Believing in the known is easy, but real courage requires the ability to see beyond present realities, embrace uncertainties, and take a bold leap of faith. This visionary leap of faith—the act of overcoming resistance, daring to move forward with conviction, and inspiring others to also believe in something bigger than themselves—was embodied by modern-day matriarch and philanthropist Elizabeth Nitze Paepcke, co-founder of the Aspen Institute alongside her husband, Chicago businessman Walter Paepcke.
Without her passion to share the splendor of a quaint silver-mining town against the backdrop of snow-capped Rockies, and her vision to create a center for artistic, cultural, and intellectual enrichment, the “Aspen Idea” may have never been born.
Photo credits: Aspen Historical Society (Cassatt and Durrance Collections) | Illustration credit: Rasika Gasti
“Aspen had everything,” said Elizabeth in Mary Hayes’ book “The Story of Aspen,” describing the beauty that charmed her enough to return with her husband, six years later. “It had the mountains. It had fishing, climbing, and skiing. Aspen had so much to add to leisure, to the renewal of the inner spirit. It was the perfect setting for music, art, education — all the things that make life worth living.”
It all started with a plumbing disaster at the Paepckes’ ranch house in Larkspur, Colorado, in 1939 that prompted her to divert a houseful of guests with an impromptu ski outing to Aspen Mountain, as recorded in a 1995 New York Times article.
“At the top, we halted in frozen admiration,” Paepcke recalls in a memoir, after skiing up the Aspen Mountains. “We were alone as though the world had just been created and we its first inhabitants,” perfectly reflecting the immense potential and endless possibilities she saw in the once-sleepy Alpine town—an optimism that helped shape Aspen into a sanctuary of reflection, renewal, and creative possibility.
On a Memorial Day weekend in 1945, Elizabeth lured her husband and Chicago industrialist Walter Paepcke to return to Aspen, and together they imagined a contemporary version of the Chautauqua tradition, where learning, culture, and community come together. In Walter’s words, “The Aspen Idea was to create a place, for man’s complete life … where he can profit by healthy, physical recreation, with facilities at hand for his enjoyment of art, music, and education.” In collaboration with great thinkers and philosophers, like Robert Maynard Hutchins and Mortimer Adler, who were advocating for the revival of humanism amidst the horrors of World War II, the Paepckes laid out the foundations for the Aspen Institute of Humanistic Studies, now known as simply the Aspen Institute.
From “Preservation Pioneer” to “Grand Dame of Aspen,” people have eloquently described her unforgettable contributions and exemplary leadership in many ways. Elizabeth Paepcke is remembered not only for her consummate grace and sophistication but also for her unwavering strength and conviction in the face of resistance. She dared to be opinionated and uncomfortable, standing firm in her vision even when it challenged convention.
“You persuaded many to recover from the needless slaughter of millions of men against men in WWII,” wrote Sarah Pletts, co-founder of the Sarah Pletts Dance Theatre, Ltd., in a public letter to her friend. “And like you, Elizabeth, we must dare to be uncomfortable.”
“Her style was to hold strong opinions and to raise expectations to her standard,” recalled David McLaughlin, former Aspen Institute chairman, in a tribute.
For instance, against the growing industrial spirit of work and consumerism in America, Elizabeth maintained a more holistic view of leisure. For her, it was not an idle indulgence but a pursuit of the mind and spirit. “It should concern itself with those things we do to replenish the spirit, such as listening to music, watching good films or theater, taking part in discussions of politics and ideas,” she wrote. “It is the opposite of killing time.”
In Her Musical Era
If it were not for Elizabeth, the Aspen Music Festival and School might never have existed, and the world would have never known the unforgettable magic of musicians playing melodic instruments in the fresh air of the Rockies.
According to a 1994 New York Times article, Aspen, CO, was put on the cultural map in 1949 when Walter Paepcke invited the Budapest String Quartet to perform in honor of his wife Elizabeth’s birthday. That intimate celebration led to a larger vision when Paepcke organized the Goethe Bicentennial Festival in 1949, convening global thinkers, artists, and leaders to mark the 200th birthday of German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Among them were luminaries such as Albert Schweitzer and Arthur Rubinstein, both of whom attended the festival at Elizabeth Paepcke’s personal appeal through letters and phone calls.
The success of the Bicentennial was so profound that both musicians and students were eager to return the following summer. Recognizing this enthusiasm, the Paepckes established a music school by the end of the summer of 1949—the Aspen Music Festival and School. Since its founding, the school has attracted some of the most talented students from around the world, cementing Aspen’s reputation as a premier destination for musical education and performance.
In Her Artistic Era
If it were not for Elizabeth, both the Container Corporation of America (CCA) and the town of Aspen might never have achieved their reputations as beacons of modernist design and artistic innovation. Joseph Malherek, in his book Free-Market Socialists, notes that it was Elizabeth who cultivated Walter’s interest in both philanthropy and the modernist art movement, and persuaded him to embrace Bauhaus principles and “good design” as a fundamental business strategy. She made a habit of sharing the German commercial design journal Gebrauchsgraphik with him, eventually convincing Walter to refashion CCA’s public image through institutional advertising featuring modernist artists like Herbert Bayer, Jean Hélion, and Man Ray. As historian Victor Margolin noted, Walter understood that this connection to modern art was more than just philanthropy—it was a calculated business decision that elevated CCA’s public image at a time when trust in big corporations was dwindling.
Elizabeth’s influence extended beyond business into Aspen’s transformation into a cultural and artistic hub. According to a memoir by artist and interior designer Marcia Weese, it was Elizabeth who befriended and invited Bauhaus leaders like Herbert Bayer and Laszlo Maholy-Nagy to Aspen. After succeeding in charming Bayer over lunch in New York, she collaborated with him to oversee the design of the Aspen Institute campus and work on projects such as the makeover of the Hotel Jerome. She also helped bring Franz Berko to the Institute as its in-house photographer, ensuring that Aspen’s visual identity reflected the modernist ideals she championed. The magnetic pull of Aspen, shaped in large part by Elizabeth’s artistic sensibilities, attracted many of Chicago’s design elite, further cementing the town’s reputation as a place where art, architecture, and intellectual discourse thrived.
In Her Environmental Era
If it were not for Elizabeth Paepcke’s growing concern over the environmental impact of Aspen’s rapid development, the Aspen Center for Environmental Studies (ACES) may have never come to life. Following the death of her husband, Walter, in 1960, Elizabeth remained deeply engaged in shaping Aspen’s future. Recognizing the missing “connection between the human and natural world,” she sought a way to ensure that environmental education, conservation, and a deep relationship with nature remained central to Aspen’s identity. The answer came in 1968 with the founding of ACES at Hallam Lake.
An Aspen Times article later described ACES as “a magic show for children, a school for the ecologically curious, a meeting place for environmentally minded groups, a hospital for injured wild animals, and a refuge for tired Aspen professionals on a lunch break.”
Elizabeth’s commitment to the project was hands-on. “Every year, I worked on it,” she recalled in 1989. “Friends would come to see me. I wore a male shirt and pink bloomers, and I would be up there with a shovel, heaving manure down over the slopes in order to fertilize the land so we could grow plants and flowers.”
A year later, she deepened her legacy by donating her own twenty-five-acre property on the north side of town as ACES’ headquarters and as a protected natural preserve. Decades later, it remains a treasured retreat and a testament to her unwavering belief in harmony between nature and human progress.
What Elizabeth imagined as a sanctuary of reflection and renewal nonetheless evolved unevenly. “A good deal of courage, imagination, and shared guts was needed to do such a thing in a sleepy, almost dead little town in the high Rockies,” she once said. “And the goal was to make something better than what was begun. My sorrow now lies in the fact that people have come to Aspen to make money. My heart is broken.” Her disappointment underscores a deeper truth: Aspen, and the Institute at its best, was never meant to be defined by glamor, but by purpose.
When asked in a 1978 interview, “Are you glad that you’ve done it?” Elizabeth promptly responded, “Yes, of course, it has enriched my life. What else could I say?”
Elizabeth Paepcke didn’t just imagine a better Aspen—she envisioned a more inspired world, where music nourishes the soul, art shapes identity, nature is preserved, and ideas have room to breathe. Her visionary leadership exemplified the courage to believe in what did not yet exist, and the foresight to connect extraordinary individuals, like Albert Schweitzer and Herbert Bayer, in service of a greater good. By seeing possibilities where others saw limitations and acting with intention to build something enduring, she helped shape not only a town but a global platform for intellectual cross-sector dialogue. Today, her spirit lives on in the Aspen Institute’s ongoing mission to convene changemakers, foster dialogue, and imagine a future where culture, nature, and ideas thrive in harmony.
