skateboarding – Whistler Museum and Archives Society

Keep on Pushin’… the Man behind the SkateparkKeep on Pushin’… the Man behind the Skatepark

August 19, 2026 Whistler Museum 0 Comments

Photo: VHS screengrab of Monty Little skating the newly opened bowl. 1990. Little collection.

The 79-year-old man who designed the original Whistler Skatepark first came here when he was 17. On a motorcycle, by himself. He got run off the road by a logging truck. Rattled, but unphased, he carried on to Alta Lake, enjoyed a swim, then rode back to Vancouver.

He would return to Whistler four years later, in 1968. “I drove up to the Gondola Barn [in Creekside], as it looked like the place to go, and the first guy I ran into was Jim McConkey.” Monty Little became McConkey’s first-ever employee.

Little ran McConkey’s rental shop. “I would start early on Saturday morning at the top of Taylor Way in West Van with my thumb out hitchhiking a ride to Whistler. … After I got the rentals out, about 10:30 I would head up to the Roundhouse where I ran the little ski shop up there.”

Little usually “would go all the way back to West Vancouver, hang with my friends. On Sunday morning, I’m back out there thumbing a ride all the way back up.”

Though never a resident of Whistler, Little would later develop the Blackcomb Discount Lift Program in 1982 in conjunction with SuperValu: “a big bonus for Blackcomb who were the new guys on the block. They needed help.”

When talking mountains, Little was a skier-turned-snowboarder. In the city, he was a ‘sidewalk surfer’-turned-skateboarder – a man at the genesis of the sport. “The best compliment I’ve ever received was the United States had Frank Hawk and Canada’s got Monty Little.”

“I made my first board in 1963” with steel wheels “slapped onto a two by four.” In ‘65 he upgraded to clay ones with Chicago trucks for $12.50.

50 years ago, Little organized the first skateboarding competition in BC in Stanley Park. “CBC’s award-winning TV show W5 came out, covered the event for part of their documentary they were doing on this fad called skateboarding.” The contest was a huge success.

In 1977, Little helped form the Canadian Pro-Am Skateboard Association. That same year, Little was responsible (with the YMCA) for the creation of the “first skatepark in Canada” in West Vancouver. However, the municipality, claims Little, said there were too many interested kids showing up – so they instructed the builder to change Little’s plans from one run to two. Away at the time, when Little returned and saw the “disaster,” he almost cried. “The top of the park [wasn’t] even functional. I don’t take any credit for designing the West Van Park as they strayed from my plans.” It was buried in 1984.

Little’s reputation remained intact and subsequently co-designed the legendary Seylynn and William Griffin Parks in Greater Vancouver.

“And this is where we come to Whistler…” Little begins tearing up.

Blueprints for Fitzimmons Creek Park Skate Board Bowl. May 3, 1990. Little Collection.

“I remember the call. … ‘We’d like to build a skate park along the banks of Fitzsimmons Creek. Would you come and take a look at it?’” Little jumped in his car, early Spring 1990, came and viewed the site covered in cottonwoods and agreed to the project.

Enlisting the help of builder Terry Snyder, on August 11th – mere months later – the first skaters were allowed in the park. “The reservoir, the snake run of the bowl all happened at once.” The official opening would happen a few weeks later. This week, the first phase of the Whistler Skatepark celebrates its 36th birthday!

Little’s design for the Whistler park was inspired by the snowboarding and skiing culture – “They’re going to come down from the snowboard camp and want to play, and they’re going to want to carve just like they’re used to. So I made it a bigger park, bigger hips, so you can go way up this wave of this hip and then across … and pump your way back up.”

Skateboarder displays his talent for the many onlookers at the Skate Bowl. July 1992. Whistler Question collection.

Whistler’s Skatepark – and Little’s contribution – holds an important part in Canadian Skateboarding history. The park remains one of the country’s largest. It has been expanded (Phase II designed by Jim Barnum). It is also one of the featured stops of the second-oldest skateboard contest in Canada: ‘The Bowl Series’ and houses such inspiring initiatives as those facilitated by the Real Wild Kittens. Meanwhile, Monty Little “keeps on pushin’”!

Whistler’s Skateboarding StoryWhistler’s Skateboarding Story

August 13, 2019 Whistler Museum 0 Comments

Nestled along the Valley Trail near Fitzsimmons Creek, the Whistler Skate Park is a popular summer hangout for skateboarders and board sport enthusiasts.

During the late 1950s and early 1960s, surfing’s popularity began to skyrocket in California, and would eventually go on to influence North America’s youth culture with the music, films, philosophies, and attitudes that are now associated with the sport. Skateboarding, or sidewalk surfing as it was then known, grew out of the surfing culture during this time, and became something to do when surfing conditions were less-than-optimal.

In the early days of the Whistler Skate Park, roller blades could be found as well. Whistler Question Collection, 1993.

Skateboarding’s popularity increased during this period, expanding out of California surf shops to any place around the world that had cement or asphalt. In 1976, the world’s first purpose-built skatepark opened: Carlsbad Skatepark in Southern California. This was soon followed by the Albany Snake Run in Albany, Western Australia. Both areas had strong links to surfing culture.

Surfing and skateboarding had an immense influence on the development of snowboarding; one of the first snowboard products, the Snurfer, invented in the late 1960s in Michigan, allowed riders to essentially surf on snow. Over the next 20 years, snowboarding evolved and expanded and by the late 1980s started to become a fixture in Whistler, specifically on Blackcomb Mountain.

The Whistler Skate Park, 1995. Whistler Question Collection, 1995.

Olympic gold medal winner Ross Rebagliati was the first snowboarder allowed to ride the Blackcomb lifts. The new sport found its home early in our valley, he said. “When we were first allowed to snowboard here, they did not just sell us the tickets and say, ‘that’s it.’ They embraced the whole idea, the culture. They took the initiative to build snowboard parks and created things specifically designed for snowboarders.”

In 1990, the original Whistler Skate Park was constructed and includes the snake run and bowl that are still present today. Designed by Monty Little and Terry Snider, it integrated elements that they had developed in other skate parks in West Vancouver and North Vancouver. These elements included large waves and shapes that would encourage speed and fluid, rounded movements, a nod to the surf-inspired approach to both snowboarding and skateboarding. Monty Little viewed the Whistler Skate Park as a functional sculpture, taking inspiration from the mountains and streams of the area.

In the late 1990s, the Whistler Skate Park saw its second round of development. This refurbishment was born out of safety concerns due to the original surface delaminating, as well as the changing style and approach boarders were taking to skateboarding. With support from then-Mayor Hugh O’Reilly, the Resort Municipality of Whistler and the skating community, new elements were added to the skate park that reflected the next generation of skateboarders. These included more street elements, such as rails and grindable steel edges, used for more technical tricks and manoeuvres.

The Skate Park signs, like the park itself, are well decorated. Whistler Question Collection, 1994.

With the latest expansion in 2016, the Whistler Skate Park has become the second largest in Canada with a total skateable area of more than 4,600 square metres (50,000 square feet). The Whistler Skate Park’s popularity has made it one of Whistler’s prominent summertime features.

The Whistler Skate Park is centrally located between the Village and Fitzsimmons Creek, and open daily from April to November.