Tag: ski

Skiing on Colorado’s Plains?

A funny thing happened this past weekend. With hardly any snow on the ground and only five miles from Greeley, people were having fun, fun, fun, and skiing up a storm.—Greeley Journal, 1971

Hat tip for image to Coloradoskihistory.com

Sometimes politicians do good things for their communities. Yes, really. This was true of Mayor Dick Perchlik, who created a beginner ski hill for the kids of his town, along with his wife Sylvia and others. They made it on a sandstone bluff overlooking the Cache La Poudre River, only minutes from town.

The purpose was to allow the average boy or girl living on the plains, who couldn’t afford to go to a mountain ski area, the opportunity to ski. While constructing the hill, the Mayor and friends found sharks teeth; hence the name.

Hat tip to Coloradoskihistory.com.
Hat tip for image http://www.coloradoskihistory.com

Read more about this ski hill in Lost Ski Areas of Colorado’s Front Range and Northern Mountains.

Another remarkable instance of skiing on the plains, also covered in this book, is the ski jumping exhibition that took place at Inspiration Point in Denver after the Big Snow of 1913. It started the craze of the extreme sport in Colorado, which went on for decades.

Carl Howelsen and friends set up a makeshift jump and demonstrated ski jumping for a crowd of some 20,000 people on January 19, 1914.

The images below are from Municipal Facts Monthly, January 11, 1920, when folks also came to see ski riders go off the jump at Inspiration Point.

2020–2021 Ski Season is On

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah and Happy New Year! Looks like COVID19 will not totally stop this ski season, even though the virus will change the way it works. You know the drill by now: keep six feet between parties; wear masks whenever possible; wash hands often; stay home if you’re sick. Also, you must have a pass to ski at resorts.

The last event to interrupt skiing in Colorado in such a way, apart from skimpy snow years, was World War II. Only a few hills and areas remained open as Americans turned their focus to fighting.

The B-Hill or B-Slope was one of these hills. It was here that the Tenth Mountain Division of the US Army’s Eighty-Seventh Mountain Infantry Regiment, which was created in 1941, trained recruits to ski. Lost Ski Areas of Colorado’s Central and Southern Mountains tells the story and gives the exact location of the hill in Eagle County.

Glen Cove in Teller County managed to stay open. The Pikes Peak Ski Club turned the area over to the military to use. In 1944, they held a military meet there. Lost Ski Areas of Colorado’s Front Range and Northern Mountains tells that story.

After World War II, Tenth Mountain Division soldiers led skiing forward in Colorado with an emphasis on Alpine skiing. Skiing had been Nordic before. What will be different about skiing in Colorado when we get through this pandemic?

2019–2020 Ski Season Shuts Down

Colorado skiers have been sans powder for a month due to COVID-19.

Governor Jared Polis said in early March that he would not shut down ski areas, but he encouraged skiers to social distance because of the new coronavirus. Then, as the resorts closed voluntarily, he issued an executive order suspending skiing for one week. That was mid March. On March 19th he extended the ban. Also, he discouraged people from traveling to the high country.

Most skiers left the resorts as they shut down, but backcountry enthusiasts just kept skiing. TV news reports showed that the parking lot at Berthoud Pass was packed. In mid-April the reports were that the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) blocked parking areas on Loveland Pass with snow to end parking along the mountain road.

Current generations of skiers are not the first to experience a loss of the “healthful sport” in their lives. World War II brought almost a complete shutdown of small ski areas and hills all over Colorado as the USA mobilized to fight overseas. The winter carnival in Hot Sulphur Springs shut down in 1940. When the war ended things would be different in Colorado; large resorts and alpine skiing eclipsed the little hills and Nordic skiing. Read more about this in the lost ski area books.

What will the changes be to skiing after this pandemic has passed? Perhaps Nordic skiing will become more popular because it lends itself to more social distance between skiers. Or, maybe skiers will have to ride two to a gondola unless they’re family members. Whatever happens, we know Coloradans will keep their chins up, be part of the national effort to defeat this virus, and find a way to ski after the emergency is over.

It’s Snowing Again!

Yippee! That’s what skiers say in 2020 with snowfalls that continue to accumulate inches.

In 1913, the people of Denver were not so thrilled when a blizzard hit the city, bringing 57 inches of snow in December alone. The city was immobilized, but there was a silver lining in those snow clouds.

Historic photo showing historic snowfall that got Denver hooked on skiing.
The author’s (Caryn’s) grandmother Martha (R), with sisters Mary Louise (L) and Sylvia Springsteen in the aftermath of the Big Snow of 1913.

Carl Howelsen was living on Sherman Street in Denver and working as a brick layer. He took the opportunity to ski around and show off his Nordic prowess.

One of the men who saw Howelsen ski, George Cranmer, asked Howelsen to show him how to ski. In that moment the passion for skiing among Denverites was born. Howelsen and Cranmer became great friends and the early ski clubs of Denver were born. Plus they set up a ski jumping exhibition one hundred years ago at Inspiration Point in Denver that was wildly popular. (The image atop this post shows the take off they built.) It ignited a passion throughout Colorado for ski jumping, which became the extreme sport of the day.

Read more about it in Lost Ski Areas of Colorado’s Front Range and Northern Mountains.

Come for a Fun Evening in the Town of Frisco

USFS Ski Poster
The US Forest Service was actively involved with early Colorado skiing.

Come hear the Boddies share about the lost ski areas of Colorado at the Museum in the Town of Frisco (120 Main Street) in Summit County, on Friday, November 8, at 4 p.m. It’s opening day of the 2019–2020 Season at Copper Mountain!

Come hear the story beneath the story of the Colorado Ski Industry. Come learn who brought the ski culture here initially. Come find out about the only American to win a medal in Olympic ski jumping and how he is connected to Summit County. 

The evening will be lots of fun and historic photos will be involved, plus you can buy copies of the lost ski area books and have the authors sign them. (They make great Christmas gifts!)

Berthoud Pass Film Event

Come see the documentary film Abandoned on Friday, February 8, 2019, at the D.L. Parsons Theater, Northglenn Community Center, 11801 Community Center Drive, Northglenn. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. The film will begin at 7 p.m., followed by Q&A time with a panel. Cost: $5 donation suggested per person. RSVP with name and number attending to BerthoudEvents@gmail.com.

This event celebrates the 82nd Anniversary of the opening of Berthoud Pass Ski Area. The film was created by The Road West Traveled, filmmakers who are helping people discover the lost ski areas of Colorado through film.

The authors of the lost ski area books will attend and be available to sign books after. Peter will be on the panel to answer questions along with Lucy Garst, who ran Berthoud with her husband; Sally Guanella, whose family was involved with Geneva Basin and Berthoud; one of the filmmakers; and perhaps a couple other interesting people who know and love Berthoud.

Hope to see you there! Please bring your friends.

CBS4 Features Lost Ski Areas Story

The evening news on CBS4 Denver on April 17, 2018, featured a story by Dominic Garcia and his cameraman Bill (with his drone) on the lost ski areas of Colorado.

Authors Caryn and Peter Boddie spoke with Garcia about the areas and about how hard-working immigrants first brought the ski culture to Colorado.

They met for the interview at Inspiration Point in Denver where skiing “took off” when Carl Howelsen put on a ski jumping exhibition in 1914.

After leaving the Boddies, the CBS4 staffers headed to Genessee where more ski jumping took place and to Berthoud, which was a beloved ski area for years—a place to ski and see and be seen—and is still skied by backcountry skiers.

The story is now posted on the CBS4 website. Many thanks to them and especially to Dominic and Bill!

 

Norwegian Snowshoes Started it All

Ski jumper on Norwegian snowshoes at Hot Sulphur Springs in early days of Colorado skiing. USFS photo.

The earliest skis in Colorado were long, wooden ones called Norwegian Snowshoes, which were impossible to turn. And so, skiers didn’t turn for the longest time; I mean, they just went straight downhill.

Folks also used the skis for ski jumping, which was the extreme sport of the day in many parts of the state, starting in 1911 in Hot Sulphur Springs, home of the earliest Winter Carnivals in Colorado. The town also had a newspaper—and a newspaper editor with a sense of humor.

He wrote an account of one wild ride downhill—fictionalized if not pure fiction—which appeared in The Middle Park Times on January 30, 1914 with the headline, “Judge Kennedy’s Wild Ride.” You can read the entire story in Lost Ski Areas of Colorado’s Front Range and Northern Mountains. Here’s a little taste of it:

There are two rides in our nation’s history that are sacredly popular. One is “Paul Revere’s ride” and the other is “Washington’s boat ride across the Delaware” on that memorable Christmas night. Thus far, our nation’s historians have not taken cognizance of a third ride. But it happened this way. Last Sunday afternoon, every able-bodied man in town was called into service to erect the tower on the summit of the hill at the head of the ski course. Most of the men on the hill had skis on and it was suggested that they coast down the hill. Among others who were on skis was Judge Kennedy of the county court. Charley Free and Ed Chatfield suggested that the Judge coast down the hill. “I’m game,” said the Judge. Charley got the toes of the skis straight in the ski trail, while Ed attended the heels. Everybody in town had at least one eye on that hill. Finally Charley shouted, “All aboard! Let ‘er go!” Chatty yelled, “All ready, skiddo!” Zip—and the chief dignitary of the county court was on his way at a terrific and suffocating rate of speed…

Miners in the southern part of Colorado and ranchers in most of the state used Norwegian snowshoes to get around in winter. You can read about them in Lost Ski Areas of Colorado’s Southern and Central Mountains.

In Irwin, near Crested Butte, miners started sharing their skiing prowess early on. “About 1886 we had a ski club that attracted much attention all over the country. We gave exhibitions on the steep hillside just south of town. We gave the fastest runners first second and third prizes or real worth usually gold stick pins made to order. Had folks from Gunnison and other towns such as Montrose, Delta, Grand Junction, Salida and Denver come to the exhibitions at the Buttes…”

 

 

 

Olympians and CO’s Lost Areas

Colorado’s lost hills and ski areas launched the careers of athletes in the United States for the Winter Olympics.

A very early winter Olympian was ski jumper Anders Haugen. In 1919, he skied over Loveland Pass to the site of the Prestrud Jump at Dillon Reservoir—the hill is now under water—to take part in a competition. He set a world record of 213 feet. The next year he came back and set a new record of 214 feet. He was captain of the U.S. Olympic team at the first Winter Olympics in 1924 in Chamonix, France.

Some twenty years later, Robert L. “Barney” McLean skied the areas around Hot Sulphur Springs: Bungalow Hill, Mount Bross, and Snow King Valley. Grand County Museum Director B. Tim Nicklas said about him, “Barney McLean, many can argue, is the best skier to ever come out of Colorado. He has twelve national championships for both jumping and alpine, and he was captain of the 1948 Winter Olympic Team.”

Maggie Armstrong skied on Maggie’s Hill at Hot Sulphur Springs in the 1960s. She remembered a substitute teacher at her one-room schoolhouse in Parshall. Johnny R. Cress took the students skiing on Thursdays at the hill. He also skied Nordic Combined on the U.S. Ski Team at the 1960 Squaw Valley Olympics.