08/23/2026
Today marks 60 years since the incorporation of the Town of Vail!
Pete Seibert and Earl Eaton’s wild idea to start a ski mountain with its base in a quiet sheep pasture high in the Rocky Mountains had taken off since Vail Mountain's opening in 1962, people were showing up and it was apparent that the fledgling community of skiers could no longer just make it up as they went along.
As our town took shape over the following decades, we laid roads, built schools, cleared snow, piped water, held council meetings, formed committees, built bridges, added transit, saw record snow years and spring floods, protected open space, created homes; filling in this narrow island between Forest Service Land from East to West Vail piece by piece.
Now, it’s not quite as freewheeling as those early days, but still, we don’t mind being the first. We’re not afraid to try and learn as we go. As we celebrate the town’s 60th, we have the privilege of carrying that dream forward into a new age.
Here’s to another 60 years of loving these mountains, innovating what it means to be both a resort and a town and, maybe most important, staying true to that indomitable sense of fun and optimism that started it all.
Many thanks to narrator Pete Seibert Jr. and to ART Digital Media for bringing these words to life!
