Sunday · January 23 · 1938
Two coaches and two combination baggage cars, over a hundred skiers aboard, skis rented on the train and waxed in the baggage car. It lost money. They ran it again anyway.
| Date of travel | Sunday, Jan. 23, 1938 |
| Consist | 4 cars |
| Skiers carried | 125 |
| Sponsor | Junior Chamber of Commerce |
| Organised by | Sam Stephenson Jr. |
| Snow on the ground | About 3½ feet |
The train was the Junior Chamber of Commerce’s idea and Sam Stephenson Jr.’s organising, and it did something no amount of advertising had managed: it put a hundred Great Falls people on a mountain sixty-eight miles away, all on the same morning, and got them home again.
It was not a lift-served ski area they were going to. There was no lift anywhere in the Little Belts in January 1938 — the first rope tow was still a winter away. What Neihart had was gulches, a schoolhouse hill, a mine road, and a cut through the timber along the power line. What the train had was a baggage car fitted out as a ski shop, where Jack Throckmorton — then working for Morris Sporting Goods — waxed skis on the way up.
The mayor of Neihart met the party at the station and offered them the run of the town. On the way home the ski shop became something else: a hideaway for skiers who had partied too hard, and, by the light of the cars’ kerosene lamps, the setting for a mock wedding.
“A hideaway for skiers who partied too hard.”
Great Falls Tribune, March 17 1988 — on the return leg
Two ski trains ran that season and both lost money. By February 27 the club had switched to a chartered bus — and that bus went further than the train ever had, past Neihart and up to the top of Kings Hill, dropping skiers at their favourite slides. The fare was about $1.75 and the equipment followed in a truck donated by Home Oil.
That bus, not the train, is the first documented organised trip to the ground the ski area still stands on.
StatedContemporary clippings in SCRAP-HASTERLIK-01; car count, headcount, fare and the baggage-car ski shop from NEWS-1988-03-17-TRIB, credited there to research by Donna Wahlberg| Date | Movement | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Winter 1937-38 | Reider Byfuglin, instructor to the Great Falls Recreation Association, gives the first public ski classes in the city — free, on a hill southwest of town, sponsored jointly by the club, the Recreation Association and the WPA | — |
| c. Jan 1938 | The CCC camp on Belt Creek, eight miles beyond Monarch, is opened to Great Falls skiers. CCC workers build a temporary ski jump at the club’s request; Capt. E. Brinkman commands the camp | Byfuglin jumps 122 ft before ~350 spectators |
| Sun, Jan 23 1938 | The first ski train runs to Neihart | Lost money |
| c. late Jan 1938 | The Great Falls Ski Club holds its first meeting. Temporary officers: Sam Stephenson Jr., Jim McFarland, Bill Bertsche | Club formed |
| c. Feb 1938 | Organisation “perfected.” Permanent officers elected; a committee appointed to choose a name and an emblem; dues set at $1, payable at Morris Sporting Goods | Incorporation voted |
| Sun, Feb 27 1938 | A chartered bus runs to the top of Kings Hill, dropping skiers at their favourite slides. Byfuglin lays out several runs and builds a jump at Neihart | Fare ~$1.75 |