Books for the Skier in Your Life

International Skiing History Association Skade Book Award

Skiing in Colorado evolved from a transportation necessity to a world-class recreational pursuit. The first documented use of skis in Colorado occurred in the winter of 1859. As the popularity of the activity grew, ski resorts opened throughout the state. After World War II, Colorado saw a boom in the industry along with advancements in equipment, lifts, and safety; the development of ski schools; and the opening of new ski areas. This volume includes photographs from the Colorado Snowsports Museum that illustrate and celebrate the history of skiing in Colorado.

The snow-laden slopes of the San Bernardino and San Gabriel Mountains have beckoned Southland skiers since the 1930s. Many once-cherished ski areas have disappeared, yet their history remains. A short drive from the sun and sand, places like Rebel Ridge and Kratka Ridge offered snowy escapes. Thrilling races were held at the First International Pine Needle Ski Tournament in North Hollywood, while the San Diego Ski Club boasted Dorothy McClung Wullich, the first female member of the National Ski Patrol. Ingrid Wicken, ski historian and founder of the California Ski Library, chronicles Southern California's lost mountain getaways and the vanished ski areas that introduced everything from rope tows to artificial snow.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, Lake Tahoe and the Donner Summit region became California’s first developed winter sports areas. Plentiful snowfall and newly built highways opened up the summer playground for visitors year-round, and skiing flourished. The Sierra Ski Club formed in 1925, attracting members eager to experience everything the mountains had to offer. People flocked to the slopes, visiting places like Clair Tappaan Lodge in Soda Springs, boasting one of the summit’s earliest ski tows, and the Yuba Gap Lodge, a pioneer in night skiing. Join Ingrid P. Wicken, award-winning author and ski historian, as she recounts the fascinating beginnings of this celebrated ski hub.

Located 8,671 feet in the clouds, Lake City sits on the edge of the beautiful San Juan Mountains on Colorado's Western Slope. Between Lake City and Silverton, 28 miles away, are towering 14,000-foot mountains with three nearly 13,000-foot-high passes and scenery that takes one's breath away. Lake City began as a booming gold and silver camp, complete with a narrow-gauge railroad, 4,000 residents, a smelter, and rich investors looking for their El Dorado. Today, the beautiful little town, tucked away in the Rocky Mountains, is a haven for the many tourists who come to hike, ski, fish, climb, and relax in the quaint Shangri-La of Colorado.

Organized ski racing in America started near Lake Tahoe in the 1860s when gold miners rode 15-foot boards that reached speeds near 100 miles per hour. By 1895, residents of Truckee had started the nation's first winter carnival west of the Rocky Mountains and soon built the largest ski jump in California. Today's Lake Tahoe, with significant annual snowfall, has become home to the largest concentration of ski resorts on the continent. Places like Mount Rose, Squaw Valley (home of the 1960 Winter Olympics), Sugar Bowl, Heavenly Valley, Homewood, Sierra-at-Tahoe, Alpine Meadows, Kirkwood, Diamond Peak, Donner Ski Ranch, Granlibakken, and Northstar-at-Tahoe have seen skiing styles, sports, and fashions churn through the decades, while now gone resorts, such as Edelweiss and White Hills Ski Resort, echo the memories of yesterday's skiers through the pines.

Author Lynn Arave gathered rare historic photographs to capture the majestic Wasatch Mountains - the rugged backbone of northern Utah.

Stretching some 160 miles, from Nephi on the south to Grace, Idaho, on the north, their elevations rise to nearly 12,000 feet above sea level. Mount Nebo, at the range’s south end, is a mammoth, triple-peaked monolith at a top elevation of 11,928 feet, the Wasatch’s highest. Dozens of densely vegetated and narrow canyons cut through the Wasatch. Thirteen public ski resorts, plus hundreds of miles of hiking and biking trails, bisect the Wasatch and offer world-famous recreation. These mountains were the centerpiece of the Salt Lake 2002 Winter Olympic Games and will also be for the Salt Lake 2034 Olympic Games. This book contains more than 125 historic photographs, including dozens of vintage pictures from the Wasatch Mountain Club’s collection.

Colorado's central and southern mountains still draw droves of skiers to the slopes. However, many of the historic runs and areas that were popular over the past century—some near the current resorts of Aspen, Breckenridge, Crested Butte, Purgatory, Telluride and Vail—no longer exist. Local hills like Whittaker Ranch near Eagle featured little more than a rope tow and warming hut. Now underneath Lake Dillon, Prestrud Jump hosted tournaments where Olympian Anders Haugen broke ski-jumping world records. From Lands End near Grand Junction to Sugarite near Trinidad, from swanky Hoosier Pass in Summit County to Stoner in Montezuma County, authors Caryn and Peter Boddie take readers on a tour of the lost ski areas of central and southern Colorado.

Settled by miners and Mormons after the Civil War and incorporated in 1884, Park City grew into one of the world's most prestigious mining camps.

Known primarily for its richness in silver, Park City miners also extracted lead, zinc, gold, and copper from the surrounding hills. With the town and its mines located at over 7,000 feet above sea level, miners faced brutal winters to unleash treasure for the nation. As the mines grew, so too did the town, attracting businesspeople, grocers, doctors, lawyers, teachers, and more to the area, in addition to miners and prospectors seeking to strike it rich. While most miners faced tough lives and died young, some did create legacies beyond their wildest dreams. Park City made many a millionaire, including David Keith, Thomas Kearns, R.C. Chambers, John Judge, John Daly, and Suzanne Bransford Emery Holmes Delitch Engalitcheff (also known as the "Silver Queen"). From mines large (like the Silver King and the Ontario) to small (like the Nelson Queen), Park City's early history is that of the triumphs and tragedies of mining, the ebbs and flows of the community, and the metals that made it all happen.

Dalton Gackle is the research, digital services, and social media coordinator at the Park City Museum (Park City, Utah). An American West and pop culture historian by way of the Midwest, Gackle manages the Park City Museum's Hal Compton Research Library.

Avid skiers have flocked to the northern reaches of the Centennial State for over a century. While the prized powder remains the same, the top skiing destinations bear only a faint resemblance to the resorts of previous generations. Neighborhood slopes, such as Tabernash Hill, featured little more than a rope tow and a storage shed. Other spots like Estes Park's Old Man Mountain held tournaments and contests with Olympic participants. From the Cathy Cisar Winter Playground in Craig to Cheyenne Mountain's Ski Broadmoor and everywhere in between, join authors Caryn and Peter Boddie on a tour through the lost ski areas of northern Colorado and the Front Range.

Known for its sunshine and sandy beaches filled with bathing beauties and musclemen, Southern California is a Mediterranean-climate haven for winter-weary Americans from Michigan to Maine. But for those with a hankering for winter sports, one could scarcely ignore the snowcapped peaks of Mount Baldy and San Gorgonio shimmering in the bright California sunshine. By the 1930s, skiing was all the rage, with the towns of Big Pines, Lake Arrowhead, and Big Bear Lake evolving into popular snow-sport locales. Southern California was also home to many who made their mark in the world of American skiing: Walter Mosauer, the father of skiing in Southern California; Tyler Van Degrift, owner of Los Angeles's first ski shop; Clarita Heath Bright, talented member of the first U.S. Women's Olympic ski team; Dorothy McClung Wullich, first woman member of the National Ski Patrol; and Sepp Benedikter and Tommi Tyndall, both leading the way with ski schools and instruction. These and many others are documented here in this collection of rare and vintage images of Southern California skiing.

These mailable vintage-photograph postcards celebrate Colorado's ski patrol, which has grown from a volunteer operation to a professional workforce—incorporating advancements in lifesaving techniques, avalanche forecasting, and specialized guest services. The Army's 10th Mountain Division, developed during World War II for combat missions in the mountains of northern Italy, evolved into ski patrols as we know them today. Far-reaching and nuanced, the job of a ski patroller combines long days, physically demanding work in high alpine environments, and the ability to respond to complex medical emergencies.

Since the 1930s, two valleys nestled amid California’s High Sierra peaks have enraptured explorers, skiers and winter sport enthusiasts worldwide.

Olympic Valley made a name for itself as the host of the 1960 Winter Olympics. Meanwhile, just over a high ridge, Alpine Meadows was developed by devoted local skiers and Bay Area families. In spite of avalanches, fires, floods, public opinion and the whims of mountain weather, determined entrepreneurs Wayne Poulsen, John Reily and Alex Cushing persevered to lay the foundation for two ski resorts, now known collectively as Palisades Tahoe.

In this updated edition, local award-winning author and ski historian Eddy Ancinas shares tales of the colorful characters whose exploits and imagination contributed to the unique history of these two valleys.