Category Columns

I’ve always said that my motto is “don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story!” However I would like to go back and set some facts straight about which Watson owned which house on Spruce. It… Continue Reading →

What was the original name of the Smugglers Notch Resort? No, it wasn’t Madonna as a couple of readers answered. The original name was Smugglers Notch Ski Ways. Glen Findholt was the first correct responder. Glen is a Smugglers Notch… Continue Reading →

AIG founder C.V. Starr was a successful business executive who got hooked on skiing and hooked on Stowe! But he wasn’t the only successful executive to get hooked on skiing and Stowe. Thomas J. Watson Jr. was the son of… Continue Reading →

A little over a month ago IBM announced that it was selling its Semiconductor division to Global Foundries – well actually IBM is paying Global Foundries to take the semiconductor division. This includes the IBM Burlington facility which as we… Continue Reading →

Cold weather has arrived and the snow has begun to fall! Skiing can’t be too far off. And neither can RetroSki. I plan to start columns Thanksgiving week in concert with when most Eastern (and some Western) resorts will be… Continue Reading →

It’s 4:30 in the morning as I load my skis and get in the gondola. I join a group of non-skiers already in the car. I ask them where they’re from and they tell me they’re from Fairfax, Vermont. That… Continue Reading →

Spring skiing always brings back memories from past springs. Last week’s trivia question took us back to a warm day of spring skiing in the early 1970s in some huge bumps on Liftline. One of the first skiers in our… Continue Reading →

Where did you first learn to ski? Not the first place you skied, but the place where you really learned. For a majority of Retro-Skiers the answer will be some small, family-friendly area that probably no longer is in business…. Continue Reading →

My junior year in high school my parents bought me a pair of skis. As I’ve chronicled in this column before, buying me a new pair of skis was an annual event since I couldn’t seem to make it through… Continue Reading →

What ski company made the Zebra-Ski? There were many readers who knew that it was Volkl that introduced the Zebra-Ski in 1967. The first person to post the correct answer on my blog was regular RetroSki contributor Gary Tomlinson from… Continue Reading →