Wayne Lee Hamilton (Grangeville ’57)
Posted: October 01, 2025
Wayne was born July 2, 1936, and passed away on September 19, 2024. His father worked for the National Park Service, and Wayne grew up surrounded by the glories of nature. As a child during World War II, Wayne helped the war effort by gathering milkweed seedpods, which the US Navy needed to make life jackets. When he was a teenager, he won a televised talent contest playing “Dixie” on his accordion in Tupelo, MS. Also in that contest was a young upstart named Elvis Presley.
Wayne began high school in Gardiner, MT, a town located near the north entrance to Yellowstone National Park, where his dad worked as the park’s assistant superintendent. He was an Eagle Scout, musician, and track athlete who later graduated from the Wasatch Academy in Mount Pleasant, UT.
After earning a bachelor’s degree in geology from Dartmouth University, Wayne reported for Army basic training at Fort Ord in California and was eventually assigned to research labs in Greenland and Alaska.
Wayne married the love of his life, Margot, on March 17, 1962, and they moved to Florida, where Wayne took a research job at the University of Miami. They would have two sons, Scott and John.
Wayne received his PhD in geology and taught at Ohio State before pursuing a career with the NPS, moving his family near Utah’s Zion National Park and eventually writing a book and creating a map of the park. Later, as a geologist in Yellowstone National Park, he conducted many research projects, including many on the Yellowstone Caldera.
He retired from the NPS in 1996. He and Margot first moved to Gardiner, MT, and then back to the Zion area. They were married for 62 years.
Wayne jumped at Grangeville in 1957 and at West Yellowstone in 1958.
