Archives West Finding Aid

William Wallace Wylie (1848-1930) came to Bozeman, Montana from Iowa in 1878 as the principal of the city schools. In1881 he became the principal of the Bozeman Academy. Several years later he was Montana Superintendent of schools. He made his first trip to Yellowstone National Park in 1880 and in 1881 he started a lecture tour on the park using H.B. Calfee's stereopticon views. In 1882, he published a guidebook to the park "Yellowstone national park; or, The great American wonderland : a complete description of all the wonders of the park". As he continued to visit the Park and took teachers on educational tours, he used tent camps to house them. In 1893 he got permission to establish fixed camps in the Park for tourist groups. This developed into the Wylie Way Stations which he ran until 1905 when he sold the business. During the winter of 1898 he went to Washington, D.C. to secure renewal of his license for the Wylie Way Stations. He wrote (sometimes twice daily) of his visit to his wife Mary at their home in Bozeman, Montana.