October 22, 2009, 8:09 pm
Cliff Hansen is known throughout Wyoming for his
achievements as governor and U.S. senator.
But recently, Hansen was in the national spotlight when he was
featured in Ken Burns' popular PBS documentary series on America's
national parks for his opposition to - and, later, his support of -
the expansion of Grand Teton National Park.
As a prominent Jackson rancher and a young Teton County
commissioner in 1943, Hansen was outraged when President Franklin
D. Roosevelt turned about a third of Jackson Hole - much of it land
covertly purchased by millionaire John D. Rockefeller - into a
national monument.
Despite howls of protest by Hansen, as well as locals and Wyoming
politicians, the national monument eventually became part of Grand
Teton National Park in 1950.
Hansen, along with other local ranchers and movie star Wallace
Beery, even illegally drove 500 head of cattle across the national
monument to protest its creation and to draw national
publicity.
"No Compromise!" boomed the headline of a September 1943 letter
from Hansen to Gov. Lester Hunt published in the Jackson Hole
Courier.
But starting in the 1960s, Hansen rethought his opposition to the
expansion of Grand Teton National Park and became a strong
supporter of it. He even became friends with many members of the
Rockefeller family. His granddaughter-in-law, Kate Mead, chairs the
Grand Teton National Park Foundation.
"I want you all to know that I'm glad I lost, because I now know I
was wrong," Hansen said during a luncheon in New York in 1967.
"Grand Teton National Park is one of the greatest natural heritages
of Wyoming and the nation and one of our great assets."
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