U.S.'s oldest ski area fits the slopes to a 'T'
By Stefan Hard TIMES ARGUS STAFF - Published: January 19, 2009
There was a time, about eight years ago, when Northeast Slopes directors Steve Simpson and John Pierson thought seriously about closing the tiny East Corinth operation, founded in 1936 and today the nation's oldest continuously operating ski area.
But anyone driving past the throwback ski area on Route 25 can see fortunes have changed since those dark days and new things are afoot.
"We had some lean years, especially around 2000, 2001," Northeast Slopes Board President Simpson said recently, "and John and I found ourselves doing almost everything" at the small, volunteer-run, non-profit ski area.
"You get burned out at some point," he added.
With only two jerking rope tows to take skiers to the top of a mere 35 acres of ski-able terrain in what at first glance looks like a steep cow pasture, Northeast Slopes seems a quaint anachronism in a state replete with large, commercial ski resorts sporting high-speed lifts or gondolas linking multiple mountains and hundreds of trails.
There are no slopeside condos, gourmet restaurants, or nightclubs. No manufacturer demo parties with rock music piped through the base area. No groomed mogul fields or gleaming half-pipes.
But, for $12 on weekends and Wednesdays when conditions allow, you can ski all day at Northeast Slopes - a price and style that has for decades drawn a segment of the skiing public that appreciates the tiny ski area's convenience, affordability and homey atmosphere.
Still, volunteerism and skier visits to Northeast Slopes had waned to an all-time low around the turn-of-the-millenium. Simpson, Pierson, and the rest of the ski area's board of directors were facing the facts that the nonprofit could not continue much longer, even with taxpayer subsidies from the towns of Corinth, Bradford, and Topsham.
"We thought about hanging a sign out by the road saying, 'Closed - Lack of Volunteers,'" said Simpson.
Somehow, the threat of closure seemed to motivate volunteers into action, and Simpson said perhaps more importantly, a new generation of volunteers - many who had learned to ski at Northeast Slopes as children, came out of the woodwork to run the lift, staff the warming shack and snack bar, groom the trails, and plow the parking lot.
And now, a longtime dream of updating the ski area with a T-bar lift that would zip skiers in a sit-down position to a higher elevation on the slopes is nearing a reality and injecting new excitement into the volunteer staff. In December, after a fall of frenzied preparation, volunteers and a contractor erected the nine T-bar towers and top pulley assembly amidst a deep blanket of new snow.
Simpson sees the T-bar as having the potential to attract new skiers to Northeast Slopes, and even some older skiers who left because of the physical demands of the old rope tow.
Ski area board member Peter Keene, 66, of Corinth Corners, agrees. An avid skier in the past, he's been unable to use the jerking rope tow because of arthritis in his shoulder. In December, he was dressed in insulated coveralls with frozen breath on his whiskers, helping about a dozen other volunteers erect the refurbished T-bar towers that represent a quantum leap in capability for Northeast Slopes.
"(The T-bar) might just bring me back to the slopes," said Keene, "and we're hoping it brings lots of others."
Simpson said the T-bar has been a dream since the 1970s, but money raised for the project was repeatedly sucked up by operational expenses for the ski area in leaner years. In the past several years, the T-bar again became a serious, if often-deferred, goal of Northeast Slopes' board of directors, and early in 2008, determined board members agreed to personally back a $70,000 bank loan to finally complete purchase and install the T-bar.
A surge of volunteerism at the ski area in recent years, and the directors' offer to co-sign a loan, brought new hope to the slopes, but this summer a huge boost came in the form of a large cash donation from a former patron who apparently made the gift as one of his last gestures.
Late this past summer, as volunteers were building concrete forms for T-bar tower bases by flashlight on the hillside in the late evening hours, Pierson got a call from Leland Blodgett, a former patron of the ski area. Blodgett, who had heard about the ski area's struggle to stay afloat and at the same time upgrade, asked what the ski area needed.
Pierson, the ski area's, treasurer, half-jokingly told Blodgett that what Northeast Slopes needed was $70,000 in cash. Blodgett matter-of-factly responded that Pierson would be hearing from his stockbroker.
Sure enough, a few days later, Blodgett's stockbroker called to get bank routing numbers, and 10 days later, $70,000 in new funds showed up in Northeast Slopes' bank account, bringing to a total of $200,000 raised over the years for the T-bar and virtually assuring that the project would now become a reality.
Sadly, in September, as the Northeast Slopes board was preparing a thank-you package to be delivered to Blodgett's residence in Middlebury, the board learned Blodgett, in his early 70s, had died from a terminal illness he was suffering when he made generous offer the previous month.
Even with the massive infusion of funds, setbacks continued to plague the T-bar effort. The ski area's engineer had been sent to the hospital over the summer, and Simpson and others took over the headache of completing the engineering plan for the lift, a plan that involved cobbling together parts from two lifts, one from Massachusetts and one from New Hampshire.
Simpson was up to the task of taking over engineering and overseeing construction of the T-bar; he'd been keeping the ancient rope tow running since the 1940s, and was instrumental in refurbishing a donated trail groomer that had been donated by a company in Nevada that employed a former Northeast Slopes skier, Aaron Kidder. The tracked trail groomer was transported from Nevada by a local trucker who asked only for the ski area pay his fuel expenses for the trip. Simpson repainted the machine, which looks brand new even though it's a 1977 model.
During an inventory of parts and study of engineering plans, however, it was apparent some parts were missing. Simpson got on the phone and started searching, eventually finding what was needed from a lift being parted out in Canada.
Then, when was all was ready for contractor Craig Vance to come with his tracked erector to lift the towers into place, Vance got held up on a job elsewhere and was also called away on emergency service to help with utility pole repairs associated with December's disastrous ice storm in southern Vermont. Vance, who agreed to donate his hours and travel expenses, finally made it to Northeast Slopes in mid-December, and with Simpson and the groomer helping tow Vance's equipment up the slopes in deep snow, work went fairly smoothly and all towers were installed.
Down at the new base lift housing, volunteer Chris Renner, 28, of East Orange, looked over bull pulley parts for the new lift. Renner, who learned to ski at Northeast Slopes, helped pour and finish the massive concrete pad that will anchor the base of the lift. Renner worked summers while in college for a local concrete contractor, and lent his expertise and labor free of charge to bring the T-bar dream closer to reality.
"It's exciting," said Renner. "Everybody's been working hard to make this happen. It's been great to be a part of this."
Out in the parking lot, ski area neighbor and board member Gary Bicknell of East Corinth, touched up the parking lot with his plow truck as he came by to see the progress on the T-bar lift. Bicknell leaned out his truck window and squinted into the sun with a big grin as looked to the top of the hill where the last tower was going up.
Up at the top, Simpson struggled with fitting bolts on the final tower as others secured temporary guy wires for the pulley assembly. Mother Nature seemed to bestow her blessing by sending a flurry of fluffy snowflakes down on the volunteer crew.
The T-bar will not see service before next skiing season, as much work remains to bring the lift to operation and volunteer staff are now busy with day-to-day operations of the ski area and preparing for special fundraising events at the ski area like January's upcoming snowmobile races. But the physical presence of the T-bar towers is boosting optimism for the ski area's future.
Simpson said the T-bar could generate enough new skier visits to boost revenue to new levels that might allow one or two paid staff to be hired to run the more complex lift, expand ski terrain, and eventually allow the ski area to pay off the mortgage on the 50 acres.
"All of us want to have this go on for the next generation," said Simpson. "I want my grandkids to be able to ski here."
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Northeast Slopes, VT T-Bar update
Started by Peter, Jan 19 2009 07:13 PM
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