I thought this would be a good time for memories of the ski hill.  Since I have a link on the Hopedale site, some of you have probably already looked at the old ski hill site.  If you haven't, here's the link where you can find memories of Steve Rugoletti, Jim Bowen, Robert Biggs and Dick Hensel, as well as those of Robert Holmes that you see below.  I printed this out and gave it to Marge Horton (Marge Lovejoy was her name back in the days of the ski hill) about a year ago.  She enjoyed reading it, but made it quite clear than no one ever called Willard Taft, "Willie." She still has a book of the Comet Ski Club listing all the dues paying members.  Click here to go to the homepage of the site and you can find memories of many other old ski hills, most of them long gone. And now, Bob Holmes' story: Originally, the ski hill was know as Darlings Hill. [Old town reports and maps show the west side of the Parklands, above the railroad tracks, where the stone shelter now generally known as The Lookout was called Darling's Hill.] Not too many people will recall this tidbit.  Don't know why, just was. I remember the ski hill very well.  I have worked on it in the fall of the year to trim out the brush growth, very similar to the way that snowmobile trails are done today by snowmobile clubs. The name of our Hopedale club was "Comet Ski Club".  You talked about the electric motor that was removed from the engine hut, that was new in about 1950. Previous to that, there was a 1934 Hupmobile engine.  It ran very well, but the radiator was a leaker near the end of its life.  We had to carry water up to it, each time that it was to be used. Also, there was no emergency trip switch, until Donna McGonicle got her scarf wrapped around the rope and was nearly drawn into the pulley or shiv system.  Fortunately, the scarf ripped in half and she dropped to the ground, very frightened , but unhurt.  Needless to say, the emergency shut-off bar was installed immediately thereafter. Many of us learned to ski on that little hill.  "Willie" Taft probably taught more kids to ski than anybody in the world, up to about 1950. Willie always skied like a gentleman, with a sport jacket and regular wool pants, I imagine that he had a sweater or two under the sport jacket, but he was really "cool" as the kids would say today.  There were several others that made the kids feel pretty important.  Millard and Marge Lovejoy, Woody and Jean Biggs, Ben and Barbara Barnes, Warren and Maggie Arnold and others that I don't recall at this moment.  Those were some of the people that used to take us up to Mt.  Sunapee or Hogback for a Sunday of skiing on a real mountain.  I could go on for a while longer, but that is enough Oh, just two more things. The price for the use of the facility was 25 cents if you had it; don't remember anyone getting sent away if you didn't have the money.  The other thing was that we had lights for night skiing. This all took place, long before there was a Draper Field. Draper Field was just the town dump at that time.                             Hopedale History Email Menu                      HOME