In the 1950s and ’60s, Forest Grove was in its heyday. It was a bustling community where many small sawmills were thriving.
Ranches nestled in open areas and hunters and fishermen found their way into lodges and camps along the lakes.
Around this time, a young man began a unique project.
Dick Larsen had been a skier since his childhood on a farm south of Kamloops. His father made his first pair of skis from barrel staves that he steamed and bent at one end. They were tied to the boy’s boots with leather straps.
Dick loved to ski on the hills around the farm. When he moved to Forest Grove later on, the nearest ski hill was in Williams Lake. The ambitious young man decided to build his own.
At the bottom of the hill on Canim Hendrix Highway, just outside of the Grove, is a narrow valley known as Hood’s Hollow. The road dips down to a bridge over Bridge Creek.
A little further on, the old Forest Grove Road turns to the right. Directly ahead is the hill where Dick built his ski run.
In the summer of 1962, he cut trees from the site using John Hood’s CAT to haul brush. Later, Louis Judson’s CAT was used to level the base of the slope.
The first winter the ski hill was in action, Dick and his friends skied happily down the hill but had to trudge all the way back up to the top after each run.
Dick decided to upgrade his operation with an ingenious power-driven towrope. He bought a 1952 Plymouth for $75 in Kamloops. Although barely drivable, he managed to get it home to the Grove.
He cut off the body behind the driver’s seat. The right rear wheel became the rope drive drum. Next he ran 1,200 feet of rope to the top of the hill, where he had installed idle wheels, made from car wheels. A winch at the top anchored the rope.
The 600-foot ski hill was a great success with local youth. Dick recalls the Henderson kids being avid skiers.
Ski clothes and equipment were a far cry from what they are now but everyone made do with what they had. At the end of the first winter, Dick disassembled the machinery for storage.
By the second year, Dick’s ski hill had attracted the attention of skiers in 100 Mile House. An excellent hill for skiing was available right in town, so Dick moved his towrope and machinery to the town hill.
A second car, a 1953 Pontiac, and another 600 feet of rope were added to reach the top of the new hill. Since the towrope was now in two sections, a safety gate was constructed to shunt skiers to the side at the junction of the ropes, Dick explains.
“There was a phenomenal amount of spindles and wheels involved in that structure. A governor was put in to regulate the speed of the wheels.”
By this time, skiing had become very popular around 100 Mile. A 300-foot run was built at 112 Mile by enthusiasts from Lac La Hache.
In 1970, the Ainsworth Lumber Company enlarged the 100 Mile ski area and put in a T-bar. Dick’s machinery and ropes were sold to a group in Clinton and set up on a hill across the valley from the town.
Dick continued to ski until a few years ago, using the long black skis and boots that were new in 1965. He said the skis are a curiosity to modern skiers, who are used to much different equipment.
For 38 years, Dick has been the owner/operator of Larsen’s Truck Service on Exeter Road. Once in a while, the old 100 Mile skiing days comes up in conversations. The town hill can still be seen directly across from the pull out on the highway above Bridge Creek Ranch. Young trees have filled in much of the hill.
Looking up at Dick’s original ski hill in Hood’s Hollow today, one can imagine the hard work and determination that went into clearing the slope and hauling gear to the top. All that remains is a barely discernible path through the trees and the story of how a young man’s passion for skiing resulted in the first ski hill in the area.