History

The county was the last formed in Wyoming when it was carved from Fremont and Lincoln counties in 1921. It was named by local legislator P. W. Jenkins in honor of fur trapper/trader William Sublette, one of three Sublette brothers who were active in the fur trade in early 19th century Wyoming. Green River rendezvous sites are located in the county, including the site of the last fur trade rendezvous in 1840. Artist Alfred Jacob Miller painted scenes at the Green River rendezvous in the 1830s. Famed mountain men such as Jim Bridger and Jedediah Smith trapped and traded in the area. Since 2000, the county leads Wyoming in assessed valuation due to the discovery of valuable gas deposits, particularly at Jonah Field in the southern part of the county.

Organized January 2, 1923 and named for mountain man and fur trader William L. Sublette, Sublette County was the last county organized in Wyoming. The Sixteenth Wyoming State Legislature created both Sublette and Teton Counties on February 15, 1921 but Teton was organized one month earlier than Sublette. The creation and subsequent organization of the two counties ended a long standing dispute as to how county government could best be provided this remote region in northwestern Wyoming.

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Early Settlement

The remote region is actually two distinct areas: the upper Snake River Valley, or Jackson Hole, and the upper Green River Valley. Although the headwaters of the two drainages are separated by only a few miles, as the crow flies, the two valleys are isolated one from the other by rugged mountains, deep canyons, and for a significant part of the year by severe weather. When county government became realty in Wyoming Territory in 1869, there was little concern with providing convenient local government for the two remote northwestern valleys. There was no need for concern, because there was no permanent population in the valleys. Consequently, the seats of county government were established in the population centers along the Union Pacific Railroad tracks, and the north/south boundaries for counties were from Montana to Colorado.

This dictated that when permanent population centers did develop in the northern valleys, the residents would be many, many miles from a county seat. The upper Green River Valley, all of which would eventually be included in Sublette County, was divided by the original 1869 county organization. The western one third of the valley was in Uinta County, with the county seat at Evanston; the eastern two thirds of the valley were in Carter County (later Sweetwater), with the county seat at Green River; and the Green River, itself, wandered back and forth across the Uinta/Carter County line as it flowed south.

Although the first permanent settlers did not enter the upper Green River Valley until 1878, Americans had hunted, traded, trapped, played in (if one can refer to the mountain men's rendezvous as playing), and passed through the valley for nearly seventy years. The first recorded visitors to the valley were Wilson Price Hunt and a party of sixty men, crossing the country to the Pacific Ocean in 1811. However, long before then, the upper Green River Valley had been the homeland of the Shoshone Indians, probably prior to 1700, and other Indian tribes had hunted the valley for at least as long. Price and his men were the forerunners of the mountain men, who, while they trapped, traded, and hunted, blazed the trails, including South Pass across the Continental Divide, which thousands would follow during the years of westward migration.

Missionaries, going forth to save the souls of the western Indians, and guided by mountain men were the next Americans. In 1835, Marcus Whitman and Samuel Parker, accompanying a party of trappers employed by the American Fur Company, crossed the valley on their way west to establish protestant missions. The following year, Whitman was back, but this time accompanied by a new wife, Marcella, and the Reverend Henry H. Spaulding and his wife, Eliza. The two missionary wives were the first white women to enter the upper Green River Valley. Four years later, 1840, going west to found a Catholic mission among the Flathead Indians, Father Pierre DeSmet held Catholic services, near present day Daniel, Wyoming, in Sublette County.

Emigrant Trails and Railroads

In 1842 the westward migration began in earnest. The Bidwell wagon train, made up with families from Missouri and Illinois, on their way west to Oregon to establish farms and homes, was the vanguard of the thousands that would move to Oregon. They followed the route west discovered and used by the mountain men, up the North Platte River, along the Sweetwater River, and then over South Pass and the Continental Divide into the upper Green River Valley. In the valley, the original route followed the Big Sandy River, flowing southwest to the Green River, crossed the Green, and continued southwest to Fort Bridger. Leaving the fort, the trail went back to the northwest, and followed the Bear River Valley into Idaho.

Later in the 1840's two cutoffs, to avoid the many miles to the southwest and then backtracking to the northwest, were established. The first cutoff, leaving the original Oregon Trail where it veered southwest toward Fort Bridger, proceeded directly west across the Green River Valley, crossed the river upstream from the original crossing place, and then rejoined the trail as it went northwest into Idaho. The second cutoff, known as the Lander Road, left the original route still further north than the first cutoff, went west across the valley and the Green, and then continued west through what is known today as the Bridger National Forest in the Wyoming Range and down the Gray's River, finally rejoining the original trail in Idaho.

In the early 1860s, the Overland Trail was established approximately 100 miles south of the Oregon Trail and the upper Green River Valley. The new trail mainly avoided the intense Indian warfare which had developed to the north and reduced westward travel on the Oregon Trail to a trickle. In 1865, to be followed in 1867, by a mini gold rush, the first gold mining district was established in the South Pass region, east of the upper Green River Valley. The hope of striking it rich in the gold field brought new travelers into the valley, including several hundred Mormons from the Great Salt Lake Basin, going east to seek their fortunes.

The coming of the Union Pacific Railroad to Wyoming in 1867, and then crossing the state from east to west during 1868, changed the pattern of travel through the upper Green River Valley. Stage and freight stations were built along the railroad line, and stage and wagon routes, which crossed the southeastern portion of what would become Sublette County, before veering east to the South Pass mining region, were established and heavily used. As the South Pass gold strike played out, disappointed miners began to prospect the mountains, surrounding the Green River Valley. Eventually, a mine was developed near present day Cora, and a wagon road, traversing the entire length of the valley, was established so machinery and supplies could be hauled from Point of Rocks, on the railroad, to Cora.

Hayden Expedition Photographs Area

In 1878, two events occurred which initiated the settlement of the upper Green River Valley, which had become a part of either Uinta County or Carter County in 1869. The notable photographer, William Henry Jackson was a member of the Hayden Survey Party, working in the vicinity of South Pass. In August, Jackson left the surveyors and hiked through the Wind River Mountain Range, photographing the magnificence of the rugged mountains. Toward the end of the month, he climbed to the summit of Fremont Peak, and photographed the alpine panorama below him. Descending from the peak to the floor of the upper valley, he continued to take pictures. Jackson's photographs of the Wind River Mountains and the upper Green River Valley are the first pictorial record of the region and when published, stirred national interest in it.

Cattle Industry

Later in 1878, stockmen, driving cattle herds east from Oregon and Utah, decided to winter in the valley. Most of the cattle were held in the area where the Piney Creeks (named for stockman A. W. "Piney" Smith) empty into the Green River. Ten years later the town of Big Piney would be founded where the stockmen had wintered. One herd of cattle, however, was driven approximately twenty miles north to winter on Pine Creek. The Town of Pinedale, the future county seat of Sublette County, would be located on Pine Creek, where the drovers camped for the winter. When spring came, the cattlemen were so pleased with the condition of their herds that some of them established permanent ranches in the valley. They were the first settlers to make their home in Sublette County.

The cattle boom in Wyoming during the early 1880s brought more cattle and ranchers to the upper Green River Valley. By 1900, most of the irrigable land in the valley had been patented, more than 300 water rights had been granted by the state engineer, and the towns of Big Piney and Pinedale were beginning to prosper. The first change in county government for the valley was made in 1884 --- Fremont County was created by the Territorial Legislative Assembly and organized that year. This action placed the eastern two thirds, of what would become Sublette County, and the Town of Pinedale in Fremont County and left the western one third and the Town of Big Piney in Uinta County. This organizational plan for county government in the Valley would exist until 1913.

County Creation and Organization

The Eleventh Wyoming State Legislature hotly debated county government for the far western region of the state, including what are now the counties of Uinta, Lincoln, Teton and Sublette, during the 1911 session. Five separate bills for county organization were introduced into the legislature, including one bill, introduced in both houses, for the creation of Wyoming County, with boundaries closely resemb ing present day Sublette County. This bill was rejected by the legislature, and only one bill, creating Lincoln County, was passed. Lincoln County, as organized in 1913, included the western one third of the upper Green River Valley, as well as all of present day Teton County. Consequently, county government for the valley remained divided as it had been, with the Big Piney section of the valley now in Lincoln County, and Pinedale and the eastern two thirds of the valley still in Fremont County.

On January 20, 1921 Fremont County Representative from Cora, P. W. Jenkins, introduced House Bill No. 17 during the session of the Sixteenth Wyoming State Legislature. The bill provided for the creation of Sublette County, with boundaries which included all of the upper Green River Valley. There was only minimal opposition in the legislature to the creation of Sublette County, and on February 15, 1921

Governor Robert Carey signed the act into law. Nine days later, the governor appointed W. E. Enos, L. H. Hennick, and Oscar Beck as organizing commissioners to organize the new county. This left only the approving vote of the new county's electorate for the establishment of county government in the Green River Valley. The organlzlng commissioners met early in March 1921, and set June 28 as the date of the election for the voters to approve the organization of Sublette County and to choose a county seat. The residents of the upper Green River Valley, regardless of which county, Lincoln or Fremont, they resided in, had long supported one county for the valley, and their vote on June 28, approving organization of Sublette County by a vote of 1,139 for, and 50 against, a margin of more than twenty to one, strongly reflected their desire. There was not anything near unanimity in the selection of a county seat for the new county. Big Piney, Daniel, and Pinedale were the candidates, and throughout the spring the campaign for votes was heated. Pinedale won, but only by six votes, receiving 488 votes to 482 votes for Big Piney. Daniel received 230 votes, so Pinedale's winning margin was far from a majority vote.

During the next eighteen months, the organization of Sublette County was in limbo, waiting for the general election to be held in November 1922, after the organizing commissioners decided the county should not spend the money required for a special election to elect county officers. Both the Democratic and Republican parties chose candidates for county offices in the August primary election, and on November 7, 1922 the county's voters elected the first Sublette County officers. They were: John L. Allen, Frank D. Ball and Vigo Miller, county commissioners; Keith Culbertson, county clerk; R. T. Albert, county treasurer; James M. Payne, county sheriff; Claire W. Tanner, county superintendent of schools; B. N. Tibbats, county assessor; George Voorhees, county and prosecuting attorney; and C. C. Feltner, county surveyor.

The elected county commissioners met with the organizing commissioners on January 2, 1923 to have their bonds approved, take the oath of office, and elect a chairman. John L. Allen was elected to the chair, and Sublette County was declared as duly organized. The elected commissioners then proceeded to conduct county business. They accepted the oaths and bonds of the other elected county officers, and then declared vacancies in the offices of county assessor and county coroner. B. N. Tibbats had been elected county assessor, but had refused to qualify for the office, by failing to post a bond. The commissioners appointed William Baehr county assessor to replace Tibbats. There had been no candidates for county coroner, and to fill the vacancy, the commissioners appointed Jacob Springstead to the office. Completing their first meeting, the elected county commissioners accepted the offer of the Town of Pinedale for the county to use the town hall and the town jail as the county courthouse and county jail.

Agricultural Depression and County Debt

During the 1920s, Wyoming suffered a severe agricultural depression, and counties like Sublette, with economies based upon the livestock industry, were especially hard hit. Almost from the time it was created, Sublette County was in debt. There was the expense of the special election, the primary election, and the general election. There were various operational expenses of the organizing commissioners, and there were the costs of separation from Lincoln and Fremont Counties. These costs included a pro rata share of any debt either county had at the time Sublette County was created; a pro rata share of any operational costs incurred by either Lincoln County or Fremont County, during the interim period between the creation of Sublette County and its organization, which would have been paid by Sublette County if it had been fully organized, including such costs as property assessment, tax collection, court costs, and road maintenance; and the cost, and a substantial one, of duplicating Lincoln County and Fremont County records needed by Sublette County to operate effectively as an independent county government.

By January 1924, the county commissioners recognized that Sublette County was not going to be able to pay off its accumulated debt in the foreseeable future with its normal tax collections. Consequently, the board of commissioners resolved to issue $10,000 in coupon bonds to retire the debt. The bonds were sold on April 1, 1924, to the low bidder, George W. Vallery and Company at an interest rate of 5 1/2 percent. Later, the Vallery Company rejected the repayment terms established by the commissioners, and the commissioners then awarded the sale of the bonds to the Frank C. Evans Company of Denver. In January 1925, the Evans Company rescinded their offer for the county's bonds too. This left the commissioners with no choice except to issue interest bearing Certificates of Indebtedness, as provided by Wyoming statutes at the time, and pay off the debt through the county's normal taxes as soon as they could. During the next several years, as Sublette County's revenues increased, the commissioners accumulated the funds to redeem the certificates, with the accrued interest.

By 1930, Sublette County was out of debt and the county commissioners were considering incurring a new one --- issuing county bonds, with the approval of the county's citizens, to raise $30,000 to construct a county courthouse and jail. On June 3, 1930, the board of county commissioners employed architect D. D. Spani of Rock Springs to provide them cost estimates and a preliminary design for a suitable courthouse and jail for the county. Two months later, August 6, the commissioners accepted Spani's designs and commissioned him to draw the working plans for the courthouse and jail. At the same meeting, the board of commissioners resolved to submit the question of issuing $30,000 of county bonds, at five percent interest, to be redeemed in twenty years but with an option to repay the bonds in ten years, to the county's taxpayers and voters at the general election in November.