{"id":3543,"slug":"jackson-hole-jackson-wyoming","story":[{"heading":null,"paragraphs":["A 'hole,' in mountain-man English, was a high valley ringed by mountains — and the one below the Tetons belonged to Davey Jackson, a trapper who wintered on the shore of the lake that also bears his name. His partner William Sublette called it Jackson's Hole in 1829, and the name outlasted the beaver, the fashion for fur hats, and the entire era that produced it.","The valley had been hunting ground for the Shoshone, Bannock, and Blackfeet long before John Colter — fresh off the Lewis and Clark expedition — probably became the first white man to see it in the winter of 1807. The mountain men followed: Jedediah Smith, Jim Bridger, Sublette, and Jackson himself ran the traplines that fed the rendezvous. When the beaver were trapped out and silk replaced fur, the trappers vanished and the valley went quiet for a generation — eighteen years, by the historians' count, when almost nobody came at all.","The settlers who finally stayed found a valley too cold and too short-seasoned to farm — which is why it survived. Jackson Hole became dude ranches, then a national monument that locals fought and Congress ratified, then Grand Teton National Park, then the ski resort and the billionaires' retreat it is today. The town of Jackson still has its elk-antler arches on the square; the lake is still named for the trapper who wintered there two hundred years ago."]},{"heading":"Why this file matters","paragraphs":["Jackson Hole is the archive's named-valley file — a landscape so beautiful it was named for the man who merely wintered in it, then preserved because it was too harsh to ruin.","A valley too cold to farm kept its wilderness — the file's suggestion being that Jackson Hole was saved by the same severity that made the trappers leave."]}],"name":"Jackson Hole","aliases":[],"type":"SITE","type_label":"Site","cats":["LOCAL_FOLKLORE","HAUNTED_PLACE","FRONTIER","GEOLOGY"],"groups":["hauntings","legends"],"desc":"The valley—where the trappers held their rendezvous.","full_desc":"A site in Jackson, Wyoming, Jackson Hole is filed here for what the record attaches to it. The valley—where the trappers held their rendezvous. The file’s recurring figure goes by a name, not a description: the trappers. The dossier holds 2 reported claims, 1 legend and 1 documented fact, with the verified spine filed separately from the lore. The site is open to visitors.","address":null,"city":"Jackson","county":null,"state":"Wyoming","postal":null,"region":"West","lat":43.471936,"lon":-110.775267,"coord_kind":"CITY","status":"ACTIVE","access":"PUBLIC","access_notes":null,"ownership":null,"website":null,"phone":null,"year_built":null,"year_opened":null,"year_closed":null,"year_demolished":null,"designation":null,"current_use":"Historic site","research_notes":"MTWY batch; VERIFY task auto-queued.","stage":"SOURCE_RESEARCH","quality":{"level":"MEDIUM","score":59.4,"dims":{"location_confidence":0.75,"identity_confidence":0.65,"historical_confidence":0.8,"source_quality":0.3999999999999999,"paranormal_claim_provenance":0.8,"coordinate_confidence":0,"current_access_confidence":0.7,"freshness":0.65}},"claims":[{"id":3896,"type":"NAMED_GHOST_LEGEND","description":"The trappers are reportedly seen. Jackson Hole in Jackson, Wyoming carries the report the way old places do — as part of its identity. 'Jackson Hole' preserves the telling; the record keeps it filed where it belongs, as lore. The name travels further than the proof; the sightings keep renewing the lease.","evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","evidence_label":"Documented legend","entity":"The trappers","where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Jackson Hole","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Hole","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]},{"id":3897,"type":"APPARITION","description":"Reported figures in the valley. The site in Jackson, Wyoming gives the account a documented setting: real place, real history, unresolved reports. It's anecdotal evidence in the strictest sense — stories, repeated, unresolved. 'Jackson Hole' carries the account. The figure remains the site's most-repeated sighting.","evidence":"ANECDOTAL","evidence_label":"Anecdotal","entity":null,"where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Jackson Hole","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Hole","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]}],"history":[{"description":"The valley’s history is documented. Jackson Hole's past is on record — the entry belongs to the verified layer beneath whatever lore attaches. This belongs to the verified spine of the entry, the layer everything else is measured against. The detail is preserved in 'Jackson Hole'. The date is part of the site's documented spine.","evidence":"HISTORICALLY_VERIFIED","date_start":null,"date_end":null,"confidence":null,"source":{"name":"Jackson Hole","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Hole","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"legends":[{"name":null,"summary":"The trappers are reportedly seen. Jackson Hole in Jackson, Wyoming carries the report the way old places do — as part of its identity. The account has a collector's pedigree — written down as legend, which is the most honest status it can hold. Every community keeps one story like this; this is theirs.","earliest":null,"evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","source":{"name":"Jackson Hole","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Hole","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"entities":[{"name":"The trappers","claimed_identity":"The trappers","verified":null,"summary":"The trappers are reportedly seen. Jackson Hole in Jackson, Wyoming carries the report the way old places do — as part of its identity. Sources including 'Jackson Hole' keep the claim in circulation. The file keeps The trappers on the roster; the sightings keep the name alive. The account stays in the file — reported, retold, unresolved.","behavior":"The trappers are reportedly seen.","area":null,"first_ref":null,"source":{"name":"Jackson Hole","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Hole","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"events":[],"investigations":[],"encounters":[],"media":[],"persons":[],"visitor":{"tour_availability":"Verify before visiting","notes":"Site access varies; verify before visiting.","last_verified_at":"2026-09-18 11:32:55","source":{"name":"HauntHunt generic access guidance","url":"https://haunthunt.com/about#access-guidance","publisher":"HauntHunt editorial","type":"DIRECTORY","authority":2}},"sources":[{"name":"Jackson Hole","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Hole","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}],"conflicts":[],"wiki":{"title":"Jackson Hole","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Hole","desc":"Valley in Wyoming, U.S.","extract":"Jackson Hole (originally called Jackson's Hole by mountain men or trappers) is a valley between the Gros Ventre and Teton mountain ranges in the U.S. state of Wyoming, near the border with Idaho, in Teton County. The term hole was used by these same early trappers as a term for a large mountain valley. These low-lying valleys, surrounded by mountains and containing rivers and streams, were and are good habitat for beavers and other fur-bearing animals. Jackson Hole is 55 miles (89 km) long by 6-to-13 miles (10-to-21 km) wide and is a graben valley with an average elevation of 6,800 ft (2,100 m), its lowest point being near the southern boundary of Grand Teton National Park at 6,350 ft (1,940","img":"https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d0/Barns_grand_tetons.jpg/960px-Barns_grand_tetons.jpg?utm_source=en.wikipedia.org&utm_campaign=api&utm_content=thumbnail","score":104,"lat":43.51666667,"lon":-110.83333333},"counts":{"claims":2,"history":1,"legends":1,"entities":1,"sources":1}}