The system of trading at annual summer “rendezvous,” several of which have been previously mentioned, was inaugurated by Ashley in 1825. The rendezvous site of that year was on Henry’s Fork of the Green River. By such a method, more flexible than the previously used “fixed fort” system, the trappers assembled at a previously determined place, conveniently located for the widely separated trapper bands. The trader brought his goods to the site where furs were exchanged for the trade goods. It was a time of celebration, frolic, and general carousal for all concerned. The rendezvous site can be likened to the hub of a wheel, the trails followed by the trappers as they came in from the spring hunt and departed for the fall hunt were the spokes. Thus rendezvous sites were on the Green, Wind, Popo Agie Rivers, at the Bear and Great Salt Lakes, in Pierre’s Hole, and finally at Fort Bonneville. Jackson Hole was never a rendezvous site because of the difficulty of access for the traders over the high mountain passes surrounding the valley.
SKETCH BY PAUL ROCKWOOD
A fur brigade in Pierre’s Hole (Teton Basin, Idaho), at the western base of the Teton Range
There is no positive evidence of trapping activity in the valley in 1827-28, although it is quite probable that the Hole received its share of attention. In 1829, however, Sublette and Jackson joined forces again in Jackson Hole, where by previous arrangement they were to meet “Diah.” Smith did not appear, and the partners were greatly concerned by his absence. Tradition has it that Sublette named “Jackson’s Hole” and “Jackson’s Lake” in honor of his associate while they were encamped on the shore of the lake waiting for Smith. Smith was eventually located in Pierre’s Hole by one of the Sublette-Jackson party, Joe Meek, and the partners were finally reunited there, Jackson and Sublette moving over via Teton Pass.
Throughout the period 1811-40, nearly every mountain man prominently connected with the fur trade visited Jackson Hole. It was an area greatly favored by Jackson, which undoubtedly accounts for Sublette’s most appropriate name. Following Colter’s discovery of the valley, it was traversed in 1811 by three employees of the St. Louis-Missouri Fur Company, John Hoback, Edward Robinson, and Jacob Reznor. These three, en route to St. Louis in the spring, encountered the Astorian expedition (John Jacob Astor’s overland party of the American Fur Company) and agreed to guide the party, commanded by Wilson Price Hunt, over a part of the westward route. This group entered Jackson Hole that fall by way of the Hoback River, then went west over Teton Pass. Robert Stuart brought a returning band of Astorians back in the fall of 1812, following the same general way and discovering the “South Pass,” as they moved eastward beyond the Green.
British interests took the initiative in the exploration of the fur country following the War of 1812 and a general, and temporary, decline of American interest. In 1819 Donald McKenzie of the Northwest Company brought a large party through Jackson Hole and on north into the Yellowstone.
The Americans again entered the picture with Smith’s previously mentioned venture of 1824, and from that time forward the list of Jackson Hole visitors reads like a “Who’s Who” of the western fur trade. There were James Beckwourth (with Sublette), all of Bridger’s partners (Fitzpatrick, Milton Sublette, Fraeb, and Gervais), Nathaniel Wyeth, Captain Benjamin L. E. Bonneville, and probably on one occasion the redoubtable Kit Carson.
The era of the mountain man was brief. It is doubtful that the trappers, traders, and fur company men realized the significance of their exploits in the expansion westward of a new nation. Yet without their activities the exploration of the western lands might have been long delayed, and the claim of the United States to the Pacific Northwest much less secure.
Bibliography
Alter, J. Cecil: James Bridger, Trapper, Frontiersman, Scout and Guide, Shepard Book Company, Salt Lake City 1925.