A collection of Aspen Hall of Famers that were crucial to the Aspen we grew up in.
Andy Mill
A product of the Aspen Ski Club of the 1960s, Andy Mill worked his way onto the U.S Ski Team, becoming one of the most decorated Alpine ski racers to come out of Aspen.
Born in Fort Collins, Colorado, Mill came from humble beginnings. His father managed a lumber yard in Laramie and Andy and his siblings were exposed to skiing in Wyoming’s Medicine Bow mountains. It wasn’t until his father was relocated to Aspen in the 1960s that Andy found himself in the heart of ski racing, the site of the 1950 World Championships, home of the Roch Cup and one of the most notorious downhill race courses in the world.
Barry Mink
Barry was born in Chicago. Encouraged by his father, Barry participated in many sports, excelling as an All-Conference high school quarterback and an All-State baseball catcher. He was offered many college football scholarships and was scouted by major league baseball teams. He chose to sign a professional baseball contract with the Cincinnati Reds after high school graduation. Cincinnati arranged for Barry to attend Northwestern University so we could attend college during baseball’s offseason. His teammates included the likes of Pete Rose and Tony Perez. After three years with Cincinnati, Barry injured his throwing arm in a freak accident and was released.
Dr. Barry Mink’s medical training and love of sports benefitted the Aspen community in a myriad of ways. For over 40 years, Barry had a highly successful internal medicine practice.
Nancy & Bob Oden
Dr. Bob Odén was one of the kindest, most beloved physicians in Aspen—a description he shares gladly with his close friend, Harold Whitcomb. The stories of his generosity and caring would fill many books as he has extended the principles of the Hippocratic oath to every facet of his life.
Harold Whitcomb
Dr. Whitcomb was not an
ordinary M.D. He was a true healer. Although trained traditionally as an internist, he was far ahead of his time, mixing healthy doses of alternative medicine, vitamins and bioenergetics into his practice. Forty-five years ago he was the rare physician who invited fathers into the delivery room, and before Aspen had its first veterinarian, he doctored numerous dogs, cats, horses and mules, often stepping outside the back door of the Aspen Clinic to treat an animal emergency. He rarely met a person he didn’t like – or who didn’t return the sentiment. He especially loved Aspen’s old ranchers and miners, and spent hours listening to their stories.
Bobby Mason
Bobby Mason was born in Arizona and lived in Kansas until the age of 11 when his family moved to Southern California. He knew as a child that music would be his calling. He began playing the ukulele at age three and soon moved on to the guitar, writing and singing. He had a well-established professional career in Southern California when he arrived in Aspen in 1969 for a two-week gig. Quickly seduced by the beautiful mountains, budding music scene, and the people who would become his family, Bobby knew he was home.
Tee & Bob Child
Bob was instrumental in creating CORE and was its first board representative. He was a founding member and active participant of the Snowmass-Capitol Creek Caucus, was involved in the establishment of and served on the board of Pitkin County Open Space and on the Pitkin County Planning and Zoning Commission. He also served on the boards of Aspen Valley Hospital, the Windstar Foundation, Colorado River Water Conservation District, the Western Slope Water Advisory Council, the Northwest Colorado Council of Governments, the Governors Water Roundtable and Colorado Counties, Inc.
Jeanne & Wilton Jaffee
As the owner of the W/J Ranch on McLain Flats Road near Woody Creek, Jaffee was well-known for the lively community rodeos he held at the ranch. He was also well-known for the cavalier attitude he took toward government regulations, his support of employee housing on his ranch and for his caustic criticism of Pitkin County elected officials and staff.
George Madsen
George married Connie in 1980 and the couple led more than 60 trips in the backcountry to the 10th Mountain and Braun ski huts, as well as Colorado Mountain Club hikes and Tour d’Aspen bike trips with groups of seniors.
Always an entrepreneur, Madsen started The Aspen Flyer newspaper, a one-man-show published three times a week. He was a writer and photographer, interviewed local dignitaries, did the layout, sold advertising and was in charge of distribution. Soon the paper was purchased by Bil Dunaway and absorbed into The Aspen Times.
Carolyn and Tom Moore
The young couple moved back to Aspen after graduation with their Irish Setters, various cats, and a guinea pig. Tom worked at the family real estate company, Moore Realty, and Carolyn worked at United Lumber as a bookkeeper under Dick Mill. In 1967 they moved to a dilapidated ranch on McLain Flats Road and have lived there ever since. Together they made the ranch and the ranch house livable and productive and began to raise a family. Son Travis was born in 1967, daughter Cinnamon in 1969.
John Keleher
Shortly after their arrival in town, John and Linda became active in church, community and school activities. He helped coach middle school football, and served on superintendent and principal selection committees. A member of the Aspen Ski Club, John was elected president of the board in 1981, serving until 1984. Also in 1981, he joined the Rotary Club, where through the years he served as president, head duck of the Ducky Derby fundraiser and co-chaired the World Community Service Committee, benefitting families in Mexico, Central and South America and Africa. He received the Tom Sardy Award for outstanding leadership and service in 1999.
Tony Vaugneur
Tony Vagneur was born into the Vagneur ranching family in Woody Creek. His great-grandfather, Jeremie Vagneur arrived from Val d’Aosta, Italy, in 1882, and carved out a ranching dynasty that thus far includes five generations.
Once back in Aspen, Tony began working for his aunt and uncle (Eileen and Vic Goodhard) at Aspen Trash Service, Inc., a relationship that would indelibly mark Tony’s business career for the next 25 years. He also did stints as a builder, a bartender, an equipment operator, a horse trainer, a ski racer, a string of Marlboro commercials and a long run at the T Lazy-7 Ranch. Tony put in seven years as an Aspen Mountain Ski Patrolman.
Marsha and Jack Brendlinger
Marsha and Jack Brendlinger settled in Aspen in 1963, where they raised four children. The couple built and operated the Applejack Inn on Main Street in Aspen, beginning in 1964, and opened the Tower Fondue Restaurant in Snowmass Village in 1967 with Howard Englander.
Rose & Edward Stanton
Originally from Chicago, Stanton and her husband, Edgar, were among the first visitors who came to Aspen for skiing. They vacationed here first as guests of Walter Paepcke in 1946 and returned in 1953 as full-time residents.
The Stantons’ daughter, Roddy, said her parents told her Walter Paepcke begged them not to visit Aspen in 1946 because the ski area was not developed enough. But they borrowed the key to his house, hopped on a train and arrived in Aspen in a snowstorm.
Elizabeth & Walter Paepcke
Skiing had already started to boost Aspen out of its 50-year hibernation when the Paepckes arrived in May of 1945.
Walter Paepcke, is best known, not for his business success with the Container Corporation of America, but for bringing culture out of the city and building Aspen into a year-round cultural and skiing mecca. The Paepckes infused Aspen with numerous cultural activities and were instrumental in creating a stable economy for the area.
Fred Iselin
Fred was born in Glarus, Switzerland and became known for his skiing abilities before he appeared on the American scene in 1940.
In 1939, Fred emigrated to the United States and became a ski instructor at America’s premiere ski resort—Sun Valley, Idaho, in 1940. In 1947, Fred moved to Aspen to become Colorado’s notable ski instructor and pioneer of innovations of skiing.
Katie & Carl Bergman
Carl and Katie Bergman, as a young couple in 1963, gave up promising careers in the Midwest and moved to Aspen to satisfy their urge to ski. All they really wanted was to do was fit into a mountain community, but they gave back as much as they gained.
Carl, trained as a pharmacist, got a job at Matthews Drug in 1963. The Bergmans seized the opportunity to buy it two years later, changing the name to Carl’s Pharmacy. They bought a lot across Main Street and built the Miners’ Building in 1976. They continue to operate both stores.
Fritz Benedict
Born in 1914 in Medford, Wisconsin, Fritz graduated with a Master’s degree in landscape architecture from the University of Wisconsin and then apprenticed with legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright for three years. He came to Colorado with WW II 10th Mountain Division ski troops. Fritz returned to Aspen in 1945 and like many other ski troopers became the nucleus for the Colorado Ski industry. He designed the master plan for three of the nation’s premier ski areas—Vail in 1962, Snowmass 1967 and Breckenridge 1971—and additions to Aspen and Steamboat Springs.
David & Sigrid Stapelton
It would be hard to think about Aspen without also thinking about David E. and Sigrid Stapleton, so seamlessly have they woven their presence into the fabric of what Aspen has been and is over the years.
Both come from pioneer families, but from wildly divergent backgrounds. The year 1880 was when David’s great-grandfather Timothy came to Aspen from Leadville, and with a splash at that. He sired the first baby boy born in Aspen and homesteaded the ranch now home to Sardy Field. Sigrid came to town a little later, in 1952, the daughter of famed mountaineer Fred Braun, who is the namesake of the Alfred A. Braun Hut System. David spent part of his youth working on local Stapleton ranches and riding rodeo bareback broncs while Sigrid spent many summer days as a young woman helping her father build high mountain cabins.
Jim Ward
It seems as though Jim Ward has always been one of those guys who has a hard time standing still.
From his earliest days in Aspen, back in 1964, until his current (2007) semi-retirement at the age of 72, Ward has been a skier, a hiker, a river rat and a desert walker. Arriving with a work ethic derived in part from his time as a Boy Scout, Ward worked with Dave Farney’s Aschcroft Mountaineering School, teaching kids about the backcountry; was an early member of Mountain Rescue Aspen; and once was director of the 10th Mountain Hut Association. When he’s not lending a hand to a friend, or climbing around on his own roof doing repairs, he’s often making plans for one backcountry excursion or another, or returning from one.
George Stranahan
George Stranahan didn’t need to work a day in his life, being an heir to the Champion Spark Plug fortune.
But this plain-spoken millionaire with a rebel agenda rejected a life of leisure.
Instead, the colorful Stranahan became an unconventional businessman—a guy who jumps into a venture not so much to make a buck but to have a good time or to promote a social or political cause.
In his 75 years, he’s been an award-winning cattle rancher, a pioneering microbrewery owner, a successful restaurant proprietor, and the man who bankrolled a legendary outdoor magazine.
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