The classic triangular peaks of GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK , which stretches for fifty miles between Yellowstone and Jackson, are every bit as dramatic as the mountains of its congested neighbor, and a visit should be more than an afterthought on the route south. Though not especially high or extensive by Rocky Mountain standards, these sheer-faced cliffs make a magnificent spectacle, rising abruptly to tower 7000ft above the valley floor. A string of gem-like lakes is set tight at the foot of the mountains; beyond them lies the broad, sagebrush-covered Jackson Hole (a "hole" was the pioneers' term for a flat, mountain-ringed valley), broken by the winding Snake River.

The Shoshone people knew the mountains as the Teewinot ("many pinnacles"), but their present name, meaning large breast, was bestowed by over-imaginative French-Canadian trappers in the 1830s. After Congress set the mountains aside as a national park in 1929, it took another 21 years of legal wrangling for Grand Teton to reach its current size - local ranchers protested that the economy of Jackson Hole would be ruined if further land was surrendered to tourism. Meanwhile, John D. Rockefeller Jr bought up a large swath of Jackson Hole and presented it to the government for free (on the condition that the Grand Teton Lodge Company, which he then owned, would be the exclusive operator of park concessions).

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Grand Teton National Park and Jackson Hole

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