Treasures from Our West: Sleeping Giant in the Winter

Originally featured in Points West magazine in Winter 2009

Photograph, a winter outing at Sleeping Giant Ski area

Reared on a dude ranch west of Cody, I learned to love and respect the mountains and valleys, the wildlife, the people, and their way of life. All these I have been photographing for more years than I care to count. —Jack Richard, 1985

Indeed, Jack Richard (1909 – 1992) was the quintessential chronicler of life in the Cody community, Shoshone National Forest, and the Yellowstone National Park areas of northwest Wyoming. He started out as a journalist in 1931, and by 1953, he’d become a full time photographer with works in many national magazines, including Sports Afield, Life, and National Geographic. That professional career spanned over fifty years, and now the Buffalo Bill Historical Center is the repository of the Jack Richard Collection, more than 160,000 negatives and 100,000 prints, plus memorabilia and photographic equipment.

This photograph of skiers at Sleeping Giant Ski Area—first opened in 1936 and just four miles east of Yellowstone Park—is dated about 1950.

Jack Richard (1909 – 1992). Color photograph, ca. 1950. MS 89 Jack Richard Photograph Collection. PN.89.114.21358.05

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