Next week will mark the beginning of the 24th (XXIV) Winter Olympic Games. They are being held in that mecca of winter sports, Beijing, China! Well, I won’t go down that rabbit hole! So let’s go back 70 years to the 6th Winter Olympics in 1952 held in Oslo, Norway.

That Oslo Olympics wasn’t without some controversy since the IOC had approved Germany’s participation for the first time post WWII. Actually it was West Germany because the IOC did say that East and West Germany would have to be a unified team. East Germany rejected the idea so they did not participate. Anti-Germany, or I should say anti-Nazi, sentiment in Norway was still very high which led to concerns for athlete safety.

Before I delve into the alpine skiing results, some of the other highlights were Dick Button winning his second Gold medal in men’s figure skating and the United States hockey team getting the Silver medal. The final hockey match-up was between Canada and the U.S.. Russia was not participating in the games. Germany would win the bobsled competition with the United States second.

For alpine skiers, particularly Vermont alpine skiers, the 1952 Olympics are probably remembered best for Stein Eriksen and Andrea Mead Lawrence. Andrea was the first American to win multiple Golds in skiing as she won both the slalom and GS. By the way, this was the first Olympics where the GS was an event. Stein won Gold in the GS and Silver in slalom.

Stein Eriksen

Stein Eriksen would parlay his Olympic success into a long, profitable career in skiing in the United States! His good looks and elegant skiing style, not to mention his flips on skis, made him one of the most recognizable personalities in skiing history.

Andrea Mead Lawrence

I have written about Vermonter Andrea Mead Lawrence before. Her parents founded Pico and she began racing at a young age making the U.S. Olympic Team for the 1948 Olympics at the age of 15! So her Gold medal success in Oslo was at the age of 19. By the way, you can see one of those Gold medals on display at the Vermont Ski and Snowboard Museum.

There was a third skier who had as much success at those 1952 Olympics as Stein, but whose name isn’t as well known. And he would go on to have ties to Stowe!

 Austrian Othmar Schneider won the Gold medal in slalom and the Silver in downhill. After his 1952 Olympic success, Schneider came to the United States and became the head of the Stowe Ski School. He became an influential coach and Billy Kidd cites Schneider as a significant factor in Kidd’s racing success.

Othmar Schneider

Schneider became the coach of the U.S. men’s ski team and then the Austrian ski team. Due to the fact that Schneider spent his summers leading the Portillo ski school, he was the coach of both the Austrian and Chilean ski teams at the 1960 Winter Olympics.

An interesting fact I discovered in researching this article was that in 1962 Sears Roebuck hired Othmar Schneider to produce a line of ski gear under his name. Now that was when Sears was one of the largest retailers in the United States where you could go to get almost anything. Most Retro-Skiers can remember the Sears catalogs which you could browse for hours! Schneider arranged for European ski manufacturers to produce the equipment and he even trained Sears staff in how to sell it!

So how did Schneider happen to come to Stowe? Well, C. V. Starr and Sepp Ruschp wanted to host a ski race at Stowe that would attract the top European racers. So Starr offered to pay-the-way for any of the top Olympic finishers to come to the U.S. after the Olympics and compete in that race. That brought both Schneider and Eriksen to Stowe to compete in what would be the first American International race.