For the week of February 12-18, 2003

Welcome to
‘Willy’s World’

Photog’s a ‘local recorder of
history kind of dude’

---

By DANA DUGAN
Express Staff Writer

Growing up in Longmeadow, Mass., in the 1950s Willy Cook discovered a crated up darkroom in his parents’ house. While they were away he set it up in his bathroom.

"The seed had been planted," Cook says.

Willy Cook, center, enjoys an outing with his two best friends, his wife Crisane and fellow photographer buddy Jack Williams. Express photo by Dana DuGan

This year, Cook, a staff photographer, and the Idaho Mountain Express celebrate 11 years as a team. Cook arrived, not surprisingly at the paper, on a round about route. His shenanigans, photo archives and his life are familiarly known around the office as "Willy’s World."

After graduating from Ohio Wesleyan University, in Delaware, Ohio, Cook joined the Air Force and was stationed for three years at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Lompoc, Calif.

He also played "A" league baseball in the L.A. Dodgers organization until a shoulder injury sidelined him. But, while he was recuperating, Cook fortuitously took a photo seminar at the Sun Valley Center in 1974. He took two classes presented by well-known professional photographers, one from Robert Gilka and another from Imogene Cunningham that he hadn’t actually signed up for.

"I sneaked in the first day but she busted me, ‘You can stay if you buy me breakfast at the Western Café.’"

“I love taking sports photos because it really tests one’s skills. Exposure, composition, expression, action and, especially, sharpness are critical.”
 

Though he returned to L.A., he realized that he had fallen in love with Sun Valley. In 1976 he returned for good. "I was looking for a home so I came back here, I knew this was my home."

He set himself up as a real-estate photographer, worked in the Sun Valley Center’s darkroom and taught classes at the fledgling Community School. And he had the requisite other jobs to keep him afloat. He learned to frame houses, tiled, bartended and fished in Alaska.

At one point Cook applied to the Idaho Mountain Express. But he was not hired for, he says, "lack of preparation." In 1992, he applied again. "I was not going to be turned down again." He began working at the Express in May of that year.

"This job takes my B.A. in history and my love of photography and combines them. I’m the local recorder of history kind of dude. Those two academic loves have allowed me to carve out a niche. It’s a good job for me. It allows me to be a creative maverick but still have structure and stability."

While Cook talks about his life, his wife of 21 years, Crisane arrives at the Cellar Pub, followed by Ketchum photographer Jack Williams and his wife, Patti.

“This shot is memorable because the police had closed the East Fork Road, making it impossible to get closer to the Triumph fire in 2001. So I made a good effort in scampering up the hillside and getting on the ridgeline with the fire below me when there I was eyeball to eyeball with this pilot dropping retardant on the blaze.”
 

Cook’s relationship with Williams goes back a ways. They and another photographer, Earl Brockman, met in the late 1970s. They would become life long friends and mentors.

"We adopted each other," Cook said. "This is why we’re friends. We feed off each other." And indeed they do. Stories flow in and out of them like a supernatural current. They even sing spontaneously, though not very well, but that’s not the point. Everyone has a Willy Cook story and Williams has the most.

There’s a bit they do about nip spots.

“This photo of an eastern Kingbird mobbing an owl was a lucky one, but would not have happened had I not jumped a posted fence.”

 

"We see each other on the street," Williams explains while Cook beams next to him. "Willy being the rascal that he is says ‘How about a snort?’ even if it’s 10:30 a.m. He gets this look in his eye."

Cook is laughing and nodding. "We have a rich history of nip spots."

To "fulfill that team thing" Cook, who is a steadfast Boston Red Sox fan, has been playing in Sun Valley’s Senior Hockey League for 20 years, with his friend Terry Crawford, who also joined our gathering. At first there was just an "A" league and Cook played goalie.

When Crawford expanded, he started a "B" league and Cook was promoted to forward. "Everyone leaves with a smile. It’s win-win. I look forward to my Sunday evenings," he said.

Among his favorite memories of the past 11 years at the Express is the time he and reporter Peter Boltz were photographing the training session of the Women’s Ukrainian Biathlete team in 2001. "Unequivocally, they rank," he laughs a bit lecherously. "Great bods."

Cook is a famous ladies man. Women approach him on the street for hugs. And men backslap him. He’s the classic hail-fellow-well-met guy.

"He’s the guy about town, who doesn’t know Willy Cook?" a friend says.

Cook agrees. "Generally, I've met lots of people, some celebs come to mind, and that has been a highlight.

Another highlight has been his work in Carey. "They really appreciate the coverage, and know it’s a big effort on our part. That’s rewarding."

Talk with Cook and his cronies meanders from road trips to hockey games to hitting geese with golf balls on a driving range in Colorado.

He and Crisane have an eventful life. Married by Mountain Express employee and former Ketchum mayor, Jerry Seiffert on Halloween in 1982, they have a son, Billy, who’s in college.

Cook’s friendships are important to him. Of Boltz, who now lives in Georgia, he says, "He’s my brother. We had a close working relationship. We were a team."

Boltz sent along his own Willy World statement, "If I didn't have him to confide in while I was in Ketchum, I'd be crazier than I am.

"Willy has two qualities as a friend, which also mark his professional life. He knows how to keep confidences, and he has a steady stream of moo coursing through him.

"I remember the first time I walked with him to get coffee. We couldn't walk a half block without Willy having his named called by a passerby, usually a good-looking woman. I told myself then and there that I needed to hang around him.

"And he always went where the action was. Whenever Willy said, ‘Let's go,’ I went; well knowing we were about to get a scoop. And I'd get some of my best stories. Happy 11th Willy. I miss you, brother."

 

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.