Tag: Dusty’s

The Bucking Bronco of Après: Part II of a not-so-Dusty-tale

The Bucking Bronco of Après: Part II of a not-so-Dusty-taleThe Bucking Bronco of Après: Part II of a not-so-Dusty-tale

March 10, 2026 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

Featured Image: The Den at Dusty’s photo. Intrawest Collection. Does anyone have any information about ‘The Den’? The Museum would love to learn more…

Last week, the adventures of Dusty – the one-time stuffed bucking bronco – from the bar that still bears his name, were chronicled. This mythic tale takes up where the last article trailed off…

The bar and bbq joint re-branded in the late 1980s, setting Dusty off from the raunchy ranch into the ‘realm of mythology.’ The now-battered-up bronco hit the fundraising circuit. He was auctioned off on Timmy’s Telethon. The buyer never picked up his rodeo cocktail champ, and that’s when Ski Patrol stepped in and ‘rescued’ him.

Dusty was set up in the Volly cabin, right next to Honest Eddie: the pop-turned-beer machine. One dollar bought you a brew-with-a-view with the dead horse.

Only in Whistler: Tales of a Mountain Town (Harbour Publishing, 2009), the book by longtime local Stephen Vogler, relays that Dusty also became a prankster. Or perhaps, more aptly, the mascot for mayhem-makers. He showed up on top of the lift evacuation practice tower, surely after going up the Pony Trail: a sky-high stallion who stirred the concerns of animal rights activists, stating it was inappropriate treatment of a dead animal. He was removed.

The bar which still bears Dusty’s moniker claims, “One of the greatest legends of our time, our namesake’s origin is as much a mystery as his whereabouts today.” But…or maybe, more appropriately, well… that is not entirely correct, nor incorrect. 

The order of operations of his subsequent adventures is hazy at best: but he did transition to ‘the dark side’. The missing-a-leg Dusty made his way to Blackcomb. He rode by snowmobile and then was transferred to toboggan. The injured horse (whose head apparently may have partly fallen off in the process) was hoped to be moved to the upper alpine, but was only able to make it to the top of Chair 2, halfway up the hill. Vogler’s telling shares many more of the bumps and bruises of the journey, including the fact that in the morning, he was promptly removed and sent to the dump.

But the story doesn’t end there… and as Vogler points out, “perhaps it’s best to leave names out when the police become involved.” And so it goes…the driver of the horse-disposing truck (again, no mention of it being a Bronco!) apparently could not bear the thought “of dumping a once-famous museum-worthy equine in the landfill” (*and as far as Museum records show, no attempt to contact the archivist was made!). The truck rolled over the old log bridge and from there “Dusty made one last jump for freedom” into the Cheakamus River. 

But, then there was the kayaker. The kayaker who called the RCMP. And the RCMP who dispatched the dive team and called in a crane to remove the horse who had “clearly stumbled over the rugged banks to its death.” The cops called in the cowboy who ran the stables at Mons, whereupon seeing the horse is reputed to have said “That’s Dusty. He’s been dead for fifty years.”

The RCMP wanted to lay charges. None were ever filed.

Back into the truck Dusty went and back to Blackcomb Base II did Dusty take his last ride. With a match, and a can of gasoline, it is rumoured that Dusty saddled up to become a blazing effigy to Après adventures and the legacy of rodeo-like-ski-resort town…

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The Bucking Bronco of Après: a not-so-Dusty-tale

The Bucking Bronco of Après: a not-so-Dusty-taleThe Bucking Bronco of Après: a not-so-Dusty-tale

March 3, 2026 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

Featured Image: The Interior of Dusty’s Bar & BBQ, 1987. Whistler Mountain Collection.

Dusty’s Bar & BBQ is about as synonymous with Whistler’s Après party scene as is snow to skiing, fish to water… or, in the memories of many locals and longer-timers: a stuffed bronco is to beers (and braless bawdiness!).

Dusty was a horse. A taxidermied bronco forever frozen in mid-buck. A stuffed relic, with an origin story that begins, however, with three different  ‘Once upon a times…’ 

The first: He was from 1920s Texas – an award winner in his time: one who had surely earned many of his rodeo riders big-buckle-bragging rights. Naturally, this would translate to him finding his ‘rightful’ place at the base of a snow-bawllin’ slope, in a bar named after him some 100 years later. Dusty’s opened in 1983.

The second, according to Dusty’s website (the bar’s not the bronco’s): “Some say Dusty [was] bred on a farm owned by the local druggist in the town of Hope. It was said this pharmacist was the best in the Fraser Valley, and upon Dusty’s untimely passing, the kindly druggist had him stuffed and placed in front of his store.”

The third: “Dusty was a Hollywood stunt horse. His trainers were forced to shoot poor Dusty when he threw a certain trailer-turned-actress into the middle of her 30’s. It is said that Dusty, a rock-and-roll horse at heart, couldn’t take it when the star stopped singing that Broadway tune. The actress had Dusty shot.” (https://www.dustyswhistler.com) 

The tales of Dusty’s tail only start there… but what remains undisputed is when he arrived here. In 1979, Dusty rolled up in the back of a truck (sadly, in a missed moment of potential corollary – or corralary – synchronicity: there is no mention that he rodeoed in in a Bronco). He was destined to be the centerpiece of the newly re-branded, mountain-base, post-slope watering hole: converting from the original L’Après to Dusty’s. However, the bar was locally, Creekside-colloquially, known as The Deadhorse. 

Much for being dead, Dusty had a lively Après-life, a Whistler ‘After’-life.

Rules, necessarily, soon needed to be put in place. Management became wranglers: if riders rode the bronco with their clothes on, they had to buy the house a round. If clothes were shed, well legends were born and tall-tales were spread from the fogginess of fact vs. fiction…

Perhaps one of the most famous stories, from which many re-tellings have been told involves a young woman in mountain management, some ‘bareback’ bouncing, a sudden supposed full moon and claims that she was subsequently fired. Some twenty years later, the woman who raised the bar – and the bar’s profile – overnight, wrote a letter to The Pique to set the riding-record straight. She was not fired, but remains known as ‘Lady Godiva’ ever since.

The bar and BBQ joint re-branded in the late 1980s, setting Dusty off from the raunchy ranch into the ‘realm of mythology.’ The now-battered-up bronco hit the fundraising circuit. He was auctioned off on Timmy’s Telethon. The buyer never picked up his rodeo cocktail champ, and that’s when Ski Patrol stepped in and ‘rescued’ him.

Dusty’s adventures will be continued in next week’s column …

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Cooking Up WhistlerCooking Up Whistler

December 26, 2023 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

While food may not be the first thing that many people associate with the Whistler Museum, the abundance of baking and celebratory meals this time of year recently had us looking at three cookbooks that are kept as part of the Museum’s reference section. Whistler Recipes, Festive Favourites, and The Whistler Weekend Cookbook all contain recipes, as expected, but they can also tell us about what businesses were operating in Whistler, who was working in the valley, and what was being eaten at the time of their publication.

Whistler Recipes is the first of two cookbooks published as fundraisers by the Whistler Museum & Archives Society’s Cookbook Committee. Published in 1997, it includes recipes gathered from past and then-present residents of Whistler and Alta Lake, as well as a few recipes from a cookbook published by The Vancouver Sun in 1940. Whistler Recipes included recipes like Yorkshire Puddings from Ann Bright, Myrtle’s Muffins from Myrtle Philip, Granny Cosgrave’s Scones from J’Anne Greenwood, and Lemon Loaves from Elaine Wallace, which we even tried making when the museum was closed in 2020.

The Whistler Museum and Archives cookbook committee, April 1997: Janet Love-Morrison, Florence Petersen (founder of the Whistler Museum and Archives Society), Darlyne Christian and Caroline Cluer. Whistler Museum Collection

The second book published by the Cookbook Committee in 2001, Festive Favourites, tells us less about the individuals who contributed recipes, but makes up for it by including food trivia and tips throughout. Many of the recipes and festive tips appear to focus on the December holiday season, with instructions for preparing The Scent of Christmas, Spiced Yule Cake, and more alongside a short history of Christmas trees and stockings, though there are also some recipes for other holidays, such as Halloween Spicy Hot Chocolate.

Festive Favourites also suggested different ways to share meals with friends, proposing a “Dine Around Party,” which is “great for a small group of friends who live close together” as the group walks over to a different residence for each stage of the meal, and providing ideas for entertaining and involving children for “When Adults and Children Party Together.”

For anyone interested in the history of restaurants in Whistler, The Whistler Weekend Cookbook compiled by Diane Nicholson in 1987 is a very useful resource. It begins with a list of all restaurants and delicatessens in Whistler at the time, of which seven are still operating under the same name today. For every recipe contributed by a chef at one of the restaurants, their name and place of work are credited. For example, Rolf Gunther of the Rimrock Cafe supplied his version of Mahi Mahi with Bourbon Pecan Cream while Toshi Saito of Sushi Village provided his Tempura Toshi.

A sunny game of volleyball outside the Highland Lodge, today the location of the Highland Lodge. Whistler Question Collection

It is made clear by the sections of the book, such as “Mid-day & Apres Ski” and “Goodies & Supplies for Your Pack etc.,” that the book caters to a population that spends quite a bit of time on the mountain. Each recipe is also accompanied by a difficulty rating in the form of a circle, a square, or a diamond, symbols that could easily be interpreted by most skiers.

The recipes and their contributors also reflect the prevalence of sports in Whistler. Dave Murray provided instructions to make his Breakfast of Champions (oatmeal with nuts and apples) while Leanna Rath and Richard Kelly of Lifestyles Adventure Company included their Mountain Bike Greek Salad and Rob Boyd supplied his recipe for World Cup Granola Bars (cooking must a family affair, as his mother Molly Boyd’s Sunshine Pie can also be found in this book).

Molly Boyd receives the plaque honouring her as the Chamber of Commerce Citizen of the Year Saturday. Brian Walhovd, 1983’s winner, announced to the crowd that Boyd was the 1984 winner for her involvement and extra commitment to the community. Whistler Question Collection

Like the cookbooks published by the Cookbook Committee, The Whistler Weekend Cookbook was also a fundraiser, with a portion of the proceeds going to the Whistler Public Library to purchase New Age/Self Help books. Today, the books produced for such fundraisers can tell us more about the people and food in Whistler at that particular time. They can also be very helpful if you’re trying to recreate a meal you once had at your favourite restaurant, whether you miss the Southside Hot Antipasto Hero from the Southside Deli or the wings that you used to get at Dusty’s Cantina.

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Whistler’s Original On-mountain DiningWhistler’s Original On-mountain Dining

December 13, 2022 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

When Whistler Mountain opened to visitors in 1966 Franz Wilhelmsen was certain people would bring their own lunch and would not want to purchase food up the mountain. Originally the only place on the hill to purchase food was Garibaldi Cafeteria near the gondola base on Whistler Mountain (now Creekside).

The cafeteria first opened during construction of the lifts in 1965 to feed the influx of workers. Run by Leo and Soula Katsuris, the cafeteria was nothing fancy but it fed everyone quickly with limited resources. Once the lifts opened for visitors, the cafeteria transitioned to feeding skiers.

Creekside during construction. The Cafeteria is the large building in the middle. Janet Love Morrison Collection.

Garibaldi Cafeteria, often known as Whistler Cafeteria or simply ‘the cafeteria’, quickly became a community hub and remained in operation for over 15 years. Many of the original members of the volunteer ski patrol remember sleeping in the cafeteria when accommodation was tight. Weekly movie nights also moved to the cafeteria once it opened. This social night was so popular that locals from all around the valley would gather weekly to watch films. Tragically, in the early 1970s the cafeteria was also home to Whistler’s first recorded murder when a 20 year-old employee was shot and killed.

L’Après at the base of Whistler Mountain in Creekside. George Benjamin Collection.

In 1969, Leo Katsuris opened L’Après next to the cafeteria. Open from lunch until late, L’Après catered to a later crowd with pizza, Greek food and regular live music and parties, becoming Le Club in the evenings. The theme nights, including Beach Party and Western Night, were legendary. Eventually the Garibaldi Cafeteria was incorporated into the L’Après brand becoming L’Après Dining Room and Cafeteria, the centre of everything in Whistler at this time. The BC liquor board required food purchase to buy a drink, and nursing a ‘plastic cheese sandwich’ kept the beer flowing.

Greek Nights at L’Après included great entertainment and even better food. Whistler Question Collection.

Further up the mountain, the hungry skier market was capitalised on almost immediately when (William) Jack Biggin-Pound from Squamish set up a Coleman camp stove and picnic table to serve soup, sandwiches and hot drinks, as well as Mary’s famous cinnamon buns, in the Red Shack at the top of Red Chair. This moved to the Roundhouse after it was built in the summer of 1966 without any dining facilities.

The Katsuris’, who along with their staff were known colloquially as ‘The Greeks’, also managed the dining at the Roundhouse where everything had to be brought up the mountain pre-prepared. There was no power, storage or refrigeration until 1970 when renovations to the Roundhouse brought ‘a new modern electric food preparation and serving area’. This allowed a larger variety and amount of food to be prepared and served, including hot chocolate, fries, chilli, stew, hot dogs and chicken. They also started serving breakfast on the mountain for the first time.

The bustling Roundhouse in Spring 1968. Janet Love Morrison Collection.

Trying to predict demand was a real guessing game, based largely on the weather. Despite the new facilities, challenges in food preparation and logistics continued and there were very few updates to the food service on Whistler Mountain over the next ten years. The food service gained a poor reputation. According to one story, when the wait time for food at the Roundhouse was long, hamburger patties were only cooked on one side to speed up the cook time. Bob Penner, who lived in Whistler in the 1970s, said the hamburgers at the Roundhouse “made your regular canned meat or tuna taste so much better”.

Once the development of Blackcomb Mountain was announced, Whistler Mountain knew they needed to step up their hospitality. Whistler Mountain Ski Corp took over the existing food venues, redeveloping L’Après into Dusty’s, and, thanks to the competition with Blackcomb, the next decade brought many new and improved on-mountain dining options.

Visitors enjoying sunshine at the Roundhouse. Greg Griffith Collection.
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