THE STORY BEGINS
The Teton Range is one of the most magnificent mountain ranges on the North American Continent. Others are longer, wider, and higher, but few can rival the breath-taking alpine grandeur of the eastern front of the Tetons. Ridge after jagged ridge of naked rock soar upward into the western sky, culminating in the towering cluster of peaks to which the early French voyageurs gave the name “les Trois Tetons” (the three breasts). The range hangs like a great stone wave poised to break across the valley at its base. To the south and east are lesser mountains, interesting and scenic but lacking the magic appeal of the Tetons.
This is a range of many moods and colors: stark and austere in morning sun, but gold and purple and black in the softly lengthening shadows of afternoon; somber and foreboding when the peaks wrap themselves in the tattered clouds of an approaching storm, but tranquil and ethereal blue and silver beneath a full moon.
These great peaks and much of the floor of the valley to the east, Jackson Hole (a hole was the term used by pioneer explorers and mountain men to describe any open valley encircled by mountains), lie within Grand Teton National Park, protected and preserved for the enjoyment of present and future generations. Each year more than 3 million visitors come to the park. Many pause briefly and pass on. Others stay to explore its trails, fish its streams, study the plants and wildlife that abound within its borders, or to savor the colorful human history of this area.
Most visitors, whatever their interests and activities, are probably first attracted to the park by its unsurpassed mountain scenery. The jagged panorama of the Tetons is the backdrop to which they may turn again and again, asking questions, seeking answers. How did the mountains form? How long have they towered into the clouds, washed by rain, riven by frost, swept by wind and snow? What enormous forces brought them forth and raised them skyward? What stories are chronicled in their rocks, what epics chiseled in the craggy visage of this mountain landscape? Why are the Tetons different from other mountains?