After the Civil War Jackson traveled throughout the western part of the country with his friends. He supported himself initially by pawning a watch, but thereafter had to live from day to day on the road. Jackson decided to remain in his beloved West by working as a ranch hand and bullwhacker. Eventually, however, he searched for a job as a photographer.

Shortly before Jackson’s wedding on May 10, 1869, a photographers position making stereographic scenes along the new Union Pacific Railroad was offered to him. With the blessing of his new bride, he left her behind in Omaha and began his career as a professional photographer for the railroad. After a little more than one year, however, Jackson accepted a job documenting the western landscape for the U.S. Geological Survey under Geologist Dr. Ferdinand Hayden. The following year Jackson was the first to photograph the wonders of Yellowstone.

Survey of the Territories.  This Hayden Survey photograph of William H. Jackson and W.R. Taggart was taken in 1872 at the Snake River Division. American Heritage Center Collections.

	Snake River, Idaho, 1870s. This photograph was taken by Jackson looking up from Taylors Bridge twenty miles west of Fort Hall. An example of the landscape photographs Jackson took during the Geological Survey under the supervision of F.V. Hayden. Fritiof Fryxell Papers, American Heritage Center.

	This 1872 photograph of Jackson alongside Charles R. Campbell  illustrates the conditions in which heavy equipment had to be transported around the rugged landscape. American Heritage Center Collections.

Painter

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