Sun Valley got its start in 1935 when Union Pacific Railroad Chairman Averell Harriman hired Austrian Count Felix Shaffgotsch to find the most scenic snow spot in the country for a huge ski resort. Passing up places that would become Aspen, Jackson Hole and Mount Hood, Shaffgotsch chose Sun Valley. Soon stars from all across the country came to ski down Dollar Mountain (chairlifts were not installed on 9,150-foot-tall Bald Mountain until Sun Valley's fourth operating season) and hobnob in the huge lodge Harriman built. Gary Cooper and Clark Gable were frequent visitors; novelist Ernest Hemingway spent his last years in the area, and a memorial to him stands alongside Trail Creek. Learn More...