Pierre's Hole 1832 Battle Area Site
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Nearest city | Driggs, Idaho |
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Area | 400 acres (160 ha) |
Built | 1832 |
NRHP Reference # | 84001197 |
Added to NRHP | September 7, 1984 |
Pierre's Hole is a shallow valley in the western United States in eastern Idaho, just west of the Teton Range in Wyoming. At an elevation over 6,000 feet (1,830 m) above sea level, it collects the headwaters of the Teton River, and was a strategic center of the fur trade of the northern Rocky Mountains. The nearby Jackson Hole area in Wyoming is on the opposite side of the Tetons.
Today, the Idaho valley in Teton County is known as Teton Basin or Teton Valley. In 1984, it was designated a historic place as the site of the infamous events in the Battle of Pierre's Hole (below), following the well-attended Rendezvous in July 1832.
Explorer and mountain man John Colter, a member of the earlier Lewis & Clark Expedition, asserted that he passed through the valley in 1808. The Teton River flows northward though the mountain meadows of Pierre's Hole and then conjoins Bitch Creek (once known as the North Fork of the Teton) just before it turns west and into Teton Canyon. To mountain men, a large low-lying valley, such as this, with abundant beaver and game was called a "hole". Mountain men preferred these areas of numerous beaver rich streams as they provided ample food and comfortable camping in addition to beaver pelts. Pierre's Hole was named in honor of "le grand Pierre" Tivanitagon, a Hudson's Bay Company trader said to be of Iroquois descent, who was killed in a battle with Blackfoot Indians in 1827.