Vail co-founder Earl Eaton dead at 85

VAIL, Colorado — Earl Eaton, the man credited with finding the location for the Vail ski resort, died Sunday after a battle with cancer, his granddaughter said. He was 85.   

VAIL, Colorado — Earl Eaton, the man credited with finding the location for the Vail ski resort, died Sunday after a battle with cancer, his granddaughter said. He was 85.   
    Eaton was born in 1922 on a ranch in Eagle County, Colorado, which surrounds Vail, and learned to ski on skis his father made for him, according to the Colorado Ski Museum.   
    After working for the Civilian Conservation Corps, Leadville-area mines and construction projects, Eaton was drafted into the Army and served in Europe during World War II.
    After the war, he returned to Colorado and worked in ski shops and ski areas and dreamed of developing a ski resort.
    In 1957, he showed longtime friend and partner Pete Seibert the mountain setting where they would later spearhead the development of the Vail resort. Construction began in 1962.   
    Seibert died in 2002.

    — The Associated Press