Lives

French sports journalist

Yves Montredon
Passing Date: December 29, 2015

French journalist Yves Montredon, who covered alpine racing in the early years of the World Cup, died on December 29, 2015 in Paris. He was 78. Born in Grenoble, as a sportswriter Montredon specialized in skiing and skating. After an early career in the regional press and daily newspapers, in 1979...

Olympic Champion, Face of Skiing for a Generation

Stein Eriksen
Passing Date: December 27, 2015

Stein Eriksen, the most famous skier of his generation, died December 27, at his home in Park City, Utah. He was 88 years old. For a full biography see the January-February 2016 issue of Skiing History. Stein was the son of Marius Eriksen, a skier, Olympic gymnast and manufacturer of ski equipment...

ISHA founder, ski historian

Allen Adler
Passing Date: December 24, 2015

Allen Adler, in ISHA founder and 15-year selection committee chair for the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame, died on December 24, 2015 at his home in Barton, Vermont. He was 100 years old. Adler was born in New York City in 2015. After graduating from New York University with a master's degree...

Alpine champ, EASA president, resort developer

George Macomber
Passing Date: December 13, 2015

George Macomber, national champion in downhill and combined in 1949, died December 13 at age 88. Raised in Massachusetts, Macomber raced for MIT, and was rarely off the podium. A slalom specialist, he nonetheless won the U.S. national downhill and combined championships in 1949. He was named to the...

Inventor of the nose warmer

Grace Van Hulsteyn
Passing Date: December 12, 2015

Grace Van Hulsteyn, co-inventor of the Savaface nose warmer, died December 12, 2015 at a hospice in Manhattan. She was 78 and suffered a stroke after a three-year battle with ALS. While an undergraduate at Bryn Mawr, Van Hulsteyn and her classmate Betsy Nelson crocheted a woolen nose-sock that...

Instructor, retailer, rep

Bill Witte
Passing Date: November 30, 2015

Bill “Wittso” Witte, of Lake Placid, New York, died November 30, at age 83. Raised in West Orange, New Jersey, Witte was 13 when his older brother Norman was killed while fighting in Italy with the 10th Mountain Division. After high school, Witte hitchhiked all 48 states, then settled at Bromley,...

Winter Park pioneer

Jerry Groswold
Passing Date: November 26, 2015

Denver Post story by Jason Blevins: Gerald Groswold, the Fraser Valley ski pioneer, passed away on Thanksgiving, just a year after Colorado's governor declared Nov. 15 as "Gerald F. Groswold Day." He was 84 and had been ill with pneumonia. It's impossible to overstate Groswold's role in the...

Taos Ski Valley founder

Rhoda Blake
Passing Date: November 3, 2015

Rhoda Blake, 97, who helped her husband Ernie Blake to found Taos Ski Valley in New Mexico, died November 3, 2015, after a brief illness.   Rhoda Limburg was born April 8, 1918, in London and was orphaned during World War I.  She was adopted by a New York State supreme court justice, and raised in...

Jackson Hole co-founder

Alex Morley
Passing Date: November 1, 2015

Alex Morley, one of Jackson Hole’s founders, died November 1 at his home in Bend, Oregon, of pancreatic cancer. He was 96 years old. Born in Cheyenne, Wyoming to Scottish immigrant parents, Morley began skiing at age 8 on skis he built himself under the guidance of his carpenter father. While...

Timberline veteran

Henry Bendinelli
Passing Date: October 27, 2015

Henry Bendinelli Henry Bendinelli, who first started skiing Oregon’s Mount Hood in 1936, before the opening of the historic Timberline Lodge, died on October 27, 2015. He was 91. Born in 1924, Bendinelli grew up in a tight-knit Italian neighborhood in Portland. He learned to ski with his Boy Scout...