‘Once a Queen, always a Queen.’
By Mario Carr EBS CONTRIBUTOR
Jean Palmer, 71 years old and better known in the community as “Queen Jean,” first visited Big Sky for the ski resort’s opening season in 1973. Her trip included a train ride with some friends from her home in Saint Paul, Minnesota to Bozeman, a shuttle to the resort, and a stay in the Silver Bull condos. The 22-year-old future Queen had developed her love for skiing in the Midwest, and immediately fell in love with the expansive terrain Big Sky had to offer.
“[Mr. K] just kept going and going and going, it was unbelievable. We stopped halfway down and turned back and there was Lone Peak looking out at us. It’s just majestic,” Jean recalled with a tear in her eye, her voice cracking.
She was enjoying her trip so much that she went into the resort offices across from the Conoco and was disappointed to find that they were fully staffed for the winter. She went home and continued to work and ski, and wasn’t able to return to Big Sky until the summer of 1976.
That summer, Jean took a long road trip out to Glacier National Park. She planned on visiting a friend from high school who had moved to Bozeman, on her way back home. Her friend left her a postcard and a phone number at the post office in Gallatin Gateway, so that Jean could give her a call when she had arrived. Jean’s friend lived with five other women in a Forest Service cabin in the Gallatin Canyon.
All the women in the cabin were born-again Christians, and at that time “the Jesus movement” was in full swing. Jean herself became born-again and considered her new sisters and her own conversion as a sign from God that she was supposed to be in Big Sky. Jean’s family, including her future mother-in-law, were in disbelief of her decision to stay in Montana. However her future sister-in-law stood up for her back in Minnesota and assured the family that she was “with Jesus.”
Canyon Dwellers
At the cabin, Jean and a few other women lived year-round in a summer porch that was covered in visqueen plastic and filled with four twin beds and plenty of electric blankets.
In Big Sky’s early days, residents were categorized by their geographic location, Jean explained.
“I considered myself a ‘Canyon Dweller’… I was a ‘North Canyon Dweller’ and they had ‘South Canyon Dwellers’ and then they had ‘Meadow Muffins’ and ‘Mountain Muffins,’” she said.
In Big Sky, Jean expected that skiing would be the center of her lifestyle.
“And life got in the way, I got married and all that other good stuff,” Jean said.
During the 70’s in the Midwest, Jean saw her life being overtaken by “drugs, sex and rock and roll.”
“I went to the mountains to get my head cleared out… And I found God,” she said. Jean believes that the beautiful landscape around is wonderful evidence of God’s creative handiwork and that the mountains helped draw her closer to him.
“I wanted to stay here no matter what. I knew that this was home and there was no turning back.”
Queen Jean Palmer
By 1980, Jean was married to a man named John Palmer, a Midwestern mechanic who followed Jean out to the mountains and learned to build log homes. They bought the Forest Service cabin that she had first moved into, and the couple went on to raise their only son, Jordan. John died in 2021 and his obituary describes his company, Big Timberworks, and his dedicated service to the Gallatin Canyon Volunteer Fire Department.
“[John] saved countless lives in the Gallatin Canyon while bringing calmness and competence to any accident scene,” the obituary states. John and Jean were married until around the year 2000.
Jean and John worked hard in order to live in Big Sky and raise their son. Jean remembers being seven months pregnant and filling in as a cook at Karst Stage Stop Inn.
“I lasted six days and I go, ‘I will never ever do that again.’ But Karst was one of our biggest places because it was only a mile from our house,” she recalled.
“They had like 42 cabins on both sides of the river and each year a cabin would burn down, and another cabin would burn down… It was really somethin’,” she explained. Karst was a gathering place for her family and fellow North Canyon Dwellers, filled with potlucks and celebrations—until the Inn itself burned down in 1980.
“I was coming home from the winter fair in Bozeman… I turn the corner and here is Karst just ablaze. It was just unbelievable… So Jordan and I nursed in one of the turn-offs as we were watching it burn,” Jean recalled. The fire was so hot that it was melting the plastic tail lights on the fire trucks. Another iteration of Karst was built on the East side of the road , and also proceeded to burn down. Jean believes many of the fires in the early days of Big Sky were caused by people using propane torches to thaw their frozen plumbing.
“We all had about three jobs at that time when it first started, just to make sure [we] could all stick around,” Jean recalled of the young Big Sky community. At first, Jean cleaned condos for Jerry Pape with Triple Creek Realty. John and Jean cleaned The Soldiers Chapel for a couple of summers. John helped with the fireworks shows that the resort was putting on every Saturday during the winter. The family did a lot of caretaking for part-time residents, and Jean emphasized how people were constantly moving around with the ebb-and-flow of the seasonal town. Even the Palmers had to be out of their Forest Service cabin for at least two months of the year.
“I wanted to stay here no matter what. I knew that this was home and there was no turning back,” Jean said.
It took the Palmers 13 years to buy their first condo on Spruce Cone Drive, where Jean still lives today.
“Now I’m a hood rat,” she said, laughing. “No longer a Canyon Dweller.”
What makes a Queen
Jean has lived a life of service and sacrifice in Big Sky and has loved every opportunity to help contribute to the community.
“Some of our election days we had, amazingly, 25 people vote,” Jean recalled. She spent time as an election judge.
Jean homeschooled her son Jordan along with about five other families that she said were homeschooling at that time. Jean was very happy to homeschool her son, especially when the family would travel together as John built log homes all around the Rockies. While her son was young, Jean prioritized Jordan’s ability to go out and ski at the resort over her own, but she would still get out on the snow while cross-country skiing at Lone Mountain Ranch. Jean also worked for Yellowstone Rafting company in the summer so that she could afford to get out on the slopes more as the years went on. When Jordan was older, Jean took a job at the post office where she could bring her son to work and earn a free ski pass of her own. Jean took a full-time position around 2001 and worked for the Big Sky Post Office for about 32 years. On the side, Jean, Jordan and some of his homeschool buddies would help stock shelves at the Country Market next door. Jordan, now 43, went into the trades like his father and now lives in Belgrade.
Jean calls herself a “glorified scorekeeper” for the Big Sky Co-ed Softball League which she helped start more than 20 years ago. She has plenty of community contributions to be proud of—the Big Sky Community Organization named her winner of the prestigious Krista Mach Award for Volunteer of the Year—but for those contributions she refuses to brag or boast.
Her Queenship, on the other hand she embraces wholeheartedly.
As her son grew older and her husband’s business became more successful, Jean was able to ski more. The hard work her family had put into Big Sky was paying off and her ascent to Dirtbag Royalty was in the making.
“It was a privilege because [John’s] business was going really good, and I didn’t have to work as much, and so I skied. I skied a lot. In fact, I skied more days than I worked, which was really good,” the Queen explained with a grin on her face. That dedication earned her the crown.
“Yes, I am Queen Jean. That is true. Once a Queen, always a Queen… 1999—the millennial Queen,” she declared.
“To enjoy this area you have to enjoy the tourists, because that’s what we live on. You have to enjoy the people who live here, because that’s what you rely on. You have to be a part of the community so that you know that you will be taken care of.”
Queen Jean Palmer
Jean believes that we live in a bubble in Big Sky. She believes the community’s wholesome nature is preserved by kind and caring people. She loves the fact that she is able to walk around town smiling, waving to and talking with all of the friends that she has made over the years.
When asked about how her royal status may conflict with her born-again, cleaner-living Christian outlook, Jean said everybody has a choice and there’s plenty of responsible dirtbags in Big Sky.
She believes that the community members look out for each other and help each other maintain a healthy and balanced way of living. She explained that a true dirtbag is somebody who puts skiing first, not the partying.
“The reason we were dressed up was because we didn’t have any quarters left to clean our clothes so we’d go to the back of the closet and ‘there’s my prom dress!’” she said.
Even in her dirtbag royalty, which she described as “decadance beyond imagination,” Jean said the dirtbaggery was always in support of the ski patrollers of Big Sky and laughed about how the resort used to host the dirtbag dance in a ballroom at the resort.
“Dirtbag has always been a kingdom in our lives. It’s the kingdom of skiing,” she said.
Jean loves her nickname and the opportunities it gives her to share stories about five exciting decades in Big Sky. She says her involvement in the community is a result of necessity and survival. As the community has grown, so has her own area of effect. All of her jobs and volunteer positions have thrust her out into the public eye, forcing her to interact with the people of Big Sky.
“You have to be kind and gentle to be able to deal with the public… To enjoy this area you have to enjoy the tourists, because that’s what we live on. You have to enjoy the people who live here, because that’s what you rely on. You have to be a part of the community so that you know that you will be taken care of,” Jean said.
“To be known in a community, I think, is the heart of the long-time residents. Through the good times and the bad times,” Jean said. Talking with EBS at the Hungry Moose, Jean was interrupted several times by local friends hugging and congratulating her for her volunteer of the year award. The community that she has loved for the past five decades, just days before, had thrown a surprise party to celebrate her, showering her with love.
Jean has adored her Big Sky life for the skiing, the hiking and volunteering, the community potlucks. She is grateful to have escaped the partying of her younger days and found an opportunity to step up as a positive figure in a special place.
“It was a lot of hard work,” she said of her 47 years in Big Sky. “But oh my goodness the playtime was wonderful.”
This story is a part of an ongoing series. Read the rest of them here.
