Fans of Discovery Channel’s treasure-seeking reality series Gold Rush Alaska are all too familiar with the grizzled, hard-working, and eternally optimistic crew patriarch Jack Hoffman, whose failed attempt at gold mining 25 years previous inspired his son to try again. But, back before he was a white-bearded heavy machinery wizard with a propensity for homoerotic innuendo (gl0ry hole any one?), Jack Hoffman was a recently enlisted, clean-cut 18-year-old military man with a beautiful young wife, Georgia Hoffman.
The photos are courtesy of Discovery Channel and were featured in the Gold Rush 2: “Aftershow Episode 3” in which Jack and his son Todd reveal there was a long history of family issues that contributed to the father and son’s falling out on screen, with Jack eventually storming out and leaving the mining camp. Here’s the clip:
Todd was only 15 when his dad decided to take his family and go mining for gold in Alaska. Todd reveals the ordeal nearly tore his family apart, and to have Jack walk out on their second attempt would have all but ended the current expedition and the show. So let’s all be thankful that Thurber (and his magical lip broom) were able to talk Jack back down!
Here’s one last image of young Jack Hoffman and younger-at-heart Jack Hoffman side-by-side:
