Jackson Hole News&Guide

About Jackson Hole News&Guide

In a mountain valley where billionaires and ski bums share the same grocery store lines, the Jackson Hole News&Guide has spent more than half a century holding one of America's most extraordinary communities to account. Born in 2002 from the merger of two fiercely competitive weekly newspapers — the Jackson Hole News and the Jackson Hole Guide — the paper is a locally owned, award-winning institution that covers Teton County, Wyoming, with a depth and independence rare in modern community journalism. Under the ownership of Teton Media Works and publisher Kevin Olson, it has become a national model for how a small-market paper can thrive through local ownership, digital innovation, and an uncompromising commitment to watchdog reporting.

History and Founding

The News&Guide's story begins with two rival papers. The Jackson Hole Guide was launched in 1952 by Bill and Floy Tonkin and their daughter Jean Kirol; it was later bought by Fred and Elizabeth McCabe, who continued as publisher after her husband's death. The Jackson Hole News was founded in 1970 by Virginia Huidekoper and Ralph Gill, who shortly after sold his shares to the late Marc Fisher, the paper's editor. Michael Sellett bought the News in 1973 and served as publisher for nearly four decades, building it into a paper of national prominence.

For more than three decades, the two weeklies were "friendly" competitors and consistent state and national award winners, taking turns winning "best weekly" honors. In November 2002, the families that owned the two papers merged them into a single publication, the Jackson Hole News&Guide. As News publisher Michael Sellett wrote in his paper's final standalone edition, the merger was consummated because the owning families "believe strongly in local ownership of community newspapers" — at a time, he noted, "when giant newspaper chains are gobbling up community newspapers at an alarming rate." Sellett and Elizabeth McCabe became co-publishers of the merged paper, with Angus Maclean Thuermer Jr. and Thomas Dewell as co-editors. In 2013, ownership passed to Kevin Olson, then the company's chief operating officer, who purchased the company from Sellett along with his wife Shelley, forming Teton Media Works as the new parent company.

Coverage Area and Readership

The News&Guide serves Jackson Hole and Teton County, Wyoming — a valley of roughly 23,000 year-round residents that swells with seasonal workers and tourists drawn to Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks and the Jackson Hole Mountain Resort. Its readers include ranchers and real estate moguls, ski instructors and hedge fund managers, environmental activists and elected officials — a demographic mix found nowhere else in America. The paper's print edition arrives every Wednesday, and its website, jhnewsandguide.com, is updated daily with breaking news.

The paper also publishes the Jackson Hole Daily, a daily edition serving the valley's news needs on a faster cycle, alongside magazines including Jackson Hole magazine, Images West, and Teton Family. This multi-platform approach gives the company reach across the valley's permanent residents, second-home owners, and the millions of annual visitors. The valley's extreme wealth disparity — Teton County is routinely ranked among the highest-income counties in America while service workers struggle to afford housing — makes the paper's role as a chronicler of inequality particularly vital.

Ownership and Organization

The News&Guide is owned by Teton Media Works, a locally owned company led by president, CEO, and majority owner Kevin Olson, who purchased the paper from Michael Sellett at the end of 2013. Olson, his wife Shelley, and their family moved to Jackson Hole from Orange County, California, in 2001, when he became associate publisher of the Jackson Hole News; before that, he held leadership positions at the Orange County Register and began his journalism career after graduating from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University. In a more recent leadership transition, Adam Meyer — a minority owner of Teton Media Works who joined the company as an advertising assistant in 2005 and rose through the ranks — was promoted from associate publisher to publisher, while Olson stepped back from day-to-day operations.

Teton Media Works' assets include the weekly News&Guide, the Jackson Hole Daily, Jackson Hole magazine, Images West magazine, and associated websites and partnerships, plus the digital creative agency Orijin. The company also acquired Buckrail, the valley's local news stream, further consolidating local news under community ownership. Olson has been active in civic life, serving as a Rotarian, past board chairman of Jackson Hole Young Life, past chairman of the Jackson Hole Chamber of Commerce, and president of the Wyoming Press Association's board of directors.

Newsroom and Editorial Approach

The News&Guide's newsroom practices the kind of ambitious local journalism that has made the paper a national exemplar. Its reporters cover the full spectrum of valley life: Teton County and town of Jackson government, the region's severe housing crisis, wildlife and public lands issues in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the tourism economy, education, and the courts. The paper's editorial approach combines deep enterprise reporting with the daily grind of meeting coverage — town council sessions, county commission hearings, and school board meetings that determine the valley's future.

Under Olson's leadership, the paper embraced digital innovation early for a market its size: in November 2013, it launched a metered paywall, among the first small-market papers to do so, along with a redesigned and expanded website carrying all the content of the weekly and the daily. The paper's journalists have won top honors from the Wyoming Press Association and the National Newspaper Association, and the paper's tradition of excellence dates to its predecessor papers, which traded "best weekly" awards for decades. The Guide was named best weekly in its circulation category by the National Newspaper Association two of three years before the merger, and won its category seven times in sixteen years, once earning "Best of the Best" against general-excellence winners from all fifty states.

Print and Digital Presence

The News&Guide's flagship print edition publishes weekly on Wednesdays as a broadsheet, while the Jackson Hole Daily provides daily print coverage. The company's digital flagship, jhnewsandguide.com, offers breaking news updates, multimedia content, online classifieds, and newsletters for subscribers. The 2013 launch of the metered paywall — allowing a set number of free articles before requiring subscription — was a pioneering move for a paper in a market of Jackson's size, and Olson has described the philosophy as serving readers rather than simply printing copies: "Instead of how many copies we print, it's about how many we can serve. We're not just at the print level anymore."

The company's magazine portfolio — Jackson Hole, Images West, Teton Family, and others — serves the valley's luxury and lifestyle advertising markets, providing revenue that supports the news operation. The digital creative agency Orijin extends the company's services to local businesses. This diversified media-company model, which Olson has articulated as a deliberate rebrand "from a paper company to a media company," has allowed the News&Guide to invest in staffing, adding key positions in the newsroom and advertising departments even as many community papers were cutting.

Notable Coverage and Investigations

The News&Guide has built its reputation on fearless coverage of the powerful in a valley where power is concentrated and personal. Its reporting on the housing crisis — the defining issue of modern Jackson Hole, where workers commute over mountain passes because they cannot afford to live in the community they serve — has documented the human cost of the valley's resort economy. The paper has investigated development battles, short-term rental controversies, and the influence of wealthy donors and second-home owners on local politics.

Its environmental reporting covers the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem: wildlife migration corridors, grizzly bear management, public lands policy, and the tension between conservation and development. The paper has covered the valley's ski industry, the economics of tourism, and the periodic dramas of Jackson Hole's political scene, where town and county governments grapple with growth. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the paper provided essential coverage of public health measures in a tourist destination caught between economic survival and community safety. Its editorial pages host vigorous debate among valley residents, reflecting a community that takes its civic life seriously.

Community Role and Impact

In Jackson Hole, the News&Guide is the community's central nervous system — the place where the valley argues with itself about its future. In a town where the gap between rich and poor is among the widest in America, the paper gives voice to the workers who keep the resort economy running, covering labor issues, housing policy, and the struggles of the valley's Latino community. Its reporting on wildlife and public lands connects residents to the natural world that defines their home.

The paper's local ownership is itself a community statement: in an era when hedge funds and chains have hollowed out local news across America, Jackson Hole's paper is owned by people who live in the valley and whose children go to its schools. The company's journalists are fixtures at community events, from town hall meetings to nonprofit fundraisers, and the paper's community calendar and engagement efforts reflect a deep embeddedness in valley life. Olson's civic leadership — from the Chamber of Commerce to the Wyoming Press Association — underscores the paper's institutional role.

Awards and Recognition

The News&Guide and its predecessor papers have won the highest honors in community journalism. The Jackson Hole News and Jackson Hole Guide traded state and national "best weekly" awards for decades before their merger; the Guide was named best weekly in its circulation category by the National Newspaper Association two of the last three years before the merger and won its circulation category seven times in sixteen years, once taking "Best of the Best" honors against general-excellence winners from all fifty states. The merged paper has continued that tradition with top awards from the Wyoming Press Association.

The paper has been held up nationally as a model for the future of community journalism — a locally owned, digitally innovative, financially sustainable news organization in a small market. Journalism educators and industry observers have cited the News&Guide's metered paywall, its media-company diversification, and its commitment to watchdog reporting as lessons for papers many times its size. Its longevity and continued independence stand as a rebuke to the narrative that local news cannot survive.

Recent Developments

Recent years have brought both continuity and change. The promotion of Adam Meyer to publisher marked a generational transition, with Olson remaining as president, CEO, and majority owner while handing day-to-day operations to a leader who rose from advertising assistant over two decades. The company's acquisition of Buckrail expanded its digital footprint in the valley's fast-moving online news space. The paper continues to navigate the economics of local news — balancing print and digital, subscription and advertising — while covering a community in the throes of a housing crisis, a tourism boom, and intense debates over growth and conservation.

As Jackson Hole grapples with questions that resonate nationally — who can afford to live in America's most beautiful places, how resort economies treat their workers, how communities balance growth with environmental protection — the News&Guide remains the indispensable record. More than fifty years after the founding of the Jackson Hole News and more than seventy after the Guide, the merged paper continues the tradition its founders envisioned: a newspaper owned by people who live in the valley, telling the valley's story to itself, every week.