The Ledouxs in Aspen

Born August 1, 1912, in Cornwall-on-Hudson, NY, Louis Pierre Ledoux was a colorful, interesting and multifaceted character. A Harvard grad, he became President of the family company, Ledoux and Co., a metalurgical laboratory in New Jersey. This company still exists today, and is apparently a pretty good source of cash, as Louis and his wife, Joan, spent a great deal of time traveling.

Joan brought her own towering personality into the marriage as well. She was born in Vienna, also in 1912, and attended the Schwarzwaldschule before graduating from the Reinhardt Seminar in 1937. Studying directly with Max Reinhardt, she became a renowned actress, traveling with the Reinhardt Troupe until Hitler took over Austria in 1938. Told by a friend that she was to soon be arrested, she escaped to Switzerland, then France, and finally to New York in late 1939. While in New York, she played leading theatre roles under the name of Joan Fernay. She was a lifelong skier, earning a spot on the first Austrian women’s ski team, a passion she would continue to enjoy through her eighties. It was skiing that brought her to Bromley, Vermont, where she met Louis in 1941. They would be married less than a year later. She took over the helm of Ledoux & Co. after Louis’s death in 2001, at the young age of 89. She would hold this position until her death in 2015, at the age of 103.

One of the travels Louis undertook before meeting Joan was a meticulously planned trip to New Guinea in 1936, prior to which he consulted with Margaret Mead, who informed him of what the trip would entail and various items he should take with him, and culminated his trip with two things. First, he took copious notes, intending to write a book about the trip, a tome so complete and authoritative, including observations, field notes, and diaries, that Ms. Mead made a commentary on the work, to be included with it. Unfortunately, the book was never published, and its location is currently not known.

The other memento of the trip, and of subsequent years collecting, was one of the world’s largest and most informed collections of New Guinean art, masks, pottery, household items, and ceremonial garb. Estimated to be worth millions, the collection was sold off 20 years after his death in 2001. It is now scattered to the four corners of the Earth.

During this lifetime of travel, he acquired a great love of skiing, repeatedly visiting Aspen, Alta, Arapahoe Basin, Davos, Stelvio, and others. He made these trips even though he had season passes for decades to Stratton and Bromley in Vermont.

His trips to Colorado and surrounds took place during the middle of the 20th Century. The views shown here are remarkable because they show what Aspen and the area was like during that time, in a way rarely seen. Historical images typically are taken with great care, to show the most popular spots, but these are travel snapshots, taken with a photographer’s eye. We’re brought into the same era, as though we’re skiing with Louis and Joan. We dive into the period, seeing the everyday in a completely new and immersive way. This period shows Colorado skiing at its legendary best - a place that people would aspire to visit, not because stars were there, not because it was expensive, but because of the world-class skiing and freedom of spirit in the perfectly clean mountain air. It is truly this aura that underpins Aspen today, plastered over by the gauche and supposedly urbane. Join us in this journey of remembering the life and adventures of a classic raconteur and his tremendously interesting wife.