open rehearsals are Fridays at 10 a.m. The Grand Teton Music Festival was founded in 1962 and has come a long way since. In its earliest years, performances were held in the old Jackson Hole High School gymnasium, at Jackson Lake Lodge, and on the lawn of St. John’s Episcopal Church. In 1967, the orchestra began performing in Teton Village. Full orchestra concerts were outside, under a carnival tent. Chamber performances were inside the Mangy Moose Saloon. It wasn’t until 1974 that Walk Festival Hall, at the base of Jackson Hole Mountain Resort, opened. It wasn’t until 2007 that the hall had heat installed. While GTMF has only had three music directors over its 50-plus years—Ling Tung (1968-1996), Eiji Oue (1997-2003), and Donald Runnicles (2006–present)—dozens of soloists and conductors have performed with the group. The list reads like a who’s who of classical music: violinist Itzhak Perlman, pianist Yefin Bronfman (returning this summer), soprano Christine Brewer, conductor Mehta, and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir among others. This summer’s guests include Grammy-winner Norah Jones (July 21), Tony Award-winner and television star Kristin Chenoweth (August 15), and violinist Hilary Hahn. Open rehearsal tickets from $15 (students free), concert tickets from $30; gtmf.org

Jackson Hole Art Fairs July 12-14 & August 9-11

“I THINK THE art fair is quintessential Jackson,” says the Art Association of Jackson Hole’s director of marketing Kirsten Corbett. “It is relaxed and outdoors and fun and blows you away with the quality of what you find.” Put that way, we agree with Corbett and see it’s no wonder that these bisummer art fairs, which are the largest annual fundraiser for the Art Association, are now in their 53rd year. Last year about six thousand people attended each art fair, and together the fairs raised about $240,000, all of which was used to support Art Association programming, which includes deeply subsidized art classes for children and adults, outreach programs for atrisk community members, and free gallery exhibitions.

About three hundred artists in total are juried into the two different shows. (Some artists do both weekends; others pick just one weekend.) Art can be anything, so long as it is original. “A nice thing about having a jury select artists is that we get all of these different perspectives that result in a wide variety of art, prices, and mediums,” Corbett says. In addition to artist booths, the art fairs include music, food, and family-friendly activities. This year the activities include outdoor yoga, bicycle-powered spin art (exactly what it sounds like and even more fun than you’d imagine), and the Hand Drawn Photo Booth (@hand_ drawn_photobooth). The Hand Drawn Photo Booth is the creation of Salt Lake City artist Natalie Allsup-Edwards; it’s a pretend photo booth “machine.” Strike four poses and, in less than five minutes, your poses are drawn on a “film” strip that is delivered through a “photo out” slot. “They’re nice sketches, not caricatures,” Corbett says. $5, kids under 10 are free; 10 a.m.–6 p.m. Friday & Saturday; 10 a.m.–4 p.m. Sunday, artassociation.org

The Art Association of Jackson Hole hosts 150 artists and their works at Miller Park this summer for the 53rd Art Fair Jackson Hole, held July 1214 and August 9-11.

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Grand Teton Music Festival

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Targhee Fest and Grand Targhee Bluegrass Festival

Teton County Fair July 19-28

July 12–14 | August 9–11

BRADLY J. BONER

RUGILE KALADYTE

“WHAT SETS THE [Teton County] fair apart is that other events are tailored more toward visitors, but the fair is for locals,” says Rachel Grimes, Teton County Fair & Fairgrounds manager. “We’re happy to have visitors, but it is truly a locals’ event.” For instance, to compete in the fair’s most popular evening event, the Figure 8 races, in which cars race on a track that purposely intersects itself (increasing the risk of collisions), “you have to live in Teton County or be a full-time employee here,” says Grimes, who grew up coming to the fair and guesses her first fair was around 1986. (The first Teton County Fair was held in 1956.) Also, it’s local kids who show off what they’ve done in the 4-H livestock program over the year. Expect to see super specimens of beef, swine, lambs, goats, ducks, chickens, and rabbits. Anyone can enter the horse show and Exhibit Hall though. Last year the former had about 1,100 entrants and the latter about 800. The Exhibit Hall includes 70 different judged categories that range from chocolate chip cookies to trail mix, painting, photography, and drawing. In addition to the Figure 8 races, which “sell out every year,” Grimes says, evening events include pig wrestling, Ninja Warrior, and a concert by Texas-based Southern rock group Whiskey Myers. And then there is the carnival. “We get a Ferris wheel that is so big you can see it from downtown. It’s a giant invitation to a party where everyone’s welcome and there’s so much to do,” says Grimes. See the full schedule and ticket prices at tetoncountyfair.com

“MAYBE 50 PERCENT of these festivals is about the music,” says Tom Garnsey, the Targhee Bluegrass Festival producer since 1996 and Targhee Fest’s producer since it was founded in 2005. “The other 50 percent is the community and the vibes of Targhee and Teton Valley. I mean, if you don’t like the music, jump on your mountain bike and you can be in a field of wildflowers in a minute and then come back for the next performance.” Although, of course it’s because of the consistently compelling musical lineups each of these festivals have that they have the strong community they do. “There are some people who’ve been here every bluegrass festival,” Garnsey says. Now in its 32nd year, the Targhee Bluegrass Festival has had everyone from David Grisham to Leftover Salmon, Greensky Bluegrass, The Infamous Stringdusters, Joe Craven & The Sometimers, and Darrell Scott on its stages. (Scott even proposed to his then-girlfriend-now-wife at the bluegrass festival.) Held about one month before the bluegrass festival, Targhee Fest celebrates its 15th anniversary this year. While on the same site, the two festivals are different. Targhee Fest’s musical lineup is wider ranging: Music could be anything from Americana to folk rock, reggae, soul, or blues. Past performers have included Brandi Carlile, Los Lobos, Taj Mahal, and Grace Potter. Contributing to the community feeling of both festivals is the fact that Targhee is an intimate space and musicians and attendees are staying in the same lodging, or camping together. “Everyone’s in the same place and hanging out,” Garnsey says. “Everybody is very accessible.” Targhee Bluegrass Festival tickets start at $85, Targhee Fest tickets at $85, grandtarghee.com

Fans and musicians at the annual Grand Targhee Bluegrass Festival. 92

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Pig wrestling is one of the most popular events at the Teton County Fair.

Driggs Plein Air Festival THE DRIGGS PLEIN Air Festival is a phoenix that rose from the ashes. Literally. In 2003, fire destroyed a significant portion of downtown Driggs. To help bring back a sense of community and excitement to the area post-fire, Julie Robinson, her husband, David Hensel, and friends formed the Downtown Driggs Association (DDA). “We started doing things to help keep Driggs vibrant,” Robinson says. Because of its quiet back roads and agrarian/mountain scenery, Robinson thought a plein air festival— “plein air” is a French term for artists who paint outside, studying their subjects in real life rather than working from photos or memories in a studio—would draw artists, collectors, and people curious to see artists at work. This year is the eighth annual Driggs Plein Air Festival. The number of artists is capped at seventy-five, but the number of collectors and spectators continues to grow. “The public response has been great; they’re becoming more engaged with the event every year,” says Alison Brush, the DDA’s executive director. “They go out looking for artists around the valley working at their easels along the sides of roads. Town buzzes with talk of where artists have been spotted, and people will come into the [festival] gallery looking for paintings they saw an artist out working on.” While the artists are encouraged to paint whenever and wherever they want during the festival, there are scheduled Quick Draws and Paint Outs where you can catch the majority of them in one spot. One Paint Out coincides with Symphony on Sunday (4–6 p.m. July 28) and a second one with Music on Main (6 p.m. August 1). “When we have these combo events, the energy really is something,” Brush says. In addition to scheduled events, a festival gallery is open daily in the Driggs Center. Each artist gets three spaces in the gallery. “They arrive with three paintings they’ve done prior to the festival,” Brush says. “And then as they paint the local landscape over the week, they bring in new paintings. It is a moving, organic, wonderfully changing exhibition, which is exciting. Some collectors check in every day to see the newest paintings.”All events are free, driggspleinair.org

LINDA SWOPE

July 24–August 3

The Driggs Plein Air Festival is July 24 through August 3.

SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

SEPTEMBER 12-15, 2019 RYAN JONES

Opening “Sneak Peak” – Sept. 12, 3-6pm Harvest Moon Art Benefit for NMWA – Sept. 14, 5-8pm Bryce Pettit works on a sculpture during the Fall Arts Festival.

Fall Arts Festival September 5–15

— 2019 AWARDEES — Lifetime Achievement – John Nieto Photographer of the Year – Jeremy Kidd Sculptor of the Year – Bart Walter Held Concurrently with the 35th Annual Jackson Hole Fall Arts Festival Snow King Sports and Events Center

www.jacksonholefineartfair.com Jeremy Kidd, Grand Teton Night Day (detail), March 2019. Image Courtesy of Imago Galleries Institutional Partners

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

“JACKSON HOLE HAS a vibrant art scene all year, but the Fall Arts Festival (FAF) is the one time of the year when the whole valley’s attention is focused on it,” says Kiera Wakeman, sales manager of Diehl Gallery and president of the Jackson Hole Gallery Association. No one knew if the Fall Arts Festival would last when it was held for the first time in September 1985. Certainly no one expected it would grow to be one of the longest and largest festivals of its kind in the country. But it has lasted, and thrived. This year’s FAF includes more than 50 events. There’s the Western Design Conference (Sept. 5-8), a juried show of functional Western art that includes a fashion show. Also, the Jackson Hole Art Auction (Sept. 13-14), historic ranch tours (Sept. 7), and the art fair Takin’ It To the Streets (Sept. 8), to name a few. The two most popular FAF events are Palates & Palettes (Sept. 6) and Quick Draw (Sept. 14). At Palates & Palettes, galleries pair up with chefs and restaurants for an art walk that is as much a feast for the eyes as stomach. During the Quick Draw, which is held on the Town Square, several dozen artists race to complete a work in 90 minutes. The event ends with the finished pieces being auctioned off. “I don’t know of another art festival in the country that lasts as long, covers as much, and offers as many different events as this one does,” says Brad Richardson, co-owner with wife Jinger of the Legacy Gallery. Many events are free, but some require tickets; jacksonholechamber.com JH

MUSIC DIRECTOR DONALD RUNNICLES

JACKSON HOLE, WYOMING

JULY 3 - AUGUST 17, 2019 F E AT U R I N G

HILARY HAHN KRISTIN CHENOWETH BRANFORD MARSALIS YEFIM BRONFMAN NORAH JONES P R A I S E D A S A T O P S U M M E R C L A S S I C A L M U S I C F E S T I VA L B Y T H E N E W Y O R K T I M E S A N D T H E C H I C AG O T R I B U N E

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Living

LOOKING BACK

Buried in Jackson A history of some of the valleys cemeteries BY EMILY MIEURE

A toboggan funeral procession on its way to the Allen Cemetery, now known as Moran Cemetery. Mr. and Mrs. James Budge follow the procession, which was for their son, Bert.

IN 1973, CALIFORNIA resident Marianne Cotter wrote a letter to the editor of The Jackson Hole Guide. “I have decided that if I can’t live in Jackson Hole, I’ll be buried there,” she wrote. “My next question is, where is the cemetery?” Cotter probably didn’t realize that being buried in Jackson Hole might be even more difficult than living here. The valley has dozens of private cemeteries on ranches and former homesteads, but only one public cemetery. Much of what we know about the valley’s cemeteries, whether public or private, dates from work by volunteer surveyors from the Jackson Hole Historical Society & Museum (JHHSM). In the early 1990s, Sharon Lass Field and Polly McLaren scoured the valley looking for gravesites. They took detailed, handwritten notes—that still live at the JHHSM in both original and digital forms—on about eight cemeteries, some with as few as four known graves. [Editor’s note: This is not a complete list of gravesites in Teton County.]

1 ASPEN HILL CEMETERY The only public cemetery in Jackson is tucked between ski runs on the lower slopes of Snow King Mountain. The first plot here was dug in 1905—thirty-five years before Snow King Mountain opened as the first ski area in Wyoming—after an informal agreement between unknown persons. “They just bushwhacked their way up here to bury some of the early folks,” says Al Zuckerman, who has been Aspen Hill’s sexton since 1998. By 1920, thirty-seven people had been buried here and the Town of Jackson officially acquired the land—13.27 acres—from the U.S. Forest Service. There are about thirteen graveside services here annually now, and mourners must stand on the switchback nearest the grave because the hillside is too steep for most people to climb or comfortably stand. Today anyone can be buried here—about 1,390 people already are—but, to reserve a plot, you have to be already dead or dying. Zuckerman says there are about eighty-seven gravesites left. 96

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

JACKSON HOLE HISTORICAL SOCIETY & MUSEUM

2 ELLIOTT CEMETERY Longtime Wilson families are buried at Elliott Cemetery, which sits in the woods at the base of Teton Pass. Located on the former John Elliott homestead, the first graves were dug here in 1902. Elliott lost two sons, Clark, 4, and James, 13, to diphtheria and buried them on a bench behind his homestead. Over the ensuing decades, other long-time Wilson families including the Schofields and the Huidekopers donated adjacent land. It is not known how many people are buried here, but most are Wilson homesteaders and their descendants. Field noted in her survey that Pony Express riders and outlaws were likely buried here, too. 3 SOUTH PARK CEMETERY This is the oldest cemetery in Jackson Hole. Its first graves were dug in 1891 for siblings Ella and Joseph Wilson, both of whom died from diphtheria. (Deaths from diphtheria were not limited to the 1902 outbreak mentioned in the sidebar on p. 98.) In 1889, this cemetery was dedicated to Ella and Joseph’s parents, Sylvester and Mary Wood Wilson, who were one of the couples that led the first families over Teton Pass to settle in Jackson Hole. In 1895, Sylvester was buried alongside his children. His headstone reads, “Was a minuteman in every sense the word implies.” Today there are about three hundred people buried here; the most recent graves date to the late 1990s. 4 KELLY CEMETERY This cemetery is on a dirt road on the eastern edge of Grand Teton National Park northeast of Kelly. A gate, a barbed wire fence, and a sign that reads, “Please keep gate closed,” are the only markings here. When it was discovered that at least one dozen veterans of World Wars I and II and the Korean War are among those buried here, American Legion Post 43 began visiting every Memorial Day. The first people to be buried here were the six who died in the massive 1927 Kelly flood, which

The Allen Cemetery at Moran is a 3-acre plot now under ownership of the National Park Service. It was the original family cemetery of Maria and Charles Allen, who settled there in 1896.

was caused when the natural dam across the Gros Ventre River created two years prior by the Gros Ventre Landslide failed. The cemetery is now within the boundaries of Grand Teton National Park.

5 MORAN CEMETERY This 3-acre graveyard is the only remaining evidence of Maria and Charles Allenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 1896 homestead. When the Allens sold their ranch here in the 1920s, there were already several family members and close neighbors buried here, so they retained the title to this part of their property. (Both Maria and Charles were eventually buried here.) In 1958, the cemetery was sold to the National Park Service and one condition of the sale was that up to twelve additional descendants of the Allen family be allowed to be buried there. 6 GRANITE RIDGE CEMETERY A now-overgrown cemetery with two or three dozen known graves near the base of Jackson Hole Mountain Resort in Teton Village has its roots in the 1902 diphtheria epidemic. Ellen Magnum might be the last known burial here, in 1968 â&#x20AC;Ś but maybe not. Magnum also has a headstone in Elliott Cemetery, where it is believed her husband, Albert, was buried after his death in 1931. 7 HUNTER HEREFORD CEMETERY This small, private cemetery off Antelope Flats Road near Shadow Mountain was established in 1951. William Hunter died of a heart attack while working on his cattle ranch, and his wife, Eileen, wanted to bury him near their house. In 1987, Julius Mosley, who built the famous Hardeman barns in Wilson, was laid to rest here.

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8 CONRAD SCHWIERING CEMETERY This cemetery on a hill on former ranchland near Shadow Mountain only has four known graves. “A lovely statute of the Virgin Mary stands guard over the small burial ground, surrounded by aspens and pines,” surveyor McLaren noted in 1991. Conrad Schwiering, an accomplished landscape painter who opened a small gallery inside Jackson’s Wort Hotel in 1948, and his wife, Mary Ethel, were buried here in 1986. They owned the property at the time. This land is still privately owned.

9 ST. JOHN’S EPISCOPAL CHURCH COLUMBARIUM Cremation is now more common than casket burials in Teton County. Valley Morturary owner Scott McKague says 85 percent of people here now get cremated. St. John’s Episcopal Church built a columbarium using stone quarried in Kemmerer, Wyoming, in 1997.

10 OUR LADY OF THE MOUNTAINS COLUMBARIUM Our Lady of the Mountains built a columbarium in 2010. “The columbarium was installed to memorialize members of our parish and to hold remains,” says the church’s business manager, Tamra Hendrickson. “The other thing we found is if someone passes in the dead of winter here, it’s easier to inter their remains [than bury them].”

2 3

10 1 9

NOTE: LOCATIONS ARE APPROXIMATIONS

11 YELLOWSTONE BURIALS At least two people are buried in the Teton County, Wyoming, portion of Yellowstone National Park. Bessie Rowbottom, 3, died on July 6, 1903, and is buried near the South Entrance. In an unknown year, Private Harry Allen, a member of the Army who was stationed in Yellowstone, and another man, W.B. Taylor, of Bozeman, Montana, were in a rowboat that capsized on Yellowstone Lake. They drowned, and park historian Alicia Murphy says their bodies weren’t recovered for at least a year. Soldiers later buried body parts identified as Allen’s in a grave north of the West Thumb Geyser Basin. JH 98

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

Diphtheria

A couple of the earliest cemeteries in the valley were founded to bury residents, mostly children, who died in a 1902 diphtheria outbreak. Successful treatment of humans infected by the diphtheria bacteria started in 1894, after German physiologist Emil von Bering developed an antitoxin derived from the blood serum of horses. (Fun fact: In 1901, von Bering earned the first-ever Nobel Prize in medicine for his work on diphtheria.) But, in 1902, use and availability of the antitoxin had slowed. The year before, 10 of 11 children inoculated with the antitoxin in St. Louis died. It had been contaminated with tetanus. At that time there were no controls or regulations to ensure an antitoxin’s purity. (In 1902 Congress passed the Biologics Control Act in direct response to the contamination that had happened in St. Louis.) In 1902, diphtheria broke out in Jackson Hole and many other places in the country. No one knows for sure how many locals this outbreak killed, but diphtheria is highly contagious—it’s usually spread by direct contact or through the air or contaminated objects—and had a mortality rate of about 10 percent. The mortality rate was even higher for children under 12. We do know that the first burials at the Elliott, South Park, and Granite Ridge Cemeteries were of children who died from the infection.

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SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

Living

OUTDOORS

Thirty years ago, paragliding was a new sport in the valley; today Jackson Hole is a paragliding destination.

Bird’s Eye View

BY LESLIE HITTMEIER

Kurt Kleiner launches a British “Harley” paraglider off Rendezvous Bowl in 1990.

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JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

JOHN CARR/COURTESY PHOTO

Kleiner atop the tram dock on a sub-zero morning in the late 1980s. “I decided to open up the wing and get it ready and clip in my carabiners while inside the tram car during the ride up since only two or three other people were in that car,” Kleiner said. “I just wanted to minimize any time needed to stand around outside before launching.”

ON A DEAD calm morning in December of 1987, 28-year-old Aerial Tram operator and wildland firefighter Kurt Kleiner became the first person to paraglide off Rendezvous Mountain at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort (JHMR). Because he was an employee at the mountain and

COURTESY PHOTO

“AS SOON AS I STARTED TO EXPLORE [HERE], I SAW THE POTENTIAL FOR PARAGLIDING WAS UNLIMITED—THERE WERE SO MANY PLACES TO FLY,” KLEINER SAYS.

had good rapport with his supervisors, it just took a conversation about how he would be safe and manage risk to get the green light. There was no crowd or news team waiting at the bottom, just a few curious ski patrol friends. To Kleiner, who had done at least fifty flights around the valley by this time, this was just another day. Kleiner wasn’t only the first person to soar off Rendezvous’ 10,450-foot summit. He was also the valley’s first paraglider. An avid skydiver, Kleiner had arrived in Jackson (from Missoula, Montana) the prior spring with a newly purchased paragliding canopy. (Paragliding canopies, or wings, only became commercially available in the mid-1980s.) Kleiner began playing with his new toy shortly after ar-

riving in Jackson. “As soon as I started to explore [here], I saw the potential for paragliding was unlimited—there were so many places to fly,” Kleiner says. “It was a perfect environment because of the open grassy hills and the predictable wind and weather conditions. There was immense opportunity to establish the sport and grow it in Jackson.” It didn’t take long for others to become interested in the new sport. “Right away there were people who wanted lessons,” Kleiner says. Today there are more than 130 paragliders who live in Jackson Hole. And the valley is a destination for paragliders from around the world. Commercial tandem paragliding has been an adventure the public could have—like whitewater rafting or horseback riding—since the mid-1990s. Back then, Ken Hudonjorgensen took thrill-seekers for flights under his canopy from the top of the JHMR tram, and Jon Hunt and Tom Bartlett, Kleiner’s first two students, founded Peak Paragliding, which did tandem flights from the top of the main lift at Grand Targhee Resort on the western side of the Tetons. In 1999, Bartlett and Scott Harris started Jackson Hole Paragliding, which has been in operation since and offers everything from scenic tandem flights to ongoing lessons and training that result in pilots earning advanced instructor ratings. HUNT AND BARTLETT were ski buddies with Kleiner, and he began “teaching” them how to paraglide in spring 1988. Teaching is in quotes because today there is an official national training protocol that results in students attaining a paragliding license through the United States Hang Gliding and Paragliding Association, but Kleiner says that back then there weren’t any training standards. Neither was there tandem paragliding, in which a student sits in a harness attached to an experienced pilot. “So I was winging it a little bit,” Kleiner SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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“PARAGLIDING IS A VERY NICHE SPORT IN THE U.S., SO TO FIND A LARGE ACTIVE COMMUNITY IN SUCH A BEAUTIFUL SETTING IS AMAZING,” SAYS PARAGLIDER BECCA BREDEHOFT

says. “I was conservative and had people run on shallow terrain and do really short glides 10 feet off the ground to start.” After a few lessons, Hunt and Bartlett bought their own gear, and suddenly the number of paragliders in Jackson tripled. “Back then it was short flights in skydiving harnesses. We were flying off the side of Game Creek Canyon and landing on the road,” says Bartlett, who’s now 54. This style of flight, where a pilot takes off and glides to the ground within ten or fifteen minutes is called a “sled ride.” Between 1988 and 1990, the group discovered and launched from many of today’s most popular paragliding sites, like Curtis Canyon, Snow King Mountain, Beaver Mountain, Mount Glory, and the butte across the highway from Astoria Hot Springs. The men learned more and more with every flight. “Sometimes you’d feel pretty alone up on the hill trying to figure things out,” Bartlett says. The first time Kleiner launched off Mount Glory, which was the first time anyone had launched off Mount Glory, the wind was light. He predicted an easy sled ride down to his car. But instead of going down, he went up. And up, and up. “I noticed that the clouds above were rapidly maturing into thunderheads,” he says. Kleiner was getting sucked up into a cumulonimbus cloud. “The only way I was able to come down was to put my 102

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

KURT KLEINER / COURTESY PHOTO

Luke Madsen launching from East Gros Ventre Butte in 1990. “Luke was already a trained pilot with some experience when he arrived on the scene, and it was great to have other pilots arriving in the valley,” Kleiner says.

canopy into a stall.” He plummeted toward the road. “About 200 feet above the ground I let the canopy back out,” he says. As Kleiner packed up his canopy and harness it began to hail. Sled rides were exhilarating, but the men had dreams of flying for longer distances and times. (This type of flying is called “cross country,” in contrast to the short-in-time-and-distance sled rides.) The limiting factor was the equipment, specifically harnesses, which were uncomfortable to sit in for long periods of time. (Early paragliding harnesses were skydiving harnesses.) In 1989, a paragliding-specific harness was invented and pilots could extend their flying times. Kleiner, Hunt, and Bartlett, along with newbie pilots Luke Madsen and John Patterson, started to get more and more into cross-country flying. In 1992, Patterson took about two hours to fly across the valley, from Wilson to Jackson. The next year, Hunt was the first person to fly to and over the Grand Teton from Teton Village. In 1994, Patterson flew from Teton Village to Pinedale. Every year, the flights got longer in time and distance. Last summer, local pilot John Hovey flew from the JHMR gondola to Lander, Wyoming—170 miles from Teton Village by road—in about three hours, and Trey Hackney flew to Pocatello, Idaho, 140 miles away by road, in two and a half hours. The longest flight originating in Jackson Hole was done by Nick Greece and Hunt, who in 2016 flew from Wilson to Rawlins, Wyoming—a distance of more than 200 miles. It took them about eight hours.

KLEINER MOVED AWAY from Jackson in 1991—“it feels special to have been the first [paraglider],” he says—but the sport continued to grow. The Jackson Hole Free Flight Club formed in 1992 with about a dozen members. Its mission statement is: “To secure present and future flying sites and self-regulate one another to ensure the future growth and safety of the sport.” Today the club has about ninety members, which makes it one of the largest paragliding clubs per capita in the country. People now move to Jackson Hole for the paragliding community and opportunities. Becca Bredehoft, a 34-year-old who has been flying paragliders since she was 14 and now works seven days a week in the summer doing tandem rides and instructing for Jackson Hole Paragliding, did that 15 years ago. “Paragliding is a very niche sport in the U.S., so to find a large active community in such a beautiful setting is amazing,” she says. Her first summer in the valley she did one of the valley’s most iconic flights: from the top of the JHMR tram north to the Grand Teton and then back. (Paragliders are not permitted to launch or land in Grand Teton National Park, but flying over it is perfectly acceptable.) Bredehoft launched from the top of the tram, which is about 12 miles south of the Grand as the crow (or paraglider) flies, around noon. She caught thermals and, as she began heading north, climbed up to about 15,000 feet. (The Grand Teton’s summit is 13,770 feet.) “I waved to climbers on top of the Grand and was back to Teton Village by late afternoon in

time to make it to my evening waitressing job,” she says. “I was ecstatic. I did it two more times that week.” The Tetons aren’t just an epic place to paraglide because of the views, but also because of conditions. Jackson Hole usually gets wind from the west—it comes in smooth across Teton Valley, Idaho’s expansive flats and then hits the Tetons, which are a formidable windblock. The mountains’ mass causes significant turbulence. This turbulence makes for exciting flying, but it also makes paragliding here more challenging than in other popular American paragliding destinations like Santa Barbara, California; Sun Valley, Idaho; and Aspen, Colorado. “If you can fly in the biggest, toughest, most rowdy conditions in Jackson, you can fly anywhere,” says Blake Votilla, a 27-year-old pilot and tandem instructor-in-training with Jackson Hole Paragliding. “Paragliding feels like a combination of a chairlift, a magic carpet, and a roller coaster,” Bredehoft says. “Flying under the sheer forces of physics, while being intimately connected to the environment is hard to beat—feeling the subtle changes of the air around you, the silence of the space, the wind on your bare skin. There is no other way to get this experience.” Tandem rides with certified pilots start at $295, 307/739-2626, jacksonhole.com/summer-paragliding.html JH

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Kleiner flying a new Performance Designs 33-cell Excalibur at Curtis Canyon in August 1990.

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UPCOMING EVENTS

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GETTING OUT

Caryn Flanagan enjoys a sunrise SUP on Jenny Lake in Grand Teton National Park.

Paddle Power

Stand-up paddleboarding is as easy to learn as it is fun, and you can do it on the Snake River and on lakes around the valley. BY GERALDINE STAL

GREG VON DOERSTEN

ARRIVING AT THE Jenny Lake boat launch on the lake’s southeastern shore a little before sunrise, mine is the only car. I quickly unfasten the inflatable standup paddleboard (SUP, pronounced to rhyme with “cup”) on the roof and carry it and my paddle down to a small beach at the lakeshore. The water is glass. I set the board’s nose on the beach and swing its backend around so the tail fin is in just enough water it doesn’t scrape the bottom. Gear deposited, it’s back to the car, where I dress for my sunrise paddle around the lake, which is in Grand Teton National Park (GTNP): water shoes, a hat, gloves, and a lightweight puffy jacket (it’s summer in Jackson, but the air SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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GREG VON DOERSTEN

Stand-up paddleboarding the Snake River between Pacific Creek and Deadman’s Bar in Grand Teton National Park.

temperature is about 38 degrees). In less than five minutes, I’m walking the 100 feet back to the shore and my board. This is my third sunrise at Jenny Lake this week. A sunrise SUP across or around this lake has been my thing for the past month or so. Jenny Lake is the single most visited spot in GTNP, but at 6 a.m., I almost always have it to myself. (Although several times I have shared part of its western shore with moose.) Also, at this early hour there is rarely any

waist, and I’m not yet halfway to the board. Soon enough my feet don’t even touch the bottom. I start swimming. The down feathers in my puffy coat collapse as they sponge up the cold water. After what feels like five minutes (but is likely fifteen seconds), I grab the board and begin the swim back toward shore. After this, someone who hasn’t SUPed likely would call it a morning and drive back to town, where there are dry clothes and, at Persephone Bakery, a salve of espresso and a chocolate croissant. I change into skinny jeans and a cashmere sweater I had packed for a 10 a.m. meeting and throw on the spare puffy I always keep in the car. SUPing in skinny jeans and a sweater is better than not SUPing at all. The sport is that good.

SUPING IS THE FASTEST-GROWING OUTDOOR RECREATIONAL ACTIVITY IN THE U.S. THE OUTDOOR INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION’S 2018 PARTICIPATION REPORT REVEALS THAT BETWEEN 2013 AND 2017 PARTICIPATION IN THE ACTIVITY GREW 66 PERCENT. I’M NOT ALONE in thinking this. wind to battle. These sunrise SUPs are relaxing, meditative, and joyous. Except this morning. Back at the beach I find my board has left without me. It’s 100 feet out in the lake and moving farther away. Quickly. Without thinking—I do have one thought: “How can it be moving so quickly when there’s no wind?”—I wade into the water, which is quickly up to my knees. Another four steps and it’s at my 108

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SUPing is the fastest-growing outdoor recreational activity in the U.S. The Outdoor Industry Association’s 2018 Participation Report reveals that between 2013 and 2017 participation in the activity grew 66 percent. Aaron Pruzan, who co-founded Rendezvous River Sports with Gregg Goodyear in 1995, says the shop now sells about as many SUPs annually as it does kayaks. While it is only in the last decade that SUPing has made it into the mainstream, it’s been around in Hawaii—of course—

SUP on String Lake in Grand Teton National Park.

for centuries. What changed? Laird Hamilton. (Hamilton is generally regarded as one of best surfers of all time, if not the greatest.) By 2003, Hamilton was paddle surfing Jaws, the world’s biggest, heaviest wave. In 2006, he did an endurance paddle across the entire chain of the Hawaiian Islands. While Hamilton engages in extreme, intense SUPing, the sport as practiced by most isn’t extreme or intense. “Part of the reason it’s taking off is that it is easy to learn,” Pruzan says. (Other reasons have to do with it being fun and a great workout.) Rendezvous River Sports offers private SUP lessons and, this summer, has a multiday clinic that will introduce flatwater SUPers to whitewater SUPing. But most people rent SUPs and try it on their own. “You don’t lose any part of the experience doing it that way,” Pruzan says. (But Rendezvous River Sports can arrange for a private guide for you if that’s what you want.) WHILE I PREFER early mornings on Jenny Lake, you can certainly SUP on it all day, or SUP on another lake in the valley. If you’d like views similar to those from Jenny Lake, but no motorized traffic (and warmer water), try SUPing at String Lake, which is just to the north of Jenny Lake. String Lake is, like its name suggests, long and skinny. Also, it’s rarely deeper than 6 feet. While there are no motorized boats on String Lake, it is still often crowded. This is because it has the warmest water of any lake in Grand Teton National Park and has beachside picnic tables dotting its northern shore. On weekend days, there might be as many as one hundred others swimming from the shore or SUPing around Sting Lake. In the Gros Ventre Mountains, on the east side of Jackson Hole, Lower Slide Lake offers an interesting experience: paddling through standing dead trees that date from prior to this lake’s formation, which happened way back in 1925 when there was a massive landslide on the north flank of Sheep Mountain. (Debris from the slide

dammed the Gros Ventre River and created both Lower and Upper Slide Lakes.) When the wind blows from the east, Lower Slide Lake allows for a one-way, wind-assisted trip down its length. This requires a car shuttle, but it’s worth it. Drop one car off at the takeout on Taylor Ranch Road and then head for the campground/boat ramp at the lake’s eastern end with a second car and your SUPs. Launch your board from here and enjoy an easy trip down the lake as the wind does most of the work. While Jenny Lake is my current favorite SUP, two stretches of the Snake River are No. 2 and No. 3: the section from Jackson Lake Dam to Pacific Creek and the section between South Park and Astoria Hot Springs. The former is about 5 miles long, has no rapids, and is in Grand Teton National Park. The latter is south of the town of Jackson, about 9 miles long, and has a couple of Class II waves that can be avoided if you want. Enjoy.

GREG VON DOERSTEN

Bargain hunters check out the SUP selection at Rendezvous River Sports’ annual Boat Swap.

PRICE CHAMBERS

RENDEZVOUS RIVER SPORTS OFFERS PRIVATE SUP LESSONS AND, THIS SUMMER, HAS A MULTIDAY CLINIC THAT WILL INTRODUCE FLATWATER SUPERS TO WHITEWATER SUPING. BUT MOST PEOPLE RENT SUPS AND TRY IT ON THEIR OWN.

NUTS & BOLTS Rendezvous River Sports, 945 W. Broadway, Jackson, 307/733-2471, jacksonholekayak.com; rentals from $50/ day. Teton Village Sports, 3285 W. Village Dr., Teton Village, 307/733-2181, tetonvillagesports. com; rentals from $50/day. Dornan’s Adventure Sports, 10 Moose Lane., Moose, 307/733-2415, dornans.com; rentals from $50. Snow King Mountain Sports, 402 E. Snow King Ave., Jackson, 307/201-5096, snowkingmountain.com; rentals from $40/day. SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

A guided scenic raft floats between Deadman’s Bar and Moose in Grand Teton National Park.

Wild & Mild

A scenic float on the Snake River doesn’t get your adrenaline going, but there’s great wildlife watching and Teton views.

RYAN DORGAN

BY CODY COTTIER

RYAN DORGAN

Peter Ericson looks downstream shortly after launching from Deadman’s Bar in Grand Teton National Park.

LAST SUMMER, AS Peter Ericson pushed our raft out from the boat ramp at Deadman’s Bar in Grand Teton National Park (GTNP), the range rose in front of us. The craggy peaks were about 10 miles away as the crow flies, but felt like I could reach out and touch them. And that feeling lasted for the next three hours—through the entirety of the scenic Snake River float I did with my visiting parents. We perched on an air-filled tube at the front of the roomy, 15-foot rubber raft, complete with a carpeted floor that was surprisingly plush. Ericson, our SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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Braids of the Snake River wind through Grand Teton National Park between Pacific Creek and Deadman’s Bar.

BRADLY J. BONER

From a raft, carried along on the current, Jackson Hole unfolds before you in a way you miss on a drive or a hike. You absorb the valley at the water’s pace, and—assuming you don’t get stuck with an oar—absorbing is really all there is to do. Between Deadman’s Bar and Moose, Ericson directed our eyes to numerous wildlife hot spots along the river’s banks. He pointed out young, yellow aspen stands where moose often hang out, but that were devoid of the ungulates when we floated by. (Although he told us he saw one just a few hours before.) As we rounded a bend, Ericson pointed out an eagle’s nest tucked in the top of a dead pine tree. From the nest came the cry of a hungry fledgling. More raptors soared overhead, and a young woman from New Jersey tried to identify each one before Ericson did. Friendly tip: You probably don’t know more than the person who spends a third of their summer on the river. Floating the Snake can be done on your own, but going with a guide allows you to relax. The scenic stretches don’t get your adrenaline going like the whitewater of the Snake River Canyon, but that doesn’t mean they’re without danger. In late spring and early summer, when it is fueled by snowmelt, the Snake rages, and water levels can reach 25,000 cubic feet per second (cfs), but average around 13,000 cfs. By August, water levels significantly drop (usual is between 2,000 and 4,000 cfs). All summer long, the river’s scenic sections split into a complex system of braided channels, some of which dead-end. If you pick the wrong channel, you could get caught in a logjam or strainer, a jumble of downed trees that can suck a raft under the water, potentially trapping passengers along with it. Now to figure out what section to float.

guide, was easygoing with a thick, scraggly beard. Standing in the middle of the raft, he clutched an oar the length of a small sedan in each hand. He was lean, in contrast to the stocky, less experienced guides who try to wrestle the waterway. “You learn to let the river do the work,” he said. Last August was my parents’ first trip to Jackson Hole, and one of the first things I planned for us was a scenic float on the Snake River. Of all the sections on the Snake that commercial outfitters raft, I had heard the stretch between Deadman’s Bar (so named for a triple homicide in 1886 in the area in which a gold miner killed his partners) to Moose was the stretch to do. Wanting to show the best of the valley to my parents, who live in western Washington, I made reservations for this section, and it didn’t disappoint. (Although having since done the four other scenic sections, I can write that you can’t go wrong with any; they all have their own amazing views and personalities.) 112

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JACKSON LAKE DAM TO PACIFIC CREEK

This 4.5-mile float usually takes between sixty and ninety minutes. It is not possible to do with a guide.

This is the first stretch of the Snake River below Jackson Lake Dam in GTNP, and it has the distinction of being the most tranquil. From the launch, the river takes its time picking up speed over 5 miles of mellow floating. “It’s almost like you’re paddling in the lake,” says Reed Finlay, who has guided the Snake since 1994 with Barker-Ewing Scenic Float Trips. Keep your eyes peeled for beavers (which may or may not be planning

Enjoy a scenic float trip

FROM A RAFT, CARRIED ALONG ON THE CURRENT, JACKSON HOLE UNFOLDS BEFORE YOU IN A WAY YOU MISS ON A DRIVE OR A HIKE. YOU ABSORB THE VALLEY AT THE WATER’S PACE, AND—ASSUMING YOU DON’T GET STUCK WITH AN OAR— ABSORBING IS REALLY ALL THERE IS TO DO.

IN GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK

to commandeer the dam), pelicans, and the occasional river otter. The southern stretches of the Snake River are dominated by the Grand Teton, Teewinot, and Mount Owen, but here in the northern part of the park Mount Moran reigns, especially from Oxbow Bend. If you’ve browsed Google images of the park for three seconds or more, odds are you’ll recognize this kink in the river, which Moran looms behind.

WITH THE ORIGINAL

Barker-Ewing

PACIFIC CREEK TO DEADMAN’S BAR

Stronger currents and tricky terrain are the norm on this stretch (and all stretches south of it). Channels may lead nowhere, or to a logjam or strainer. The river flows more swiftly here than immediately below Jackson Lake Dam, but there’s no whitewater, and there’s still plenty of time to take in the first impressive glimpses of the central Tetons—the Middle, South, and Grand Tetons, Teewinot, and Owen—which are known as the Cathedral Group. “It’s a real dramatic view of them,” Finlay says. “You just see how they swoop up into the air.” More often than not, Reed says, people see elk or moose on this stretch, and there are a few eagle nests. Early morning and evening are your best bets for catching the critters.

Photo by B-E boatman Jim Stanford

This 11-mile stretch in GTNP can be done with a guide or on your own. It usually takes between ninety minutes and three hours.

barkerewing.com (307)733-1800

≈ (800)365-1800 SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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A guided raft navigates the Snake River between Wilson and South Park.

WILSON TO SOUTH PARK

At 13 miles, this is the longest scenic stretch and usually takes between two and four hours. You can do it with or without a guide.

RYAN DORGAN

This is the first segment of the river that is entirely outside GTNP, and it shows. Levees on either bank cut the river off from its historic floodplain and channels. Ranches abut the river in places, so along with bugling elk you might hear mooing cows. This stretch doesn’t have the in-your-face mountain vistas of

the scenic sections in the park, but it has the largest convocation of bald eagles in Wyoming. I once counted twelve, and river guide Jim Stanford (who has been with Barker-Ewing since 1994 and also happens to sit on the Jackson Town Council—isn’t Jackson great?) says he once tallied two dozen on a single float. In the spring, the Snake is at its widest here, swelling with runoff from the Gros Ventre River and Fish Creek. This stretch’s length makes a great justification for a riverside picnic. SOUTH PARK TO ASTORIA

Take ninety minutes or a half-day to do this 9-mile section on your own (because it is not commercially guided).

After the stretch between Jackson Lake Dam and Pacific Creek, this section of river is the Snake at its most beginnerfriendly. The braided channels that are characteristic of upriver are gone; here the river flows in a single channel from start to end. There is one Class II rapid, King’s Wave, but you can paddle around it. There 114

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RYAN DORGAN

FLOATING THE SNAKE CAN BE DONE ON YOUR OWN, BUT GOING WITH A GUIDE ALLOWS YOU TO RELAX.

South Park to Astoria is a popular stretch for Fourth of July floaters.

are plenty of eagles to be seen on this section. Megafauna aren’t nearly as common here as they are on the stretches in GTNP, but they’re not totally absent. (You just have to have really good luck.) I was introduced to this section during a massive group float on the Fourth of July, and can confirm it’s a great spot to tie some rafts and tubes together and drift serenely downstream with friends and family. Extra credit for coming ashore on a sandbar for a midriver shindig. JH

NUTS & BOLTS Guides offers multiple trips a day between May and early October. Mad River Boat Trips guides the section from Wilson to South Park; prices start at $72 for adults; 866/275-8077; mad-river.com. National Parks Float Trips, the Grand Teton Lodge Company, and Barker-Ewing Scenic Floats all do the Deadman’s Bar to Moose section. National Parks Float Trips: from $62, 307/733-5500, nationalparkfloattrips.com. Grand Teton Lodge Company: from $78, 307/543-3100, gtlc.com/activities/rafting-the-snake-river. BarkerEwing: from $80, 307/733-1800, barkerewing.com.

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Best of

GETTING OUT

Take a Ride Try your hand at horseback riding. No experience necessary. BY LILA EDYTHE

MANY OF THE first tourists to Jackson Hole came to play at being dudes. They stayed in log cabins at cattle ranches and rode horses daily. There are still dude ranches in the valley, but because there are now so many other things to do here, like paragliding, hiking, touring Yellowstone National Park, mountain biking, and floating a scenic stretch of the Snake River (just to name a few options), we recommend you don’t spend your entire time here sitting in a saddle. (Your inner thighs and butt second this recommendation.) But you should hop onto the back of a horse for at least part of one day. No experience is required. Outfitters offer rides of varying length—including ones as short as one hour—and with different views of the mountains that ring Jackson Hole.

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NEAL HENDERSON

JACKSON LAKE LODGE You’ve likely seen Oxbow Bend, a curve in the Snake River where it almost bends back on itself and, on still, clear days, reflects the hulking Mount Moran on the opposite shore of Jackson Lake. After the Moulton Barn on Mormon Row, Oxbow Bend might be the most photographed place in Grand Teton National Park. A horseback ride from the Jackson Lake Lodge stables brings you to a butte a couple of hundred feet above Oxbow Bend and a unique view of it. As fun as it is to see something familiar in a new way, the highlight of this ride is the deep well of Jackson Hole trivia that wrangler Rusty shares. As we ride past Christian Pond and begin the gentle climb up to the overlook, we learn that sage grouse and pronghorn are the only animals that can eat sagebrush, and that it provides all the water the former needs. Also that early cowboys used the wide leaves of arrowleaf balsamroot as toilet paper. And rubbed themselves with sagebrush to minimize their body odor. Emma Matilda Lake, which is nearby, but just out of view, is named for the wife of William O. Owen, who climbed the Grand Teton in 1898. Rusty shares that in the spring a family of Trumpeter swans with three cygnets nested on Christian Pond, but that, perhaps in search of more privacy, early in the summer the family relocated to Emma

Spring Creek Ranch trail rides offer unobstructed views of the Tetons.

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Adventures

INTO

Some rides from Jackson Lake Lodge climb up a butte overlooking the Snake River.

IN THE ICONIC

Airstream

1705 Industrial Way Caldwell, ID 83605 208.454.5417 BoiseAirstream.com 118

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Matilda Lake. Just as the ride is about to end and we pass under a bridge that’s part of the road to Yellowstone, Rusty shares a final bit of trivia about the bridge, which has higher guardrails on one side (its west side) than the other. “Lady Bird Johnson was out here on vacation and found that the rail interfered with the views of Christian Pond. They cut off the top rung the same day she complained.” (Editor’s note: We’re unable to fact-check this tale, but this bridge’s guardrail is lower on its east side than the west.) Back at the stables with several dozen images of Oxbow Bend, Jackson Lake, and Mount Moran on my camera and new snippets of Jackson Hole trivia to share, Rusty gives our group one last thing: slices of red apples to feed the horses. TETON VILLAGE On horseback, Teton Village’s summer crowds are easy to escape. Within 10 minutes of mounting our horses in Teton Village Trail Rides’ corral near the base area of Jackson Hole Mountain

Resort, my group of six has followed our wrangler, Kiera, through the Snake River Ranch and into Grand Teton National Park. We can’t see the main peaks of the Tetons—this is difficult to do when you’re in thick forest at the range’s feet— but there is a mother deer and fawn that seem to be following us. Kiera also warns: “There’s been a couple of black bears around here for the last week.” As we climb a couple of hundred feet up switchbacks, which I can’t help but notice that Abby, the blue roan I’m on, negotiates much easier herself than I do when hiking, the doe and fawn climb with us, staying just far enough away to not spook the horses. I’ve run and hiked plenty of times in this small section of Grand Teton National Park between Jackson Hole Mountain Resort and Granite Canyon; on horseback I notice that the network of trails is much denser here than I had previously realized … and that I’m not sure I could get myself back to the corral on my own. Civilization, including my favorite Thai restaurant in the valley, is nearby, but

DINA MISHEV

feels miles away. I like the feeling of being lost in the woods with Abby beneath me. I tense when I see a downed tree on the trail in front of us. It looks tall to me—if hiking, I couldn’t step over it and would certainly have to sit down on it and swing my legs around. If Abby senses my nerves she keeps it to herself. When we’re steps away from the tree, I still can’t guess if it’s an obstacle Abby can step over or if I need to prepare myself for a little jump. To make the ride a little more exciting, I hope for the latter. But no. Abby is well trained and steps over it like I would step over a curb. As the ride nears its end, I feel like I finally recognize where we are—in a flat meadow with views of the Sleeping Indian in the distance. (While you can’t see the major Teton peaks on this ride, you can see some of the taller peaks in the Gros Ventre Mountains, on the valley’s eastern side.) I snap some photos and then we’re back in Teton Village, where I happily join the hustle and bustle by having lunch at Teton Thai, followed by a sweet treat at Southcable Café. The perfect end to a ride.

SPRING CREEK RANCH Almost immediately upon leaving the stables at Spring Creek Ranch, on East Gros Ventre Butte, we begin climbing. And climbing and climbing. My impression had been that Spring Creek Ranch, a luxury resort popular with visitors and for weddings, was near the top of the butte just to the west of downtown Jackson. Except wrangler Randy, a woman, leads our group up at least 500 additional vertical feet from the stables, which are directly across the street from reception. When we do finally reach the top, I don’t immediately realize it; views I don’t expect distract me. Spring Creek has some of the best Teton views of anywhere in the valley. Locals, including myself, have long flocked to its restaurant and bar, The Granary, for spectacular sunset views. Sitting in a saddle on the back of George, who is part quarter horse and part draft horse and 100 percent female—“we get kind of funny with the names sometimes,” Randy says—I can see the entire length of the Teton range, from Glory Bowl in the south all the way north to and beyond Mount Moran. But then I can also see Snow King, the Town of Jackson, Jackson Peak, the Sleeping Indian, and because it’s a clear day, in the far, far distance, the Wind River Mountains, the tallest and most glacierfilled range in the state. The Winds are about 70 miles away as the crow flies. Spring Creek itself offers jaw-dropping 180-degree views. From the true summit of the butte the resort is on, which is only accessible via a horse, there are 360-degree views. I feel like I’m on a pedestal stuck in the middle of the valley’s floor. If that pedestal was warm and hairy, and liked being rubbed behind the ears. JH

NUTS & BOLTS Spring Creek Ranch Stables, 1800 N. Spirit Dance Rd., Jackson, 307/732-8140, springcreekranch. com; one-hour rides ($49) depart seven times daily and two-hour rides ($69) twice daily through October 15. Teton Village Trail Rides, 7795 Granite Loop Rd., Teton Village, 307/733-2674, tetonvillagetrailrides.com; one-hour rides ($45) depart on the hour between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m., two-hour rides ($65) on every even hour between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., four-hour rides ($100) at 8:15 a.m. and 1 p.m. daily through mid-October. Grand Teton Lodge Company Jackson Lake Lodge, 101 Jackson Lake Lodge Rd., Moran, 307/543-3100, gtlc.com/activities/horseback-riding; one-hour rides ($48) depart at 1:45 and 2:15 p.m., two-hour rides ($78) at 9 and 9:30 a.m. daily through late September. SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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BODY & SOUL

Summer Essentials BY GERALDINE STAL // ILLUSTRATIONS BY TAYLOR-ANN SMITH

Gear to get you stylishly and safely through the summer THE SUNGLASSES There’s no need to choose between style, substance, and affordability if you choose Native Eyewear’s new Raghorn sunglasses. The frames have cam-action hinges and side venting, and the N3™ polarized lenses block up to four times more infrared light than regular polarized lenses. From $109, nativeeyewear.com

THE JACKET Altra’s Wasatch Jacket, available in men’s and women’s, showcases the brand’s new ZeroH2O fabric, which impressed us for being as waterproof as it is breathable and having four-way stretch and a soft interior. The Wasatch keeps you dry without feeling (or sounding) like a trashbag. $199, altra.com

THE SOUND Because some adventures are better with tunes, the Bullfrog BF100 is water-, snow-, dust-, dirt-, and rainproof. It can be fully submerged for thirty minutes and has a twelve-hour battery life. $199.95, bullfrog.com 120

JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

THE TRAVEL COOLER When carrying your picnic and drinks is as important as keeping them cold, go for the Hydro Flask Unbound 15-liter Backpack Cooler. This is exactly what it sounds like—a cooler you carry comfortably on your back. Thanks to thicker insulation at the base, it keeps contents chilled for up to forty-eight hours. $225, hydroflask.com

THE SOCKS The best pair of socks is the pair you never feel or think about. Meet Balega’s Ultralight No Show, which is made from the brand’s proprietary Drynamix moisture-wicking fibers and has an extradeep heel pocket to combat slippage. $13, balega.com

THE SHORTS MONTANE’s Snap (women’s) and Fang (men’s) shorts had us with an inner liner treated with Polygiene, an antimicrobial odor control integrated into the fabric. The shorts overachieve by being super light, stretchy, and fast-drying and by having a zippered back pocket just big enough for most phones and gel-friendly side stretch pockets. (Have you tried GU’s new Hoppy Trails flavor of energy gel?), Shorts, $60, montane.co.uk; GU, $12 for eight, GUenergy.com

THE PANTS Whether playing in the mountains means a morning stand-up paddleboard on Jenny Lake, backpacking up Paintbrush Canyon, or climbing the Grand Teton, Arcteryx’s Gamma LT pants are up to the task. They’re lightweight, fast-drying, abrasion-resistant, and have just the right amount of stretch. Also, they look great. $189, arcteryx.com

THE SHIRT Stio’s Eddy Shirt has been a favorite with local men since it debuted several years ago. This year it’s—finally!—also available in a women’s cut. Now everyone can enjoy what we think is the world’s greatest shirt because of its stylish techy-ness: The Eddy has pearl snap buttons and a hem that can be tucked in or not, and it’s made from a stretchy nylon/poly blend with a water-resistant finish. $129, stio.com

THE LIGHT Nathan’s Halo Fire headlamp is designed for runners, but we’ve used it for all sorts of nighttime adventures and have yet to be disappointed in its 280-lumen output, five lighting modes, and ability to change light settings touch free. $119, nathansports.com

THE RUNNING SHOES With more trademarked features—a FootShape™ toe box, ZeroDrop™ platform, StoneGuard™ protection, A-Bound™ cushioning, TrailClaw™ lugs, and MaxTrac™ rubber tread—than most smartphones, Altra’s Lone Peak 4 shoe could be called gimmicky. Except all of these features combine to make it awesomely comfortable, stable, and durable. $120, altrarunning.com SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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NIGHTLIFE

Party with the Stars

BRADLY J. BONER

The Milky Way spreads over Jackson Lake on a moonless night in Grand Teton National Park. The glow of lights in Jackson and Wilson is visible on the horizon.

Yeah, Justin Bieber was here last weekend, and Sandra Bullock and Robert Downey Jr. are regular visitors, but they aren’t Jackson Hole’s best stars. BY DINA MISHEV

YOU CAN GO out for drinks or to a concert almost anywhere. You can’t see the Milky Way from anywhere. In fact, because of increasing light pollution around the planet, you can’t see the Milky Way from most places. Researchers at Italy’s Light Pollution Science and Technology Institute found that two out of three Europeans and four out of five Americans cannot see the 100-billion star galaxy to which our solar system belongs from their homes. Where can you see the Milky Way? In Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks, and national forestland adjacent to both. In the parks, alongside the Milky Way you’ll also see about five thousand stars and the 122

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WHILE GRAND TETON and Yellowstone National Parks are not recognized by the International Dark-Sky Association (IDA) for their dark skies, both parks rate well on the nine-level

AMBER BAESLER

skies. The Town of Jackson itself comes it at a 5, a “suburban sky” in which light pollution is visible in most, if not all, directions and the Milky Way is very weak or invisible near the horizon, and looks washed out overhead. Get away from Jackson’s bright lights, though, and the skies above Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks are Class 3. In Class 3 skies, the summer Milky Way appears complex and the Triangulum Galaxy (also known as M33) is visible using averted vision. “We have some of the darkest skies of anywhere in the country,” Singer says. “A few places are darker—national parks in the Southwest, which have drier air and are father from cities—but Jackson Hole still has amazingly dark night skies.” Singer says his favorite moment of every stargazing program is when he parks at the spot he will set up the telescope and the night’s stargazers exit the van. “I turn the headlights off and everyone steps outside under this big, dark sky, and

RYAN JONES

Dr. Samuel Singer founded Wyoming Stargazing in 2013.

Triangulum Galaxy, which is approximately three million light-years from Earth. And this is just with your naked eye. Sign on for a private stargazing safari offered by Wyoming Stargazing and you can see even more through its large lens telescopes. “It’s like a wildlife tour, except we go out and see stars,” says Dr. Samuel Singer, who has a PhD in science education and founded Wyoming Stargazing in 2013. Singer and his staff do stargazing safaris year-round. (Wyoming Stargazing, a nonprofit, also offers public stargazing programs, solar astronomy programs, and planetarium programs.) “We get people to explore the extraordinary in the ordinary. The sky is always above our heads, we normally just don’t look up, and there is so much cool stuff up there day and night, especially here, where we’re lucky to have pretty dark skies.” The reason dark skies are so hard to find today? Light pollution, a collective term that includes all forms of artificial light, but most conspicuously the perpetual sky glow that hovers over urban areas.

People gather for a free Wyoming Stargazing event at the Jackson Hole & Greater Yellowstone Visitor Center.

THE BRIGHTEST BEAM OF LIGHT ON EARTH SHOOTS FROM THE APEX OF THE LUXOR CASINO’S PYRAMID IN LAS VEGAS—THIRTY-NINE XENON LAMPS, EACH 6 FEET TALL AND 3 FEET WIDE. THE BEAM IS EQUAL TO THE LIGHT OF MORE THAN FORTY BILLION CANDLES. TO PUT THIS IN HISTORIC PERSPECTIVE: IN 1688, LOUIS XIV WANTED TO SHOWCASE HIS WEALTH AND POWER WITH MAXIMUM ILLUMINATION AT VERSAILLES; HE WAS ABLE TO GATHER 24,000 CANDLES. Bortle Scale, which measures darkness of a particular location. (No place in Wyoming is recognized by the IDA, but this is due to a lack of applying for IDA recognition rather than the state’s skies not being dark enough to qualify.) Developed by amateur astronomer John E. Bortle in 2001, the Bortle Scale ranges from Class 1, the darkest skies available on Earth, through Class 9, inner-city

they’re just blown away. I think some people get dizzy when they look up. It feels like you’re in a fishbowl.” There’s a lovely term that describes this feeling— when the horizon disappears and you feel like you’re falling into the stars: “celestial vaulting.” You can do this vaulting on your own by driving up to the park after the sun sets. We like the summit of Signal Mountain, which there is a road SUMMER 2019 JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE

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THE BORTLE SCALE

to, Mormon Row on Antelope Flats Road, the Cunningham Cabin, and the Snake River Overlook. “But you can really pull over almost anywhere in the park and look up and be blown away,” Singer says. You do need Wyoming Stargazing and its large lens telescopes to go deeper into the cosmos, though. Once Singer has a telescope out and is ready to go— this takes about fifteen to thirty minutes, and while you wait, there are hot cider and hot chocolate and virtual reality goggles that you can use with an app to learn about the night sky—things get next-level. “I love when people look through the telescope and see the rings of Saturn,” Singer says. “People get super psyched to see something they’ve only ever seen in photos before. There are lots of ‘Oh my Gods,’ ‘Holy sh8*%,’ and other profanities,” he says. A stargazing safari isn’t just about looking, though. “We tell stories about these objects,” Singer says. “People are looking at fuzzy spots that are the accumulated light of billions of stars from tens of millions of light-years away. That’s looking into the past. That light you’re seeing through a telescope one

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JACKSON HOLE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019

The summer Milky Way is highly structured, and M33 is easily seen with the naked eye.

RURAL SKY

The summer Milky Way appears complex.

Domes of light pollution are visible in several directions; the Milky Way is impressive, but lacks details.

SUBURBAN SKY

The Milky Way is very weak or invisible near the horizon and overhead looks washed out.

BRIGHT SUBURBAN SKY

Clouds anywhere in the night sky appear fairly bright, and the sky within 35 degrees of the horizon glows grayish white.

SUBURBAN/URBAN TRANSITION

Light pollution makes the entire night sky gray, and the Milky Way is invisible.

CITY SKY

The night sky is light gray or orange, and it is light enough one can easily read.

INNER-CITY SKY

The sky is brilliantly lit, and the only objects to observe are the moon, the planets, and a few of the brightest star clusters.

Included in Wyoming Stargazing’s goals are to decrease the level of light pollution in Jackson from a 5 to a 4 on the Bortle Scale and from a 3 to a 2 in Grand Teton National Park. The three-minute film Lost in Light shows the different Bortle stages. Nationalgeographic.com

BRADLY J. BONER

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TYPICAL TRULY DARK SITE

RURAL/SUBURBAN TRANSITION

TWO OUT OF THREE EUROPEANS AND FOUR OUT OF FIVE AMERICANS CANNOT SEE THE 100-BILLION STAR GALAXY TO WHICH OUR SOLAR SYSTEM BELONGS FROM THEIR HOMES.

night in 2019 in Grand Teton National Park took tens of millions of years to get here. We’re literally seeing the universe as it existed millions of years ago. I never get tired of telling this story.” For a schedule of Wyoming Stargazing’s public programs, go to wyomingstargazing.org. Private stargazing safaris are $500 for up to 2 people and $175/person for 3-13 people. Book by calling 844/WYOSTAR (844/996-7827). Multigroup stargazing safaris combine families together on the same program and are offered June through September. They are $115/person and have no more than 13 people total in the group. JH

EXCELLENT DARK SITE

The Zodiacal Band is visible, regions of the Milky Way cast obvious shadows, and many constellations, particularly fainter ones, are difficult to recognize due to the large number of stars.

Light pollution puts Jackson at a Class 5 on the 1 to 9 Bortle Scale.

35TH ANNUAL

FALL ARTS FESTIVAL SEPTEMBER 4 – 15, 2019

Downtown

DRIGGS Association

presents

DRIGGS

SUMMER ARTS Symphony on Sunday

June 30, July 28, August 18, & September 15, 4–6pm Driggs City Plaza

Shakespeare in the Parks “Henry IV, Part I” July 18, 6:30pm Driggs City Plaza

8th Annual Driggs Plein Air Festival July 24 – August 3 Driggs City Plaza & Teton Arts Gallery

free ART, MUSIC, and THEATER downtowndriggs.org

EXPERIENCE ONE OF THE PREMIER CULTURAL EVENTS IN THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN WEST. Widely recognized by artists and enthusiasts, the Jackson Hole Fall Arts Festival brings together nationally and internationally acclaimed artists along with an exceptional array of events featuring music, cuisine, and wine.

Stay in Driggs to enjoy the arts and explore our historic downtown with great shopping and dining.