photo courtesy of jacksonholehistory.com
Dave Walsh 13 Jan ’16
He was a late-day mountain man the Indians called “The Beaver”. This Wyoming Wonder was actually born in England, but he went off to sea, and eventually ended up in America. As a young man in the 1840’s, he became known as an accomplished trapper, first in Idaho, then in the western mountains of the Wyoming Territory. The Indians called him “The Beaver”, because of his two large front teeth. His given name was Richard Lee, but he would soon become known as “Beaver Dick”.
This mountain man legend would marry a Shoshone woman named Jenny, but tragedy would strike after helping an elderly Indian woman with smallpox, Jenny and Beaver Dick’s four children would die of the disease. He would re-marry another Indian woman named Susan Tadpole, and in 1872 Beaver Dick would guide the U.S. Geological Survey, led by Dr. F.V. Hayden, into Yellowstone country.
Two beautiful spots in the Park, Jenny Lake and Lee Lake, take their names from Beaver Dick’s first wife, and Lee himself. Beaver Dick, a Wonder of Wyoming.