Many Glacier winter caretaker dies

By CHRIS PETERSON / Hungry Horse News

The man who was the winter caretaker at Many Glacier for several years has died. He was just 37.

Steve Lautenbach was visiting his mother, Angelina Ruggiero, in Port Orange, Fla., when he died in his sleep Sept. 3, according to Cindy Ognjanov, president and general manager of Glacier Park Inc., Lautenbach employer.

Ruggiero is terminal with cancer and Lautenbach had taken some time off to visit his mother.

About 75 people attended a memorial service for Lautenbach held at the Many Glacier Hotel last Wednesday.

"He'll be greatly missed," Ognjanov said. "He loved (Many Glacier). He absolutely loved it."

It takes a special kind of personality to be the winter caretaker at Many Glacier. The Park Service closes the gate at the head of the valley in November and then snows usually make travel in and out of the valley difficult.

But Lautenbach loved it back there — he was all alone save for the ranger on patrol or the occasional winter visitor. It was just him and the bighorn sheep that winter in the valley — oftentimes the sheep would bed down right next to his cabin, though Lautenbach was also quick to offer help to a backcountry traveler in need.

His story had been featured in several newspapers and magazines, both locally and regionally.

Lautenbach worked summers for Glacier Park Inc. He started out as the head of housekeeping in 2003 and recently worked his way up as a global supervisor for the company.

The winter of 2007-08 was particularly snowy in Many Glacier and Lautenbach e-mailed newspapers photos of all the snow. The winter caretaker's cabin sits next to the Many Glacier Road and overlooks the hotel. Snowdrifts all but bury it.

Lautenbach had freezers and refrigerators stocked with goods, but fresh food, like apples and bananas, required special ski excursions out to the gate to pick up goods that friends would deliver.

He fashioned a wind sail so he could ski out faster on Lake Sherburne, but he still had to battle the valley's stiff winds to get back to the cabin.

Still, even in the worst of conditions, the place was a home like no other, Lautenbach said in a 2007 interview, and he always got at least a couple of bluebird days a week on the Park's eastern front.

Lautenbach didn't just keep on eye on things back there, either. He was a handyman and did many improvements on the hotel — everything from new dry wall to remodeling bathrooms. He also volunteered for a wolverine study in the valley one winter.

Ognjanov recalled a picture of Lautenbach holding a sedated wolverine.

"He was like a kid at Christmas. He actually got to hold a wolverine," she said. "That's the kind of memories I will have of Steve."