The Smith Mansion

We passed this on our drive to Cody and I had to find out more.  I wish I could have taken more photos but it's private property and there were no trespassing signs everywhere....and that's something I will not violate so I took this photo from the main road.  Once I found out more about the property - all the signs made sense.  This house already has a sad history and the owners do not need the possibility of future liability claims if someone is injured on their land.

Here's the information I was able to find:

The Smith Mansion is located in Wapiti Valley, Wyoming. It sits approximately 15 miles from the East Gate of Yellowstone National Park. Construction started in 1973. The creator/builder, Francis Lee Smith, was an Architect/Engineer. He spent nearly three decades building his mansion, his life's work. Smith fell to his death while working on the mansion in April of 1992.

No one knows what it is when they drive by. People are so curious about the house and its purpose. Everyone in the valley gets tired of the same old question. "What is it?"

The mansion is built primarily by hand tools, handmade pulley systems, and a lot of hard work. It stands high, over 75 feet tall. The mansion is built in the direct center of the valley. All the timbers used in its construction were hand picked from Rattlesnake Mountain, in Cody. Five to seven logs were hauled out at a time, using a small half-ton pick up.