When Dave and Lynn Mathews and Hugh Smythe arrived at Fortress Mountain in September 1974, their goal was to turn the ski area around and make it saleable. Snowridge, as it was called at the time, had declared bankruptcy in 1973 and been put up for judicial sale by the Federal Business Development Bank (FBDB). […][...]
When Lynn and Dave Mathews and Hugh Smythe arrived at Snowridge in September 1974, the Albertan ski area was not in the best shape (find out more about how they ended up there here). The lifts had stopped operating following the 1970/71 ski season and the lodge building was described as “just a total disaster.” […][...]
In 1974, a closed ski hill in Alberta developed a surprising number of connections to the Whistler area. Snowridge Ski Resort opened in Kananaskis County in 1968 as a family ski area. A daylodge designed by Joseph K. English had been constructed the previous summer and included hotel rooms, a restaurant, and a cafeteria that […][...]
Over the past few months we’ve been sharing stories about Blackcomb Mountain and its early days of operations. Last Thursday (December 4) marked 40 years since Mayor Pat Carleton cut through the ribbon on Lift Two using a chainsaw and officially opened Blackcomb Mountain to the skiing public. This did not technically mark the beginning […][...]