Spent a little time on the mountain: backcountry ski touring in Utah and Colorado
Date
2021
Authors
Miller, Alexander, author
Childers, Michael, advisor
Carr Childers, Leisl, committee member
Cheng, Tony, committee member
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Abstract
Backcountry skiing has continually grown as a recreational activity since alpine skiers began leaving developed ski area boundaries in the late 1930s. Placing individuals in a less managed, sometimes hostile, winter landscape creates a significant management issue for the U.S. Forest Service. This thesis examines this issue by looking back to the sport's emergence as a popular winter recreation activity. It asks how ski tourers from the 1960s through the 1980s understood the way they used land. To answer this question, it examines the development of avalanche research and growing avalanche awareness in the Mountain West, the experience backcountry skiers sought and the mentality that created, and how that mentality established an advocacy framework aimed at protecting access to the backcountry—the area outside ski resorts and away from signs of the "works of man." Through this investigation, it highlights how the U.S. Forest Service facilitated this new form of land use, what exactly it is backcountry skiers are using, and how this use informed environmental politics. Finally, it argues that through understanding how the growing backcountry skiing community used mountain landscapes in the past, skiers, land management agencies, and the broader outdoor recreation community, can begin to come to terms with the impacts of this use and how to mitigate them.
Description
Rights Access
Subject
environmental history
skiing
Utah
public lands
Colorado
U.S. Forest Service