Where Interstate 90 crests the Bitterroot Range, and Montana meets Idaho at its state line, sits Lookout Pass, one of the oldest ski resorts in North America. For travelers crossing the pass in winter, it’s easy to see why it has long attracted skiers—the snowpack piles feet-deep and lingers for months. In March 1956, the Daily Missoulian reported a record snow depth there of 17 feet, 8 inches.

The history of the ski area is closely tied to other aspects of local history. Recreational skiing at Lookout Pass began as a leisure activity of Scandinavian miners from nearby mining towns. In 1936, they modified the engine of a car abandoned on the Yellowstone Trail to power the hill’s first rope tow. The early skiers often arrived atop the pass on a Northern Pacific train, since the railroad kept their track free of snow.

In 1938, local ski enthusiasts formed the Idaho Ski Club and, with a highway maintenance shed as a warming hut, they officially established Lookout Pass as a ski area. The facility got an upgrade in 1941 when the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) constructed a new ski lodge there, which remains in service today and holds the distinction of being the second-oldest ski lodge in the Pacific Northwest. The year the lodge was built, the Annual Report of the Mining Industry in Idaho noted that many skiing expeditions originated from Mullan, Idaho’s Morning Club with “the famous Lookout course being only six miles distant.” In 1942, the ski area established a free ski school, funded by local mining companies and the United Crusade, the predecessor to the United Way. The program offered free transportation and ski instruction to children on Saturdays over a 12-week period.

By the 1960s, the ski club had made vast improvements to the hill: stumps removed, brush cleared, and the addition of several more rope tows and a Poma lift. The free ski school could even boast that it had produced two members of the 1960 U.S. Ski Team who competed in the Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley, California. Among them was Bev Anderson, a U.S. champion who learned to ski at Lookout Pass’s free ski school when she was 8. She began racing by 13 and had won over 100 medals and trophies that she kept at her parents’ home in Mullan.

The Lookout Pass free ski school continues to provide free transportation and instruction to area youth and is considered the oldest program of its kind in the country. Lookout Pass is also one of only three ski resorts that encompasses terrain in two states. For more information about Lookout Pass see https://skilookout.com/.

Credits and Sources:

“Beverly Anderson, Barrier on Winter Olympic Team.” Spokesman-Review, January 9, 1960.

“Beverly, at last, Finds Boots to Fit.” Spokane Daily Chronicle, January 26, 1960.

Healy, E. S. “‘Year of the Big Snow’ is What They’ll Call 1956 at Lookout Pass.” The Daily Missoulian, March 18, 1956.

History of Lookout Pass, Historic Marker, Lookout Pass Ski Area.

Historic photograph of “Mother and Daughter Skiing” and “Car at Top of Lookout Pass” courtesy of the Gildersleeve Collection, Mineral County Historical Society, Superior, MT.

Historic photograph of “Skiers at Lookout Pass,”courtesy of the Edmond Christopherson Papers; MSS 066. Photo Number 93.0718. Archives and Special Collections, Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, University of Montana, Missoula, MT.

Contemporary photographs of Lookout Pass courtesy Historical Research Associates, Inc.