June 22, 2025 • 66 mins
What happens when a 17-year-old joins ski patrol in 1967 and stays for more than four decades? Steve Rolfe's journey through 42 years of Pacific Northwest ski patrol reveals not just his personal story, but the fascinating evolution of mountain safety, leadership, and ski area management. (Part 1 of 2; Friend Shirley Cummings in audience)
The PNWD History Project: Shirley Cummings, the official history project coordinator, (& all around fabulous lady), has been on a mission: Collect and assemble an archive of stories and pictures from the different ski patrols within the Pacific Northwest Division. Hence, Patroller Chats was born!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Murphy (00:00):
Today with us we have Steve Rolfe, who, like I said, I
have never met before, and wealso have the lovely Shirley
Cummings.
Jodie (00:09):
The amazing Shirley.
Murphy (00:10):
Cummings, yeah, who's been around and runs the History
Project, and our podcast is anoffshoot of the History Project,
because we're trying to capturesome of the history of longtime
patrollers that have been inthe Pacific Northwest Division
for ages, and we have had somegreat interviews.
We already have interviewedShirley, who was really nice,
(00:34):
and we do these from time totime.
So today we've got Steve Rolfe.
So, steve, introduce yourself,tell the listeners a little bit
about yourself.
What's your NSP number?
Do you have a national number?
Where did you patrol?
Because I don't think you'recurrently patrolling, but where
did you patrol?
(00:55):
How long did you patrol?
Give us some background.
Steve Rolfe (01:00):
So started in 1967, I think it was, and I was 67.
I must have been by the time Ithink I got involved I was 17.
So but then my first year, andI remember meeting Shirley
(01:22):
Cummings.
I think she was also acandidate at the same time.
Is that right, shirley?
Shirley Cummings (01:28):
In 60 what.
Steve Rolfe (01:30):
Well, I think my first year actual patrolling was
68, but I started training in60, getting all my first aid
stuff before I even started.
And I was a junior in highschool when I got started the
first aid stuff and a senior inhigh school when I got started
the first-aid stuff and a seniorin high school when I joined
the patrol.
Shirley Cummings (01:48):
I think I joined in 67, but I don't know
what I was.
Steve Rolfe (01:54):
I don't remember I'm pretty sure we were in the
same class and there were 30candidates, which is a very
large number for a small patrollike Hayek Yep.
I was quite sure, being thestupid, stupid kid, that there
was only going to be.
Oh, and they had to vote to theentire patrol that voted on who
was to become a member.
Murphy (02:15):
So you're saying it was like Survivor you?
Steve Rolfe (02:18):
know Survivor.
Murphy (02:18):
Ski Patrol.
Steve Rolfe (02:21):
I never thought of it that way.
We were much more democratic inthose days.
The patrol ran itself quasiindependent of the area.
We elected our own directorsand all those things.
I was quite sure there wasgoing to be 29 patrollers and I
(02:42):
wasn't going to make it, butsomehow I did.
And in fact and I've told GaryBurke this Gary was the director
of the patrol at the time andGary pulled me aside one day and
he said Steve and I can'tremember precisely what it was,
but it was he says someone hasmentioned something about you
(03:03):
and I said oh, what is it?
Can I you know?
What can I do?
He says oh, don't you know.
And I said well, just do a goodjob.
Well, who is it?
Can I apologize to him?
No, I'm not going to say any ofthat.
He said well, what do I do?
Just do a good job in control.
Well, I just about fell out ofthe chair when he told me this,
(03:27):
and he doesn't remember itbecause I mentioned it to him
before, but I later figured outwho it must have been.
There was one person who neverreally liked me, but in any
event, I somehow got on thepatrol and that was the
beginning of 42 years of patrolis one of the most important
part of my life, as I'm sure itis for thousands and thousands
of others Even today.
Some of my closest friends arepeople that I met, some of them
(03:51):
at H and many at CrystalMountain, where I was a
patroller for many years.
Murphy (03:57):
Anyway, yeah, so when did you move or migrate to
Crystal?
So when did you move or migrateto Crystal?
Steve Rolfe (04:03):
So it was a kind of a multi-step process.
I got a job as a ski instructorwhich is itself at WH Ski
School, which is legendary forbeing pretty crazy and so I did
that.
I would patrol at Hayek andthen I would go over to Crystal.
Then the next year, I believe Idid that for a year.
(04:25):
So I think in the beginning ofmy fourth year as a patroller, I
got a job as a pro patroller atCrystal.
So I rather foolishly took aquarter off a winter quarter off
from school and I was studyingatmospheric sciences at the time
.
I thought, oh, this is greatpractical stuff.
But it required me to take anextra two quarters, so I didn't
(04:52):
graduate until spring of thefollowing year.
If I had been smarter and takenthe next year off, it would
have been a lot better.
But in any event, there'salways these serendipitous
things that occur as a result ofthat.
But I did avalanche control,which is what I really wanted to
do, and it taught me a verypowerful lesson.
(05:13):
The year that I worked was anear record year.
I don't have the records forsnow for crystal, but I do
remember it was probably over200, 220 inches of snow on the
ground, so it was probably atleast 600, 700 inches of snow
and Paradise had about 960inches of snow.
(05:35):
So I did avalanche controlevery week, sometimes several
times a week, and we had to beITD OBD that's.
And I can remember that 53years later, in the boots out
the door at six in the morningand I'm not a morning person, so
this was hell.
Anyway, it taught me to getback to the lesson.
I did not want to workphysically that hard for a
(05:56):
living.
I knew I needed to get back toschool and get my degree and
find some job where I didn'thave to be totally exhausted all
day long.
Murphy (06:08):
Anyway.
All right, so I'm going tointerrupt you here.
So what's your NSP number?
Do you still remember what thatis?
Steve Rolfe (06:14):
I don't know my number but I can tell you my
national number is 5450.
Murphy (06:20):
Oh dang, I get no beer out of that one.
All right, when did you getthat national appointment?
Remember what year?
Steve Rolfe (06:30):
Probably in the late, probably somewhere between
76 and 78.
Yeah.
Murphy (06:38):
All right, so we'll have to look up your number and see
where you are.
I'm always amazed because mynumber's in the 25 and I see
these people that have like fourdigit numbers.
Steve Rolfe (06:47):
I'm like, oh man yeah, well, I, I have friends
that have much lower numbersthan me, uh, and uh, some of
them are even still upright, but, um, I was chairman, you know.
So my connection to hay, toHyak, didn't end when I moved to
Crystal.
I still was very involvedbecause of Gary Burke and
(07:10):
because of Bill Brockway andothers.
But in Roger Gregory I was veryinvolved with Ski Patrol Rescue
Team and when Roger got himselfpromoted to the division
director, he had been the chairof the Ski Patrol rescue team.
He appointed me and I think atthat time I was 28 years old, so
(07:31):
I was, I guess.
I worked hard, didn't know whatI couldn't do, and they promoted
me to a job that I you know whoknows.
Anyway, I think I did a goodjob, but it was an awesome
position because I was not arescuiter.
At that point there was abouteight or nine guys that were 10
(07:52):
to 15 years older than me whowere really the guys that ran
the place, and what impressed meis they let me be the director.
They had the grace and theconfidence in me to let me run
the place and I also had thegood sense not to interfere with
them when they actually ran arescue.
(08:14):
It taught me immense aboutleadership and how followership
and leadership and how thetransitions can work in the
field and whatever.
I even had a lecture on thissubject once when I was still
doing search and rescue stuff.
Now that's.
Jodie (08:33):
SPART, spart, yes.
Steve Rolfe (08:39):
And that stood for First.
It was called Calamity PassArea Rescue Team and it had been
started by oh I can't think ofthe guy in the mid-60s, because
there was a lot of rescues andsome of the guys on ski patrol
were also members of MountainRescue Council at the time.
I guess it's Seattle SMR now.
(09:00):
And so when a rescue wouldhappen outside the ski area, a
bunch of ski patrollers whomight also be mountain rescue
types would go off and handlethe rescue.
So we organized as aspecialized team and Gary Burke
was very instrumental.
(09:20):
He never was a director, but hewas the guy that he pushed.
He pushed several people up tothe front to be the director.
Murphy (09:29):
So he didn't have to do it.
Steve Rolfe (09:33):
A rather sharp guy, as we like to say.
Gary has many qualities.
That was definitely one of hisbest.
Murphy (09:40):
Yes, so why did you join the ski patrol so?
Steve Rolfe (09:44):
you said you were 17 when you started.
Yes, so I started skiing when Iwas 10 and it became a family
thing and that's a whole longstory.
But I can't remember if I was14 or if I was 16.
My parents moved, or we allmoved to Huntsville, Alabama for
three years, from the time Iwas 14 to 16.
(10:05):
So 14, 15, and 16.
And we actually came back inthe winter and I actually skied
at least during Christmas inthose years, so I never missed a
year skiing.
Jodie (10:17):
And when I came, back.
Steve Rolfe (10:18):
I knew that I wanted to be on ski patrol.
Ski patrol and the image I havein my head that created my
desire was seeing some guy whowas probably several years older
than me but still in highschool, wearing a vest, going up
one of the rope toes at skiacres, sideways pushing the snow
(10:41):
out of the way and lookingreally cool.
Sideways pushing the snow outof the way and looking really
cool.
I just thought that was reallycool and I knew I could do that.
And so I went over to that samemotel and pushed the snow out
of the way and I thought I cando this, I want to get on it.
And also by that time I was awater safety instructor.
I'd had many years of swimming.
I worked at the YM's.
(11:01):
No, I'd worked for the RedCross as a volunteer doing stuff
in the summer.
So it was not much of a reachto finish the Red Cross classes
and become a ski patroller.
Murphy (11:16):
So did you go all right back in the day?
I'm going to ask, did they haveOEC?
What was it called back then?
Steve Rolfe (11:22):
Long before OEC.
Murphy (11:24):
So wasn't it like Winter Rescue?
Steve Rolfe (11:28):
No, no, no, no, no.
The Red Cross taught twoclasses, basic and advanced Red
Cross, and I can't remember ifit was the green book or the
gray book, but when we wereyoung it was always well.
I learned with the gray book orwhatever it was meaning you were
really old.
You were young, it was alwayswell, I learned with the gray
book or whatever it was meaningyou were really old.
But I think it was like a 15hour class and a 35 hour class,
(11:52):
you know, and surely I had tohave gone through the exact same
thing.
So she may remember better.
But I remember I went to theold Bellevue City Hall Somehow.
I I don't even know how I foundout about a free internet, but
I went to the old Bellevue CityHall a couple of nights a week
and there that's where I metGeorge Whitman, who was
(12:15):
assistant chief of police, whowould later become the division,
region and division director,and he taught some of the
classes.
And here's an aside I'm thisnaive kid in high school and
George, who looks who was a cop,but a nice, genial cop officer,
(12:36):
friendly, okay, nice guy.
But he pulls me aside one day.
He says, steve, would you liketo see some illegal drugs?
And we're sitting in thechamber of this Bellevue City
Hall.
Okay, so would you like to seesome?
And I go.
And I'm going like, is this atrick, you know?
(12:57):
And I go, okay, you know, andI'm the youngest guy in this
class.
Everybody else is an adult.
So he goes to his office, pullsout a briefcase and he opens it
up and there is a cornucopia ofdrugs and he's showing me all
this stuff totally out ofcharacter for him.
It was only later that Idiscovered that he had been an
(13:18):
undercover cop for a number ofyears and had specialized in
illegal drugs.
So that's why he was an expert.
And you know, it's funny.
I'm sure he would neverremember that, but it's funny
how those little things come tomind.
Murphy (13:34):
Make an impression on a young man.
Steve Rolfe (13:36):
Yeah, he also told me not that time but later that
when he was undercover he had abig party at his house with a
bunch of FBI agents and othersand he was growing a pot plant
on his deck.
So he had this.
There was dozens of policepeople there and this would have
been in the mid-60s, I thinkmid to late 60s.
(13:58):
He's got this big pot, plantthis, you know, standing head
tall, and not a single one ofthem recognized it.
Murphy (14:06):
That's a rather large tomato plant you have there um,
yeah, and george and I had a.
Steve Rolfe (14:13):
He taught emt classes for many years and I was
uh the ski patrol rescue team.
Uh, uh, did all the umevaluating his stuff.
We had a contract with him, sofor two decades I was involved
as an EMT as well.
Murphy (14:30):
Okay, so what, I guess your positions with the patrol?
Let's start out at Hyak.
What did you do there?
Were you patrol director Startout?
I mean, where'd you?
Steve Rolfe (14:42):
I was a 17-year-old kid.
Murphy (14:46):
Right.
Steve Rolfe (14:47):
Tried not to get himself thrown off the patrol by
doing dumb things that I didn'teven know were dumb.
And I succeeded.
I just succeeded in not doingthe dumbest things that would
get you thrown off.
But and, and you know, I madesome very long friends, good
friends, and so I didn't.
(15:09):
I had no leadership positions,I was the kid.
Shirley Cummings (15:13):
You were my senior trainer, well, maybe.
Steve Rolfe (15:19):
Well then, you must've got your seniors a year
after me, but that could be.
But at least the first twoyears was all I could do, just
to figure out which end is up.
Work really hard because I wastotally motivated.
Didn't know what it was about,but I just worked as hard as I
could to be as best a patrolleras I could.
(15:42):
Tell them about the day youforgot your boot, as best a
patroller, as I could Tell themabout the day you forgot your
boot.
Oh, you know.
So Sandy March.
Every time he sees me, he patsme on the head.
I didn't forget my boots, butthis must have been 1970, maybe
69 or 70.
And that whistle is my wifewith the tea kettle.
Murphy (16:04):
Sure.
Steve Rolfe (16:04):
John Mulholland.
This is a lot of ancienthistory.
John Mulholland invented thefoam ski boots, okay.
And so what he did is he boughtthese old Lang boots, but we
took the liner out, put awetsuit footy in it and then
(16:25):
poured foam in, and then you hadthis custom foam fit boot,
which was the name of hiscompany.
And so my brother and I wentdown to ONU on a probably Friday
night.
My parents let us do this.
It's kind of bizarre, but wespent the night out on first
Avenue in downtown Seattle,sleeping out, sleeping on first
(16:50):
Avenue, with a couple hundred ofour newest best friends.
So we could get in the store ateight o'clock in the morning
and ran in, bought these old,these Lang boots, and and then I
took them over to Johnmulholland's place in bellevue
and we had foam boots.
Well, my brother and I ended upwith the same size boots and
(17:13):
they're black.
And so one day I uh, picked up,on friday night, I picked up
two left boots, and I didn'tnotice it till I got to hayek
where my brother was teaching atAlpenthal.
So somehow, through a series ofphone calls, we figured this
out and traded boots.
I can't remember.
Jodie (17:39):
Oh temporary pause while we get them back on the internet
.
Steve Rolfe (17:45):
Remember I had.
Jodie (17:46):
Oh, we froze for just a minute, it's okay, we'll just
have a backup, just a little bit.
Murphy (17:51):
Okay, you're at the point where you had two left
boots.
Your brother had two rightboots.
Jodie (17:59):
Actually, I think we're going to have Steve.
If you want to take off yourvideo, it might help your
bandwidth.
It might I'm not quite sure 36.
We'll wait till he gets himback care so surely, while we're
(18:19):
waiting, for what other funnystories do you have about Steve?
Shirley Cummings (18:25):
I, you know, there was no Queens chair when I
was doing the senior trainingand Steve thought it'd be a good
idea if we climbed that hugebowl.
And so Wally Costello and, Ithink, ron Wu and Steve they
start hiking up the mountain andI am behind them and I got to
(18:52):
the top and all day long for therest of the skiing we could see
these lovely three sets of S'sin the bowl and then we could
see mine, s, s, s and a big G,and that was where I took the
spill and they were oh, you cando it, shirley.
(19:17):
I mean I was going throughcreeks trying to keep up with
these three, my tongue hangingout, just chugging and chugging.
Anyway, they were goodtaskmasters.
Murphy (19:32):
Wow, ssg.
Jodie (19:40):
Did Steve give an abbreviation All day long?
Shirley Cummings (19:43):
they looked at it and reminded me oh well,
that must be you surely stevewas talking about something
about an abbreviation.
Jodie (19:53):
Was there something about snow in boots out the door or
something an abbreviation?
Or did I misunderstand that?
Murphy (20:01):
ITB.
Jodie (20:03):
ITB what's that.
Murphy (20:04):
Right in the boots.
Shirley Cummings (20:06):
Yeah, out the door.
Murphy (20:07):
And then out the door OTD.
Jodie (20:10):
Oh, okay, hey, Steve's going to be coming back on.
Just keep your video off.
I think that will help you.
Steve, you're muted right atthe moment, but that will
probably help your bandwidth.
Just have to unmute yourself.
Steve Rolfe (20:31):
What happened is my computer.
This is the second time Ibought a new computer and I
haven't hooked it up yet.
This is the second time duringthe Zoom meeting that this has
happened in a month.
I apologize, and it probablywon't happen again, for—.
Jodie (20:45):
Don't apologize, but if you need, to just take your
video off.
Steve Rolfe (20:50):
I don't think that—well, that might be it.
No, that's all right, it's upto you.
It's up to you, okay.
So anyway, where was I at?
Anyway, so I—.
Murphy (20:59):
You had two left boots.
Your brother had two rightboots.
He was teaching at Alpintal.
Steve Rolfe (21:03):
And so that story, you know, you can either be
upset by it or embrace it, andso I've embraced that story.
Murphy (21:11):
So is it true?
Did you actually ski with twoleft boots?
Oh, absolutely.
I had two left boots and sosomehow I had to get a ride from
Hyak over to Alpental, where mybrother was, and we swapped
boots somehow.
But I want to know did youactually?
Steve Rolfe (21:31):
do a run in two left boots.
Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no.
This was Friday night.
We lived my brother's two yearsyounger than me.
We lived my brother's two yearsyounger than me.
We lived in Woodridge inBellevue, which at the time was
still US 10.
So we literally could well.
It was like a half a mile downto US 10.
(21:54):
So occasionally I would go downto US 10 and hitchhike, get a
ride up to Hyak, and I couldalways get a ride home.
But getting up was See thatanymore.
Murphy (22:04):
Yeah, so we have.
Let's see here.
Steve's resume is he slept onFirst Avenue, which is a dodgy
part of Seattle now, and he usedto hitchhike to the mountains.
Another thing you can't doanymore these are the benign
stories.
Steve Rolfe (22:18):
These are the ones that I can tell publicly.
Murphy (22:21):
Anyway, oh well, wait a minute.
You got stories that you can'ttell publicly.
Those are the ones you got totell here.
Steve Rolfe (22:28):
We'll have to get you to interview Wally Costello,
who was, I think, a year or twobehind me at HIAC but became
one of my closest friends and hetransferred to Crystal Mountain
.
He was on the pro patrol theyear after I was and so both of
us have that legacy of being onthe pro patrol and even today,
(22:52):
many of our closest friends.
Fortunately, we survived beingski bums and actually got real
jobs and had good careers.
Murphy (23:00):
So what did you do?
You said you went to school foratmospheric sciences.
Steve Rolfe (23:05):
Yeah, so I have a degree in atmospheric sciences.
The reason I got into it wasbecause in fact you can't
believe this Ted Rooks, who wasa patroller at Hyak, taught
basic avalanche Circle A as wecalled it then, and Ed
LaChapelle was the singularavalanche expert in the country.
(23:25):
He was the academic, I mean,he's had a lot of field
experience.
But he was the guy in theUnited States and he taught at
the University of Washington inthe geophysics department, but
he also taught atmosphericsciences 101 in atmospheric
science.
So I took his class, fell inlove with it and decided that
(23:47):
I'm going to become anatmospheric scientist rather
than what I was doing, and Ivery much enjoyed that.
I actually did very well inthat department.
I ended up doing some researchin the Arctic and then I was a
forecaster for a while and thenmy other, my idiot's ski patrol
(24:07):
friend, bob Eichenlaub, who youmight want to interview, hired
me.
Murphy (24:12):
And I call him an idiot because he hired me.
Steve Rolfe (24:16):
In 1976, as an embedded software engineer.
Now I have a degree inatmospheric science and I had
done a little bit of computing.
I'd done a lot of computing inFortran using cards, and I
didn't know what amicroprocessor was in 1976.
So he hired me and I had tocompletely teach myself how to
(24:38):
become digital electronics andin the semilanguage programming,
and that's a story that anyway.
So, by the way, he has he had aPhD in aeronautics and
astronautics, which doesn'tundermine the fact that he was
an idiot and hired me anyway.
So my career was in digitalelectronics and I ended up
(25:02):
becoming selling the kind oftest equipment that I was
designing, and so I had my ownbusiness as a manufacturer's rep
for 30, 35 years maybe.
Murphy (25:12):
So you like sold stuff for Fluke or whatever.
Steve Rolfe (25:15):
I worked at Fluke.
Murphy (25:16):
Oh, okay, there you go.
Steve Rolfe (25:17):
Yeah, that was my first job.
Bob hired me at Fluke for fiveyears and I worked there at
Fluke for five years and then Ileft for another company and I
came back as a product managerfor three years and then I ended
up in sales.
Murphy (25:33):
All with a degree the equivalent of art history.
What was it?
Steve Rolfe (25:37):
Atmospheric sciences of art history.
What was it?
Atmospheric sciences?
Well, you know I appreciateyour.
It certainly fits my sense ofhumor, but my customers I know,
so it's not surprising thatpeople with atmospheric science
degrees ended up in in the kindof electronics I'm doing.
I always thought it wasterribly amusing that my
customers at Microsoft had PhD.
(25:59):
One of them had a PhD inSpanish, 18th century Spanish
history, and another one was inmusic, and both of them managed
very sophisticated technicalgroups.
Oh, my goodness, yeah, becauseyou had a PhD got you a long
ways at Microsoft.
Murphy (26:18):
That very true, yep.
Goodness gracious.
Steve Rolfe (26:20):
Yeah, anyway, okay, so let's talk a little bit
about use their Microsoft.
Murphy (26:23):
Very true, Goodness gracious.
Okay, so let's talk a littlebit about.
You were pro-patrol over atCrystal, right?
So did Crystal have a volunteer?
Steve Rolfe (26:32):
At that time the volunteer patrol was okay.
So Crystal Mountain, thevolunteer patrol really created
the patrol at Crystal Mountainand the volunteer really created
the patrol at Crystal Mountain.
And the volunteer and theprofessional patrols were
parallel in many ways.
The volunteer patrol would comein on a Friday night and the
(26:58):
pros would leave, with theexception of avalanche control,
and then on weekdays the prosdid everything.
And if you could come up andski on a weekday and you just
put your jacket on and you couldski and you could help out, but
they were operated veryseparately and patrollers were
bums like me.
And now all of my good friendswho are still, who were pros at
(27:20):
Crystal and still think of thatvery highly, you know they would
probably argue with me aboutbeing bums, but they're wrong
Anyway.
So you know, we were all young,in our 20s.
We did it for anywhere from oneto three or four or five years
and then moved on.
By the time I became directorof the volunteer patrol, that
(27:42):
changed dramatically and some ofthe guys had been there for a
decade.
Quite sophisticated avalanchecontrol.
The science of avalanche hadbecome much more sophisticated.
They were all EMTs by then, asopposed to somebody who barely
(28:02):
was able to get a first aidclass and so there was maybe
half of the people on the patrolwho were quite dedicated and
made it into a semi-career andyou know we really didn't see it
as a year or two off orsomething like that.
Jodie (28:22):
Right.
Steve Rolfe (28:22):
But saw it as a real, as a anyway, and you know,
when you're there five days aweek you actually probably get
you know.
Anyway, as I put it when I wasdirector, because I had some
real conflict over this, becauseI was still used to running the
patrol, when I was a patrolleader and I had something that
(28:44):
was really difficult, I didn'tthink to call one of the pros to
help me.
I had been there longer, I knewmore, I had more confidence in
my knowledge and history of thearea than many of the pros.
Well, that flipped over thecourse of the by the 90s and I
came to the conclusion that theyit was very impertinent of them
to ask to be in charge of theirpatrol and tell me so directly.
(29:10):
So we really reversed roleswhere the volunteer patrol Less
in the leadership of it andshortly thereafter then a pro
was.
There were several pros on theweekends and they were the ones
in charge on the hill when whenI had been a patrol leader, I
(29:34):
ran the hill that day I didn'treport to.
I mean, I ran the hill.
Murphy (29:38):
Well, that's interesting Because I've been patrolling at
Crystal for five years now.
I think this is my fifth yearand it's getting back to that.
You know parity, let's justcall it where you know you've
got pro patroller and volunteerand that the things that the
volunteer doesn't do we don'tclimb towers, we don't do
(30:00):
avalanche mitigation, right,pretty much everything else
we're at parity.
But you're right, we do stillhave pay patrollers that are the
boss of the hill.
So we've got somebody thatworks on mountaintop, somebody
who works on nine side or overat the other side of the
mountain, and then you justshift in between those two and
(30:22):
those patrol leaders areunderneath.
You know the big boss now, whoyou know kind of runs the whole
show, but we still have a paidpatrol director and then we have
a volunteer patrol director,but the, you know, paid patrol
director is elevated and theyactually a volunteer patrol
director, but the paid patroldirector is elevated and they
(30:43):
actually it's corporate now.
I mean, so they run themountain.
Steve Rolfe (30:47):
Well, okay, so the thing that I valued the most I
think the thing that I valuedmost about being on the ski
patrol was the opportunity togrow in my skills and my
judgment and and take leadershippositions.
Uh, that was incrediblyvaluable to me.
(31:08):
And, uh, when I started, uh, uh, I could do that.
And to the point where I, whenI became patrol leader, um, the
show and it was, it was.
And I didn't get to do that.
I only got to do that because Ihad grown enough that people
(31:29):
respected me.
I don't want to sound immodesthere, but they didn't listen to
me.
I wouldn't have been effectiveif people didn't respect me, but
also I, you know, I also hadthe tremendous respect and
knowledge of all the otherpeople that I worked with.
It was just a wonderful group ofpeople.
It's hardly a surprise thatthis pro patrol, who is more
(31:54):
permanent now than they werethen, would want to take full
responsibility for the area, forrunning their show, and that we
would be subordinate.
Patrolers would be subordinate,but it was a throughout the
NSPS.
It was a difficult challenge.
There were many years.
Gary Burke can talk about thisbecause there was a time when he
(32:16):
joked that he was the mediationyou know the mediation service
because he would go from patrolto patrol who was having a
problem between area managementand the volunteer patrol during
this transition when volunteerpatrols became less independent.
That's actually a veryinteresting piece of the history
(32:37):
Gary should talk about thatHe'll be coming on in a little
bit.
Jodie (32:41):
But what did you mean by subordinate?
Well, so you mentionedinitially that the volunteers
sort of ran the mountain.
Steve Rolfe (32:53):
Yeah so the guys that came before me, guys like
Bill Savory and Bill Talbot,they walked in and they said, oh
, they created the ski patrol atCrystal Mountain.
They bought all the equipment.
Literally, crystal Mountaingave them a budget, they bought
all the equipment, they figuredout all the systems and nearly
(33:17):
everything about how the skipatrol operated was created by
the volunteers who started theCrystal Mountain Ski Patrol in
1962.
I'm not suggesting that thepros didn't have some
contribution.
They did have a couple ofpeople who were really quite
(33:44):
experienced with avalanchecontrol pretty crude by today's
standards and they taught theother guys.
But the pros would come and goand they were there, you know so
, and we had permanence in a waythat the pros did not, and that
role flipped.
The pros had permanence andwere far more sophisticated, not
unlike volunteer firedepartments and paid fire
departments, when you go throughthat process.
(34:07):
And so when I and I say I haveto repeat this when I was on the
Hill, if I needed help from apro, I mean I might call him up
and ask him, but I knew I had asmuch understanding of what I
needed, or more, I'd tell themwhat I wanted to have them do,
or maybe that guy knew how todrive a machine one of the big
(34:29):
thigh calls hey, I need one ofthose.
Okay, right, which I had achance to learn how to drive one
of those and it didn't go well.
Murphy (34:39):
Oh, we've got to hear that story.
I was going to say whathappened?
Jodie (34:40):
Yeah, oh, we got to hear that story.
So I was going to say whathappened?
Steve Rolfe (34:41):
yeah, you got to elaborate on that one so you
know, you know, here I getwisdom, judgment, judgment.
You get judgment fromexperience.
How do you get experiencemistakes?
Yeah, so true very true, so.
So anyway, by the time I wasdirector that I was really
caught right in that nexus ofwhen, where the pro patrol they
(35:06):
would have the patrol, theleaders, on top of each side of
the mountain.
Those were pros and they'd havethree or four other guys doing
all sorts of stuff and theystarted telling us what to do.
And that was not an easytransition when I was used to be
calling the shots, to havesomeone, by then half my age,
(35:26):
telling me what to do that maybehadn't been there as many years
as you know, hadn't had as muchexperience, so that was.
Shirley Cummings (35:34):
You had to convince the other volunteers
that this was the way it wasgoing to be.
Steve Rolfe (35:40):
I apologize.
Can you repeat that?
Shirley Cummings (35:42):
I said you had to convince the other
volunteers that this was thefuture.
This was the way it was goingto be with the clothes.
Steve Rolfe (35:50):
The first person that had to be convinced was me,
because I really resisted it.
It was very difficult.
To be honest, I don't talkabout it, but it was a very
difficult experience for meBecause everything changed.
I was used to being innovative.
If there was a problem, I'dfigure out how to solve it and I
(36:12):
didn't have to worry aboutsomeone coming after me and
saying, oh, you should have doneit this way.
Shirley Cummings (36:18):
How long did you stay with ski patrol after
you were the director?
Steve Rolfe (36:22):
So I was only director for two years.
Then it was at least anotherdecade, at least another decade.
But it was frustrating for metowards the very end.
I had wanted to be that 50-yearpatroller, but I made it to 42.
Jodie (36:39):
Wow, that's amazing.
Steve Rolfe (36:42):
Yeah, and you know, so I I feel really tiny
compared to Ferkavish who, whois a good friend of mine, and
that was now 60 years, so maybelonger than that.
Anyway.
Murphy (36:54):
You know, I'm going to tell you, steve, he is amazing
Cause he's what?
At 82 amazing.
He's what 82.
Now.
So I patrol with what's that?
I think he's 83.
Oh, he might be 83.
Yeah, because I remember I'vegot a sticker on my helmet that
it was Steve 80, and that wasseveral years ago.
(37:17):
But even to this day they passout jobs.
Steve takes a job just likeanybody else.
I don't care if it's linemaintenance, and he's working.
He outworks so many people.
It's like you're keeping upwith an 83 year old guy and I'm
just dripping sweat yeah, he isso.
Steve Rolfe (37:38):
So Steve and I, we were part of Ancient Skiers and
so when we go to Sun Valley,everybody else would go in by,
you know, mid-afternoon and at2.30, we would always find
ourselves at the top of themountain, wherever we were
skiing, be, steve and I andmaybe a couple other guys, and
(38:04):
we'd ski non-stop from 2, 30 to3, 30, actually 3, 45.
So we would ski non-stop, uhand uh, and it was hard for me
to keep.
He's nine and a half yearsolder than me and it was hard
for me to keep up with him.
Wow, but then, but, but I did,and we'd ski all the children
and and then two years ago, likenot last year, but two years
ago, I didn't make it to 330.
(38:26):
And I asked Steve and I said,steve, did you make it to the
final chair?
And he looks at me and he goesno, no.
So we did a few days this lastyear in January, a few days we
made it to 3.30 or 3.45.
But we ski hard and my legswere kind of worn out.
Murphy (38:49):
So do you ever come back to Crystal?
I mean, do you ski?
Steve Rolfe (38:52):
I ski there at least once a week.
Oh, you do.
Murphy (38:54):
On the weekends.
Steve Rolfe (38:55):
Yeah, I skied.
Let's see I skied 30 days thisyear.
20,.
Let's see.
19 of them were at Crystal,yeah.
Murphy (39:03):
Oh all right.
Steve Rolfe (39:04):
Well, you have to look me up when you're there.
I skied, you know, Tuesday orWednesday, typically.
Yeah.
Murphy (39:12):
Oh, where there's no lift line.
Steve Rolfe (39:14):
Well, sometimes there are.
But yeah, and if I'm reallylucky, al McEwen, who was an
original patroller, he's 90.
Well, he'll be 90 in a fewcouple of months.
He lets me stay at Billiken'swith the Billiken's, so I get to
stay overnight up there.
Murphy (39:33):
Yeah, that's one of the things that they're going to try
and fix is get overnightaccommodations accommodations,
Apparently.
Let's see here I heard theywere going to get rid or
exchange the restaurant that'sat the top of the mountain, but
that got pushed back becausethey need to replace Rainier
Express, which is starting herenext month.
(39:55):
They're going to yank out theold chair and put in a brand new
quad going up to the top of themountain.
Steve Rolfe (40:02):
Yeah, I'm a little surprised.
It's only a quad.
I thought it might be asix-pack.
Murphy (40:07):
Yeah, we were all guessing, but that's what we
were told.
It was going to be a four, andthat's all based on rumor.
Steve Rolfe (40:16):
Yeah, well, wally and VA Bob Anderson, who also
was a volunteer for many years,but he was the director of the
Pro Patrol for the second halfof the year that I worked there.
Anyway, wally and BA and I weresitting at midweek sometime and
this guy walks up to us who's?
I consider young, probablyaround 50.
(40:40):
I consider young, probablyaround 50.
And he starts talking to us andI said so, what do you do here?
And I figured he was somebodyassistant in that building.
And he said so, no, I run this.
I go.
Oh, you mean this department?
No, no, no, you mean thisbuilding?
No, no, no, I'm the president.
(41:03):
Oh, okay.
And for about 20 minutes heextemporated on the challenges
at Crystal Mountain and why ithasn't moved as fast as it
appears.
It was far more deterioratedthan Altera understood.
(41:23):
They spent a huge amount ofmoney on water systems and sewer
systems, none of which anybodysees, because they were totally
destroyed, and so, yeah, anothernew chairlift and a mountaintop
restaurant and the old daylodge just needs millions of
dollars, right?
Murphy (41:41):
Yeah Well, they put that brand new lodge in there, which
is lovely.
The old day lodge just needsmillions of dollars, right?
Yeah Well, they put that brandnew lodge in there, which is
lovely.
It's small but it's a nicebuilding.
They're going to have to getrid of the other side and put
something in there.
Steve Rolfe (41:54):
So it's still a decade away from being.
From my perspective, they mayhave more challenges than I
understand, but when you go upto Campbell Basin and you can't
get hot food because they don'thave enough staff, I don't quite
get it.
The whole point of I mean Idon't think they're being
aggressive enough at providingadditional services which they
(42:17):
can make money at.
Murphy (42:21):
Well, they got the yurt at mid-mountain, they got the
yurt down, down, you know, atthe bottom.
Steve Rolfe (42:25):
Yeah, well, you don't come on a weekday and you
go.
You walk up and you go.
You can't buy any food atcampbell basin oh, you can't no,
you can get chips oh yeah, yeah, you can get chips and some
jerky and stuff like that, butyou know, I just think that
there's a lot more opportunityto but that's a whole nother
(42:46):
story anyway.
Murphy (42:48):
All right, so let's go back to 1960.
So the biggest change thatyou've seen in Crystal Mountain
over the 25, 30 years, what doyou think it's been?
Steve Rolfe (43:02):
what do you think it's been?
Well on the.
When crystal mountain was stillowned by the 930 or 70 or
whatever it was stockholders, itwas a.
It was I haven't I haven'ttalked about this in a while,
but I've.
It was a very dysfunctionalorganization.
(43:25):
It had a rather narrow visionof itself, an old, backwards
looking vision, and I knew someof the directors and it really
did appear that their primaryinterest in being a director was
(43:45):
being a big guy in thecommunity and getting the
parking spot up in the front,and so they were just trying to
maintain what they had and theprivileges that they had.
That's a bit negative, but Idon't think it's wholly wrong.
And since it was a publiccompany, I could read the
financial statements and I go.
(44:06):
And since it was a publiccompany, I could read the
financial statements and I go.
I was shocked by how tiny itwas, how little income it made
and how you know it was it's themost important area in the
north in Washington and itreally wasn't making any money.
And I think one particular storytells it all that when Chris
(44:27):
Christensen, who I did not likeat all, he was the general
manager not the president, butthe general manager.
When the bullwheel broke on OldChair 5, on a Sunday, on a
Monday morning, he called in andhad the bullwheel ordered and
it was going to take severalweeks or take what?
Three or four weeks to bereplaced.
(44:48):
And he just did it, becausewithout your five you're very
limited.
And he apparently the board ofdirectors absolutely chewed his
ass upside down on the other formaking that decision without
them.
And it's exactly from myperspective as a manager and a
leader.
That's exactly the decision Iwould want them to, a leader, to
(45:09):
make, because every day youdon't have your ski area running
is a day that you're losingmoney hand over fist.
I think that exemplified theboard Then.
So when then they went throughseveral presidents who were
really poor, and then they soldit to Boeing and I have mixed
(45:32):
emotions about Kircher andBoeing, but the first thing they
did is they made it look betterInstead of being sh, and they
just made it look moreattractive and feel more
attractive.
And guess what?
Even more skiers showed up andBoyne made money after spending
(45:58):
a lot of money.
They made much, much more moneythan Crystal Mountain made with
a much smaller operating budget.
So Boyne must have donesomething right for sure.
Murphy (46:11):
Well, they've grown that area.
I'm going to tell you the parkouts.
That is our biggest challengenow is that you know they have
that sign down at Enumcloth thatsays if you don't have a
parking reservation, you're notgetting up there on the weekends
.
Enumcloth and says if you don'thave a parking reservation,
you're not getting up there onthe weekends.
Steve Rolfe (46:27):
It's particularly remarkable because one of the
things I did is I ran a ski swapfor Crystal Mountain for many
years.
I know a lot of the retailersand I know a lot of the people
in the industry.
20 years ago, 20, 30 years ago,skiing was a dying sport.
The demographics did not lookgood and you would not.
(46:51):
No one thinks that today, atleast at this instant in time,
In Utah and Colorado and here inthe Northwest there's too many
skiers, not enough places to ski, so that's a dramatic
turnaround.
Murphy (47:09):
Yeah, I will agree with you there, and they've got to
get some of that stuff figuredout.
Steve Rolfe (47:14):
Yeah, and Crystal is particularly constrained
because of its geography and italso it doesn't have the.
From my opinion, from adistance the relationship with
the Forest Service isn't ascollaborative as you might find
in other places in theIntermountain regions.
If you go to Sun Valley andI've met the snow rangers there
(47:37):
and they feel their mission isto collaborate with Sun Valley-
Valley.
Murphy (47:48):
Well then I might disagree with you on, because
I've been in meetings and I'mjust a cog in the wheel there.
But, um, you know, they bringin the forest service to do, uh,
a little talk.
We're, you know, bounded by thepark service, you know, with uh
Rainier on that backside, soyou can't really go that
direction.
You have the tribe and thetribe winds up having a huge say
over what goes on in that areanow.
Steve Rolfe (48:10):
So you know, you're you have, my knowledge is old,
but the tribe being involved isnot a surprise to me.
But I but I wouldn't havethought about that.
But I will say that that thechallenges compared to Whistler
we're really far afield.
That the challenges compared toWhistler we're really far
(48:30):
afield.
I ran into Tom Leonard at theairport in Chicago once, who was
the president of CrystalMountain at the time, and so we
talked a little bit later.
I was saying, tom, how comeit's so difficult to get things
done at Crystal?
He says well, you remember whenyou saw me in Chicago I was
coming back from testifyingbefore Congress to get four
acres on the back traverse toLucky Shot and become part of
(48:54):
Crystal Mountain, part of theForest Service, so they could do
it Because otherwise theywouldn't let us run grooming
equipment on the trail.
They had been doing it in thepast but the Park Service
wouldn't let them do it.
He says it took an act ofCongress.
You are kidding it literallytook an act of Congress.
Murphy (49:07):
You are kidding.
Steve Rolfe (49:08):
It literally took an act of Congress to get that
to happen.
Murphy (49:12):
Oh, and I ski that on the regular and I had no idea.
Jodie (49:16):
When did this happen, Steve?
Steve Rolfe (49:18):
Oh gosh, this has to be in the 90s, early 90s, I
think, the 90s.
Okay, so then he said, whenWhistler wanted an additional 40
acres, they went to theMinistry of the Interior in
British Columbia and thatafternoon it was done.
(49:40):
So that's the difference in thecooperation.
Now it could well be that theForest Service, the relationship
, has changed a lot in theintervening years and that my
knowledge is not contemporaneous.
I do know that there was a veryacrimonious relationship for a
(50:02):
few years because Wally Statsbecause Wally's Way is named
after Wally Stats was presidentfor a year and did as much as he
could to offend everybody, andI'm full of these stories.
I haven't talked about this inso long.
Wally Stats got a ticket.
(50:23):
He was ticketed by the by theForest Service for illegal
logging and then insulted at adinner.
Insulted the director of theForest Service in Portland at a
big dinner out.
Murphy (50:38):
Yeah, Apparently he didn't read the book how to Win
Friends and Influence People.
Steve Rolfe (50:45):
No, he was a little bit more like Trump but anyway
we won't go there uh, uh, but uh, I hadn't really, you know,
anyway, wally was a difficultman, um, but anyway.
So the biggest change, I thinkwas really, uh, the at crystal
was a totally different visionof itself and some of it being
(51:08):
lost by skiers for skiers, whichis the byword of how Crystal
was created, and there was noquestion about that.
It was a community thing byskiers for skiers.
But it didn't.
It couldn't make the leap tothe next level of being a
well-managed ski area, and Boyne, I think, did that.
(51:31):
It just created a differentattitude.
Right, you won't see it incertain places, but food service
, food service.
All of a sudden it lookedbetter and the services were
better, um, and the staff weremostly better too did you work
(51:56):
at the pass when boeing ran?
Murphy (51:58):
and it's boeing, not boeing.
Um, when boeing ran, uh, likethe three mountains or four
mountains at Snoqualmie.
Steve Rolfe (52:10):
Yeah, and I didn't have much involved.
I didn't have much specificknowledge.
They also owned up in Canada.
What is it?
I can't remember.
Yeah, no, yeah, I can'tremember.
Yeah, no, yeah, I know thatPaul Bogger, who was the patrol
director at the pro patroldirector at Crystal, was also
(52:31):
had responsibilities atSnoqualmie Pass for risk
management, so there was somecrossover there.
Murphy (52:39):
Right.
So, paul, I know the name, paulBogger, because you know Steve
Schwartz, pete Schwartz, I don'tknow if it's Steve Peter
Schwartz, come on, yeah.
So Steve, or sorry, peterSchwartz just stepped down and
Christian's a new volunteerpatrol director.
And didn't, pete, take overfrom Paul Bogger?
(53:00):
Isn't that it.
Steve Rolfe (53:02):
No, no, no, those are two, no, Paul.
Paul was the patrol patrol andhe was the patrol director for a
number of years before I becamethe volunteer director and for
a number of years after me aswell.
The linear let's see, so afterme, see before me was Jim Baldus
(53:23):
John Austin.
Was Jim Baldus John Austin?
Well, I see, if I can rememberthem all.
It was Talbot Savory, talbotGary Eide, jim Hilliker, al Al
Alpaxia, jim Hilliker, and Ican't remember who.
(53:44):
And then my Let me see, jimBaldus John Austin, me, john
Kerner and Pete Schwartz.
So I passed my mental, I havemy, your dementia.
Murphy (54:03):
Yeah, what do they call that test where you can recall
things?
Steve Rolfe (54:06):
So on the pro side there was Gordy.
Burlingame hired me and Gordywas an icon and then he left to
go work for the state foravalanche control for the state.
And Bob Anderson took over fora year and a half, and then Bill
Steele for a while, and thenthere was a series of guys that
(54:29):
were very forgettable.
Murphy (54:32):
On the pro side.
Steve Rolfe (54:34):
On the pro side yeah.
Whom we mostly kind of ignored,and then Jim Mitchell, who was
the pro director.
He became the general manager,and Paul Bogger might have been
there for 20 years.
Jodie (54:55):
So what's the last name on that?
Paul who B-A-U-G-H-E-R?
Steve Rolfe (55:00):
Oh, okay, I don't know exactly, but it was a long
time, and so Paul had been headof Avalanche and then he was
promoted to be the director ofthe patrol and I reported, and
patrol and volunteer directorsreported to the pro director
ostensibly they always did, butin the earlier years we kind of
(55:23):
ignored him.
By the time Paul came along itwas clear he wanted to run his
patrol Right.
Jodie (55:34):
On one level I could understand that so no, no, go
ahead, I'm sorry became quitesignificant.
Steve Rolfe (55:43):
He parlayed that into quite significant in the
industry.
Not only was he highlyrespected in the Northwest for
his avalanche knowledge, but helater became the chairman of the
National Avalanche School andhad his own consulting business.
He got into risk management andwould consult in a number of
(56:07):
court cases across the countryon risk management issues I
think always on the defense side.
So Paul was quite well known.
Plus, I think he was a partnerin a guide service as well.
He did a lot of climbing in thesummer.
Murphy (56:25):
Oh, kind of like RMI or something as well.
Steve Rolfe (56:29):
He did a lot of climbing in the summer, okay,
like rmi or something.
Well, I think he might havestarted at rmi, but he became a
part owner with phil or phil no,not phil, uh, um, uh, I can't
think of the name of the company, but they had the.
They had the uh license on theuh.
They had the license on thesunrise side of the mountain.
Jodie (56:48):
Oh, okay Now.
Paul was involved at Avalancheand you mentioned a gentleman by
the name of Ted, something.
Steve Rolfe (56:57):
Oh, ted Brooks was a boy.
Ted Brooks taught basic class.
He was the perfect example of apatroller who, who?
I mean he was an engineer atboeing and he studied avalanches
and he was a skier and whateverand he became the instructor
for avalanches.
Well, I'm not in any waydismissing him, but he was.
(57:22):
He just had some knowledge init and had read the books and
had been a little bit out, notunlike my early experience with
it as well.
But I remember him because hetaught the class and I mean he
was knowledgeable, but he wasn'tsomeone embedded in the
(57:43):
industry doing avalanche controlwork and throwing bombs.
Most instructors in the NSPdon't have that kind of
experience.
Jodie (57:52):
Right yeah, right yeah, definitely.
Steve Rolfe (57:54):
Now I have a side story for that, and that is
before I was patrolling at Hyatt, but I wasn't at Crystal.
One day I show up, I drive up.
I must have been 19 years oldand it snowed all week and the
north backcountry wasn't open inthose days and I remembered
that Paradise was a great placeto ski in new snow.
(58:14):
So I get to do ski cutting,which is that's not obvious to
you.
You ski across the top of theslope and you push the snow to
see if it's unstable and thenstart an avalanche.
(58:36):
So I get out there and I getright to the top of the ridge I
can still visualize it and I go,and I this is the between
arrogance and foolishness of ayoung person I go, I'm no fool,
I'm going to ski cut it.
Now, the reality is that was avery foolish choice on my part.
(58:58):
So I get out no more than thelength of my skis I had, you
know, but in those cases I had200 centimeters skis, so I had
not progressed even that far andpushed, and the whole slope
went three feet deep all the wayto the bottom, and if I had not
done that I am quite sure Iwould have died.
Wow, no one was with me.
(59:20):
And my immediate reaction thisis kind of a window on me.
I'm going like shit, I screwedup, you know it's, I made a
mistake, you know.
And.
And I'm looking around and Ilook up and there is Lloyd
McGahee, the snow ranger.
30 seconds after this.
What are the odds?
Yeah, maybe, and I go, and Ilook up very sheepishly and I go
(59:45):
did I go through a closed sign?
He goes I don't see one.
And I go, oh, and then he goes.
I need to talk to my patrolpatrollers because they were
supposed to have closed it thatnight so that people wouldn't go
skiing in that area because itwas very dangerous.
(01:00:05):
Uh-oh, so yeah, it was verydangerous.
Uh-oh, so yeah, it was verydangerous.
I mean, I have no doubt that ifI had just skied into it, it
would have gone and I would havebeen buried and nobody would
have known that.
I was there, I mean yeah,because it was three feet
fracture line.
It was probably eight feet deepat the bottom.
Murphy (01:00:27):
Oh yeah Well, and they've had some people die on
that backside, in that area, youknow, with some massive
avalanches.
In fact, I think the biggestavalanche death is, you know,
out back there somewhere.
I can remember the stories thatthey used to tell about that
(01:00:51):
used to tell about that.
Steve Rolfe (01:00:51):
Well, I, I have another, uh, wally and ba, and I
would.
Again, it wouldn't be openuntil the, until weekends.
It didn't open on weekdays.
There wasn't a chair back there.
So I remember by then wally hada bomb and ba had a bomb in in
um, in the Northway area, belowI guess I can't think of the
(01:01:16):
names anyway rather steep spots.
Wally throws his bomb a littleearly, it goes six feet deep and
I'm just watching this.
And then Bob is watching it andhe's with a bomb in his hand.
He's going whoa, and finally Ihave to yell at bob, throw your
bomb, go.
Oh, yeah, anyway.
So it had gone all the wayacross, uh, uh, north there, for
(01:01:38):
what is morning glory bowl,from below morning glory bowl
down to lower to upper north tothe trail, all all went, and the
peak of it was six feet deep,and that's because we had a hell
of a lot of snow in those years.
Murphy (01:01:53):
Right.
Yeah so you're talking about,like Gate 3, gate 4, that area.
Steve Rolfe (01:02:01):
No, that's Paradise .
Murphy (01:02:06):
So Northway Bowl, you've got morning glory bowl that
wraps all the way around.
I don't know the name.
Steve Rolfe (01:02:10):
I don't know if the names of the gates back there,
but if you go to the top ofmorning, glory bowl right ski
down, you know there's into thebowl, yeah, or you ski down.
You can ski west down the ridgea little bit.
Most people don't, but in anyevent it breaks off.
You know, just below morningglory boulder, sorry, it breaks
off into a series of cliffs,penny dogs being on.
(01:02:32):
If you face uphill, penny dogsis on the left all the way to
the snag shoot on the far right.
Murphy (01:02:39):
Uh, uh and and so that whole area went okay one, one
big, well, several avalanches,but they were all started at the
same time wow, yeah, we hadsome avalanches out there this
year that were just natural andthey, you know, were several
feet in the ground and it's uh,that's pretty amazing yeah, my
(01:02:59):
thought when I heard about thatI'm going like that ought to
make everybody a veryuncomfortable when those go
natural.
Steve Rolfe (01:03:07):
Um, that's I'm.
I'm not criticizing anybody,I'm just because these things
happen was like whoa if that hadhappened during the day yeah
instead of in in the earlyevening.
Murphy (01:03:19):
That would have been a disaster oh yeah, well, they
closed all the gates.
We had gates closed all overplus Plus, we had all that, you
know, wind load that blew allthe snow up, so you had those
cornices that were just sittingon the top and they would drop
bombs, you know and try and getthem to go Sometimes they would,
sometimes they wouldn't, sothey just had to leave it closed
(01:03:41):
.
Steve Rolfe (01:03:41):
Sophisticated now the level of understanding of
how the area works is after 62years is much better than when I
was there.
But over the years we throw abomb, a bunch of bombs, nothing
happens.
Two days later it goes on itsown.
There's no way of reallyunderstanding the mechanics
(01:04:05):
inside the geophysics of what'sgoing on inside the snow load.
There it's, yeah.
Today with us we have Steve Rolfe, who, like I said, I
have never met before, and wealso have the lovely Shirley
Cummings.
Jodie (00:09):
The amazing Shirley.
Murphy (00:10):
Cummings, yeah, who's been around and runs the History
Project, and our podcast is anoffshoot of the History Project,
because we're trying to capturesome of the history of longtime
patrollers that have been inthe Pacific Northwest Division
for ages, and we have had somegreat interviews.
We already have interviewedShirley, who was really nice,
(00:34):
and we do these from time totime.
So today we've got Steve Rolfe.
So, steve, introduce yourself,tell the listeners a little bit
about yourself.
What's your NSP number?
Do you have a national number?
Where did you patrol?
Because I don't think you'recurrently patrolling, but where
did you patrol?
(00:55):
How long did you patrol?
Give us some background.
Steve Rolfe (01:00):
So started in 1967, I think it was, and I was 67.
I must have been by the time Ithink I got involved I was 17.
So but then my first year, andI remember meeting Shirley
(01:22):
Cummings.
I think she was also acandidate at the same time.
Is that right, shirley?
Shirley Cummings (01:28):
In 60 what.
Steve Rolfe (01:30):
Well, I think my first year actual patrolling was
68, but I started training in60, getting all my first aid
stuff before I even started.
And I was a junior in highschool when I got started the
first aid stuff and a senior inhigh school when I got started
the first-aid stuff and a seniorin high school when I joined
the patrol.
Shirley Cummings (01:48):
I think I joined in 67, but I don't know
what I was.
Steve Rolfe (01:54):
I don't remember I'm pretty sure we were in the
same class and there were 30candidates, which is a very
large number for a small patrollike Hayek Yep.
I was quite sure, being thestupid, stupid kid, that there
was only going to be.
Oh, and they had to vote to theentire patrol that voted on who
was to become a member.
Murphy (02:15):
So you're saying it was like Survivor you?
Steve Rolfe (02:18):
know Survivor.
Murphy (02:18):
Ski Patrol.
Steve Rolfe (02:21):
I never thought of it that way.
We were much more democratic inthose days.
The patrol ran itself quasiindependent of the area.
We elected our own directorsand all those things.
I was quite sure there wasgoing to be 29 patrollers and I
(02:42):
wasn't going to make it, butsomehow I did.
And in fact and I've told GaryBurke this Gary was the director
of the patrol at the time andGary pulled me aside one day and
he said Steve and I can'tremember precisely what it was,
but it was he says someone hasmentioned something about you
(03:03):
and I said oh, what is it?
Can I you know?
What can I do?
He says oh, don't you know.
And I said well, just do a goodjob.
Well, who is it?
Can I apologize to him?
No, I'm not going to say any ofthat.
He said well, what do I do?
Just do a good job in control.
Well, I just about fell out ofthe chair when he told me this,
(03:27):
and he doesn't remember itbecause I mentioned it to him
before, but I later figured outwho it must have been.
There was one person who neverreally liked me, but in any
event, I somehow got on thepatrol and that was the
beginning of 42 years of patrolis one of the most important
part of my life, as I'm sure itis for thousands and thousands
of others Even today.
Some of my closest friends arepeople that I met, some of them
(03:51):
at H and many at CrystalMountain, where I was a
patroller for many years.
Murphy (03:57):
Anyway, yeah, so when did you move or migrate to
Crystal?
So when did you move or migrateto Crystal?
Steve Rolfe (04:03):
So it was a kind of a multi-step process.
I got a job as a ski instructorwhich is itself at WH Ski
School, which is legendary forbeing pretty crazy and so I did
that.
I would patrol at Hayek andthen I would go over to Crystal.
Then the next year, I believe Idid that for a year.
(04:25):
So I think in the beginning ofmy fourth year as a patroller, I
got a job as a pro patroller atCrystal.
So I rather foolishly took aquarter off a winter quarter off
from school and I was studyingatmospheric sciences at the time
.
I thought, oh, this is greatpractical stuff.
But it required me to take anextra two quarters, so I didn't
(04:52):
graduate until spring of thefollowing year.
If I had been smarter and takenthe next year off, it would
have been a lot better.
But in any event, there'salways these serendipitous
things that occur as a result ofthat.
But I did avalanche control,which is what I really wanted to
do, and it taught me a verypowerful lesson.
(05:13):
The year that I worked was anear record year.
I don't have the records forsnow for crystal, but I do
remember it was probably over200, 220 inches of snow on the
ground, so it was probably atleast 600, 700 inches of snow
and Paradise had about 960inches of snow.
(05:35):
So I did avalanche controlevery week, sometimes several
times a week, and we had to beITD OBD that's.
And I can remember that 53years later, in the boots out
the door at six in the morningand I'm not a morning person, so
this was hell.
Anyway, it taught me to getback to the lesson.
I did not want to workphysically that hard for a
(05:56):
living.
I knew I needed to get back toschool and get my degree and
find some job where I didn'thave to be totally exhausted all
day long.
Murphy (06:08):
Anyway.
All right, so I'm going tointerrupt you here.
So what's your NSP number?
Do you still remember what thatis?
Steve Rolfe (06:14):
I don't know my number but I can tell you my
national number is 5450.
Murphy (06:20):
Oh dang, I get no beer out of that one.
All right, when did you getthat national appointment?
Remember what year?
Steve Rolfe (06:30):
Probably in the late, probably somewhere between
76 and 78.
Yeah.
Murphy (06:38):
All right, so we'll have to look up your number and see
where you are.
I'm always amazed because mynumber's in the 25 and I see
these people that have like fourdigit numbers.
Steve Rolfe (06:47):
I'm like, oh man yeah, well, I, I have friends
that have much lower numbersthan me, uh, and uh, some of
them are even still upright, but, um, I was chairman, you know.
So my connection to hay, toHyak, didn't end when I moved to
Crystal.
I still was very involvedbecause of Gary Burke and
(07:10):
because of Bill Brockway andothers.
But in Roger Gregory I was veryinvolved with Ski Patrol Rescue
Team and when Roger got himselfpromoted to the division
director, he had been the chairof the Ski Patrol rescue team.
He appointed me and I think atthat time I was 28 years old, so
(07:31):
I was, I guess.
I worked hard, didn't know whatI couldn't do, and they promoted
me to a job that I you know whoknows.
Anyway, I think I did a goodjob, but it was an awesome
position because I was not arescuiter.
At that point there was abouteight or nine guys that were 10
(07:52):
to 15 years older than me whowere really the guys that ran
the place, and what impressed meis they let me be the director.
They had the grace and theconfidence in me to let me run
the place and I also had thegood sense not to interfere with
them when they actually ran arescue.
(08:14):
It taught me immense aboutleadership and how followership
and leadership and how thetransitions can work in the
field and whatever.
I even had a lecture on thissubject once when I was still
doing search and rescue stuff.
Now that's.
Jodie (08:33):
SPART, spart, yes.
Steve Rolfe (08:39):
And that stood for First.
It was called Calamity PassArea Rescue Team and it had been
started by oh I can't think ofthe guy in the mid-60s, because
there was a lot of rescues andsome of the guys on ski patrol
were also members of MountainRescue Council at the time.
I guess it's Seattle SMR now.
(09:00):
And so when a rescue wouldhappen outside the ski area, a
bunch of ski patrollers whomight also be mountain rescue
types would go off and handlethe rescue.
So we organized as aspecialized team and Gary Burke
was very instrumental.
(09:20):
He never was a director, but hewas the guy that he pushed.
He pushed several people up tothe front to be the director.
Murphy (09:29):
So he didn't have to do it.
Steve Rolfe (09:33):
A rather sharp guy, as we like to say.
Gary has many qualities.
That was definitely one of hisbest.
Murphy (09:40):
Yes, so why did you join the ski patrol so?
Steve Rolfe (09:44):
you said you were 17 when you started.
Yes, so I started skiing when Iwas 10 and it became a family
thing and that's a whole longstory.
But I can't remember if I was14 or if I was 16.
My parents moved, or we allmoved to Huntsville, Alabama for
three years, from the time Iwas 14 to 16.
(10:05):
So 14, 15, and 16.
And we actually came back inthe winter and I actually skied
at least during Christmas inthose years, so I never missed a
year skiing.
Jodie (10:17):
And when I came, back.
Steve Rolfe (10:18):
I knew that I wanted to be on ski patrol.
Ski patrol and the image I havein my head that created my
desire was seeing some guy whowas probably several years older
than me but still in highschool, wearing a vest, going up
one of the rope toes at skiacres, sideways pushing the snow
(10:41):
out of the way and lookingreally cool.
Sideways pushing the snow outof the way and looking really
cool.
I just thought that was reallycool and I knew I could do that.
And so I went over to that samemotel and pushed the snow out
of the way and I thought I cando this, I want to get on it.
And also by that time I was awater safety instructor.
I'd had many years of swimming.
I worked at the YM's.
(11:01):
No, I'd worked for the RedCross as a volunteer doing stuff
in the summer.
So it was not much of a reachto finish the Red Cross classes
and become a ski patroller.
Murphy (11:16):
So did you go all right back in the day?
I'm going to ask, did they haveOEC?
What was it called back then?
Steve Rolfe (11:22):
Long before OEC.
Murphy (11:24):
So wasn't it like Winter Rescue?
Steve Rolfe (11:28):
No, no, no, no, no.
The Red Cross taught twoclasses, basic and advanced Red
Cross, and I can't remember ifit was the green book or the
gray book, but when we wereyoung it was always well.
I learned with the gray book orwhatever it was meaning you were
really old.
You were young, it was alwayswell, I learned with the gray
book or whatever it was meaningyou were really old.
But I think it was like a 15hour class and a 35 hour class,
(11:52):
you know, and surely I had tohave gone through the exact same
thing.
So she may remember better.
But I remember I went to theold Bellevue City Hall Somehow.
I I don't even know how I foundout about a free internet, but
I went to the old Bellevue CityHall a couple of nights a week
and there that's where I metGeorge Whitman, who was
(12:15):
assistant chief of police, whowould later become the division,
region and division director,and he taught some of the
classes.
And here's an aside I'm thisnaive kid in high school and
George, who looks who was a cop,but a nice, genial cop officer,
(12:36):
friendly, okay, nice guy.
But he pulls me aside one day.
He says, steve, would you liketo see some illegal drugs?
And we're sitting in thechamber of this Bellevue City
Hall.
Okay, so would you like to seesome?
And I go.
And I'm going like, is this atrick, you know?
(12:57):
And I go, okay, you know, andI'm the youngest guy in this
class.
Everybody else is an adult.
So he goes to his office, pullsout a briefcase and he opens it
up and there is a cornucopia ofdrugs and he's showing me all
this stuff totally out ofcharacter for him.
It was only later that Idiscovered that he had been an
(13:18):
undercover cop for a number ofyears and had specialized in
illegal drugs.
So that's why he was an expert.
And you know, it's funny.
I'm sure he would neverremember that, but it's funny
how those little things come tomind.
Murphy (13:34):
Make an impression on a young man.
Steve Rolfe (13:36):
Yeah, he also told me not that time but later that
when he was undercover he had abig party at his house with a
bunch of FBI agents and othersand he was growing a pot plant
on his deck.
So he had this.
There was dozens of policepeople there and this would have
been in the mid-60s, I thinkmid to late 60s.
(13:58):
He's got this big pot, plantthis, you know, standing head
tall, and not a single one ofthem recognized it.
Murphy (14:06):
That's a rather large tomato plant you have there um,
yeah, and george and I had a.
Steve Rolfe (14:13):
He taught emt classes for many years and I was
uh the ski patrol rescue team.
Uh, uh, did all the umevaluating his stuff.
We had a contract with him, sofor two decades I was involved
as an EMT as well.
Murphy (14:30):
Okay, so what, I guess your positions with the patrol?
Let's start out at Hyak.
What did you do there?
Were you patrol director Startout?
I mean, where'd you?
Steve Rolfe (14:42):
I was a 17-year-old kid.
Murphy (14:46):
Right.
Steve Rolfe (14:47):
Tried not to get himself thrown off the patrol by
doing dumb things that I didn'teven know were dumb.
And I succeeded.
I just succeeded in not doingthe dumbest things that would
get you thrown off.
But and, and you know, I madesome very long friends, good
friends, and so I didn't.
(15:09):
I had no leadership positions,I was the kid.
Shirley Cummings (15:13):
You were my senior trainer, well, maybe.
Steve Rolfe (15:19):
Well then, you must've got your seniors a year
after me, but that could be.
But at least the first twoyears was all I could do, just
to figure out which end is up.
Work really hard because I wastotally motivated.
Didn't know what it was about,but I just worked as hard as I
could to be as best a patrolleras I could.
(15:42):
Tell them about the day youforgot your boot, as best a
patroller, as I could Tell themabout the day you forgot your
boot.
Oh, you know.
So Sandy March.
Every time he sees me, he patsme on the head.
I didn't forget my boots, butthis must have been 1970, maybe
69 or 70.
And that whistle is my wifewith the tea kettle.
Murphy (16:04):
Sure.
Steve Rolfe (16:04):
John Mulholland.
This is a lot of ancienthistory.
John Mulholland invented thefoam ski boots, okay.
And so what he did is he boughtthese old Lang boots, but we
took the liner out, put awetsuit footy in it and then
(16:25):
poured foam in, and then you hadthis custom foam fit boot,
which was the name of hiscompany.
And so my brother and I wentdown to ONU on a probably Friday
night.
My parents let us do this.
It's kind of bizarre, but wespent the night out on first
Avenue in downtown Seattle,sleeping out, sleeping on first
(16:50):
Avenue, with a couple hundred ofour newest best friends.
So we could get in the store ateight o'clock in the morning
and ran in, bought these old,these Lang boots, and and then I
took them over to Johnmulholland's place in bellevue
and we had foam boots.
Well, my brother and I ended upwith the same size boots and
(17:13):
they're black.
And so one day I uh, picked up,on friday night, I picked up
two left boots, and I didn'tnotice it till I got to hayek
where my brother was teaching atAlpenthal.
So somehow, through a series ofphone calls, we figured this
out and traded boots.
I can't remember.
Jodie (17:39):
Oh temporary pause while we get them back on the internet
.
Steve Rolfe (17:45):
Remember I had.
Jodie (17:46):
Oh, we froze for just a minute, it's okay, we'll just
have a backup, just a little bit.
Murphy (17:51):
Okay, you're at the point where you had two left
boots.
Your brother had two rightboots.
Jodie (17:59):
Actually, I think we're going to have Steve.
If you want to take off yourvideo, it might help your
bandwidth.
It might I'm not quite sure 36.
We'll wait till he gets himback care so surely, while we're
(18:19):
waiting, for what other funnystories do you have about Steve?
Shirley Cummings (18:25):
I, you know, there was no Queens chair when I
was doing the senior trainingand Steve thought it'd be a good
idea if we climbed that hugebowl.
And so Wally Costello and, Ithink, ron Wu and Steve they
start hiking up the mountain andI am behind them and I got to
(18:52):
the top and all day long for therest of the skiing we could see
these lovely three sets of S'sin the bowl and then we could
see mine, s, s, s and a big G,and that was where I took the
spill and they were oh, you cando it, shirley.
(19:17):
I mean I was going throughcreeks trying to keep up with
these three, my tongue hangingout, just chugging and chugging.
Anyway, they were goodtaskmasters.
Murphy (19:32):
Wow, ssg.
Jodie (19:40):
Did Steve give an abbreviation All day long?
Shirley Cummings (19:43):
they looked at it and reminded me oh well,
that must be you surely stevewas talking about something
about an abbreviation.
Jodie (19:53):
Was there something about snow in boots out the door or
something an abbreviation?
Or did I misunderstand that?
Murphy (20:01):
ITB.
Jodie (20:03):
ITB what's that.
Murphy (20:04):
Right in the boots.
Shirley Cummings (20:06):
Yeah, out the door.
Murphy (20:07):
And then out the door OTD.
Jodie (20:10):
Oh, okay, hey, Steve's going to be coming back on.
Just keep your video off.
I think that will help you.
Steve, you're muted right atthe moment, but that will
probably help your bandwidth.
Just have to unmute yourself.
Steve Rolfe (20:31):
What happened is my computer.
This is the second time Ibought a new computer and I
haven't hooked it up yet.
This is the second time duringthe Zoom meeting that this has
happened in a month.
I apologize, and it probablywon't happen again, for—.
Jodie (20:45):
Don't apologize, but if you need, to just take your
video off.
Steve Rolfe (20:50):
I don't think that—well, that might be it.
No, that's all right, it's upto you.
It's up to you, okay.
So anyway, where was I at?
Anyway, so I—.
Murphy (20:59):
You had two left boots.
Your brother had two rightboots.
He was teaching at Alpintal.
Steve Rolfe (21:03):
And so that story, you know, you can either be
upset by it or embrace it, andso I've embraced that story.
Murphy (21:11):
So is it true?
Did you actually ski with twoleft boots?
Oh, absolutely.
I had two left boots and sosomehow I had to get a ride from
Hyak over to Alpental, where mybrother was, and we swapped
boots somehow.
But I want to know did youactually?
Steve Rolfe (21:31):
do a run in two left boots.
Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no.
This was Friday night.
We lived my brother's two yearsyounger than me.
We lived my brother's two yearsyounger than me.
We lived in Woodridge inBellevue, which at the time was
still US 10.
So we literally could well.
It was like a half a mile downto US 10.
(21:54):
So occasionally I would go downto US 10 and hitchhike, get a
ride up to Hyak, and I couldalways get a ride home.
But getting up was See thatanymore.
Murphy (22:04):
Yeah, so we have.
Let's see here.
Steve's resume is he slept onFirst Avenue, which is a dodgy
part of Seattle now, and he usedto hitchhike to the mountains.
Another thing you can't doanymore these are the benign
stories.
Steve Rolfe (22:18):
These are the ones that I can tell publicly.
Murphy (22:21):
Anyway, oh well, wait a minute.
You got stories that you can'ttell publicly.
Those are the ones you got totell here.
Steve Rolfe (22:28):
We'll have to get you to interview Wally Costello,
who was, I think, a year or twobehind me at HIAC but became
one of my closest friends and hetransferred to Crystal Mountain
.
He was on the pro patrol theyear after I was and so both of
us have that legacy of being onthe pro patrol and even today,
(22:52):
many of our closest friends.
Fortunately, we survived beingski bums and actually got real
jobs and had good careers.
Murphy (23:00):
So what did you do?
You said you went to school foratmospheric sciences.
Steve Rolfe (23:05):
Yeah, so I have a degree in atmospheric sciences.
The reason I got into it wasbecause in fact you can't
believe this Ted Rooks, who wasa patroller at Hyak, taught
basic avalanche Circle A as wecalled it then, and Ed
LaChapelle was the singularavalanche expert in the country.
(23:25):
He was the academic, I mean,he's had a lot of field
experience.
But he was the guy in theUnited States and he taught at
the University of Washington inthe geophysics department, but
he also taught atmosphericsciences 101 in atmospheric
science.
So I took his class, fell inlove with it and decided that
(23:47):
I'm going to become anatmospheric scientist rather
than what I was doing, and Ivery much enjoyed that.
I actually did very well inthat department.
I ended up doing some researchin the Arctic and then I was a
forecaster for a while and thenmy other, my idiot's ski patrol
(24:07):
friend, bob Eichenlaub, who youmight want to interview, hired
me.
Murphy (24:12):
And I call him an idiot because he hired me.
Steve Rolfe (24:16):
In 1976, as an embedded software engineer.
Now I have a degree inatmospheric science and I had
done a little bit of computing.
I'd done a lot of computing inFortran using cards, and I
didn't know what amicroprocessor was in 1976.
So he hired me and I had tocompletely teach myself how to
(24:38):
become digital electronics andin the semilanguage programming,
and that's a story that anyway.
So, by the way, he has he had aPhD in aeronautics and
astronautics, which doesn'tundermine the fact that he was
an idiot and hired me anyway.
So my career was in digitalelectronics and I ended up
(25:02):
becoming selling the kind oftest equipment that I was
designing, and so I had my ownbusiness as a manufacturer's rep
for 30, 35 years maybe.
Murphy (25:12):
So you like sold stuff for Fluke or whatever.
Steve Rolfe (25:15):
I worked at Fluke.
Murphy (25:16):
Oh, okay, there you go.
Steve Rolfe (25:17):
Yeah, that was my first job.
Bob hired me at Fluke for fiveyears and I worked there at
Fluke for five years and then Ileft for another company and I
came back as a product managerfor three years and then I ended
up in sales.
Murphy (25:33):
All with a degree the equivalent of art history.
What was it?
Steve Rolfe (25:37):
Atmospheric sciences of art history.
What was it?
Atmospheric sciences?
Well, you know I appreciateyour.
It certainly fits my sense ofhumor, but my customers I know,
so it's not surprising thatpeople with atmospheric science
degrees ended up in in the kindof electronics I'm doing.
I always thought it wasterribly amusing that my
customers at Microsoft had PhD.
(25:59):
One of them had a PhD inSpanish, 18th century Spanish
history, and another one was inmusic, and both of them managed
very sophisticated technicalgroups.
Oh, my goodness, yeah, becauseyou had a PhD got you a long
ways at Microsoft.
Murphy (26:18):
That very true, yep.
Goodness gracious.
Steve Rolfe (26:20):
Yeah, anyway, okay, so let's talk a little bit
about use their Microsoft.
Murphy (26:23):
Very true, Goodness gracious.
Okay, so let's talk a littlebit about.
You were pro-patrol over atCrystal, right?
So did Crystal have a volunteer?
Steve Rolfe (26:32):
At that time the volunteer patrol was okay.
So Crystal Mountain, thevolunteer patrol really created
the patrol at Crystal Mountainand the volunteer really created
the patrol at Crystal Mountain.
And the volunteer and theprofessional patrols were
parallel in many ways.
The volunteer patrol would comein on a Friday night and the
(26:58):
pros would leave, with theexception of avalanche control,
and then on weekdays the prosdid everything.
And if you could come up andski on a weekday and you just
put your jacket on and you couldski and you could help out, but
they were operated veryseparately and patrollers were
bums like me.
And now all of my good friendswho are still, who were pros at
(27:20):
Crystal and still think of thatvery highly, you know they would
probably argue with me aboutbeing bums, but they're wrong
Anyway.
So you know, we were all young,in our 20s.
We did it for anywhere from oneto three or four or five years
and then moved on.
By the time I became directorof the volunteer patrol, that
(27:42):
changed dramatically and some ofthe guys had been there for a
decade.
Quite sophisticated avalanchecontrol.
The science of avalanche hadbecome much more sophisticated.
They were all EMTs by then, asopposed to somebody who barely
(28:02):
was able to get a first aidclass and so there was maybe
half of the people on the patrolwho were quite dedicated and
made it into a semi-career andyou know we really didn't see it
as a year or two off orsomething like that.
Jodie (28:22):
Right.
Steve Rolfe (28:22):
But saw it as a real, as a anyway, and you know,
when you're there five days aweek you actually probably get
you know.
Anyway, as I put it when I wasdirector, because I had some
real conflict over this, becauseI was still used to running the
patrol, when I was a patrolleader and I had something that
(28:44):
was really difficult, I didn'tthink to call one of the pros to
help me.
I had been there longer, I knewmore, I had more confidence in
my knowledge and history of thearea than many of the pros.
Well, that flipped over thecourse of the by the 90s and I
came to the conclusion that theyit was very impertinent of them
to ask to be in charge of theirpatrol and tell me so directly.
(29:10):
So we really reversed roleswhere the volunteer patrol Less
in the leadership of it andshortly thereafter then a pro
was.
There were several pros on theweekends and they were the ones
in charge on the hill when whenI had been a patrol leader, I
(29:34):
ran the hill that day I didn'treport to.
I mean, I ran the hill.
Murphy (29:38):
Well, that's interesting Because I've been patrolling at
Crystal for five years now.
I think this is my fifth yearand it's getting back to that.
You know parity, let's justcall it where you know you've
got pro patroller and volunteerand that the things that the
volunteer doesn't do we don'tclimb towers, we don't do
(30:00):
avalanche mitigation, right,pretty much everything else
we're at parity.
But you're right, we do stillhave pay patrollers that are the
boss of the hill.
So we've got somebody thatworks on mountaintop, somebody
who works on nine side or overat the other side of the
mountain, and then you justshift in between those two and
(30:22):
those patrol leaders areunderneath.
You know the big boss now, whoyou know kind of runs the whole
show, but we still have a paidpatrol director and then we have
a volunteer patrol director,but the, you know, paid patrol
director is elevated and theyactually a volunteer patrol
director, but the paid patroldirector is elevated and they
(30:43):
actually it's corporate now.
I mean, so they run themountain.
Steve Rolfe (30:47):
Well, okay, so the thing that I valued the most I
think the thing that I valuedmost about being on the ski
patrol was the opportunity togrow in my skills and my
judgment and and take leadershippositions.
Uh, that was incrediblyvaluable to me.
(31:08):
And, uh, when I started, uh, uh, I could do that.
And to the point where I, whenI became patrol leader, um, the
show and it was, it was.
And I didn't get to do that.
I only got to do that because Ihad grown enough that people
(31:29):
respected me.
I don't want to sound immodesthere, but they didn't listen to
me.
I wouldn't have been effectiveif people didn't respect me, but
also I, you know, I also hadthe tremendous respect and
knowledge of all the otherpeople that I worked with.
It was just a wonderful group ofpeople.
It's hardly a surprise thatthis pro patrol, who is more
(31:54):
permanent now than they werethen, would want to take full
responsibility for the area, forrunning their show, and that we
would be subordinate.
Patrolers would be subordinate,but it was a throughout the
NSPS.
It was a difficult challenge.
There were many years.
Gary Burke can talk about thisbecause there was a time when he
(32:16):
joked that he was the mediationyou know the mediation service
because he would go from patrolto patrol who was having a
problem between area managementand the volunteer patrol during
this transition when volunteerpatrols became less independent.
That's actually a veryinteresting piece of the history
(32:37):
Gary should talk about thatHe'll be coming on in a little
bit.
Jodie (32:41):
But what did you mean by subordinate?
Well, so you mentionedinitially that the volunteers
sort of ran the mountain.
Steve Rolfe (32:53):
Yeah so the guys that came before me, guys like
Bill Savory and Bill Talbot,they walked in and they said, oh
, they created the ski patrol atCrystal Mountain.
They bought all the equipment.
Literally, crystal Mountaingave them a budget, they bought
all the equipment, they figuredout all the systems and nearly
(33:17):
everything about how the skipatrol operated was created by
the volunteers who started theCrystal Mountain Ski Patrol in
1962.
I'm not suggesting that thepros didn't have some
contribution.
They did have a couple ofpeople who were really quite
(33:44):
experienced with avalanchecontrol pretty crude by today's
standards and they taught theother guys.
But the pros would come and goand they were there, you know so
, and we had permanence in a waythat the pros did not, and that
role flipped.
The pros had permanence andwere far more sophisticated, not
unlike volunteer firedepartments and paid fire
departments, when you go throughthat process.
(34:07):
And so when I and I say I haveto repeat this when I was on the
Hill, if I needed help from apro, I mean I might call him up
and ask him, but I knew I had asmuch understanding of what I
needed, or more, I'd tell themwhat I wanted to have them do,
or maybe that guy knew how todrive a machine one of the big
(34:29):
thigh calls hey, I need one ofthose.
Okay, right, which I had achance to learn how to drive one
of those and it didn't go well.
Murphy (34:39):
Oh, we've got to hear that story.
I was going to say whathappened?
Jodie (34:40):
Yeah, oh, we got to hear that story.
So I was going to say whathappened?
Steve Rolfe (34:41):
yeah, you got to elaborate on that one so you
know, you know, here I getwisdom, judgment, judgment.
You get judgment fromexperience.
How do you get experiencemistakes?
Yeah, so true very true, so.
So anyway, by the time I wasdirector that I was really
caught right in that nexus ofwhen, where the pro patrol they
(35:06):
would have the patrol, theleaders, on top of each side of
the mountain.
Those were pros and they'd havethree or four other guys doing
all sorts of stuff and theystarted telling us what to do.
And that was not an easytransition when I was used to be
calling the shots, to havesomeone, by then half my age,
(35:26):
telling me what to do that maybehadn't been there as many years
as you know, hadn't had as muchexperience, so that was.
Shirley Cummings (35:34):
You had to convince the other volunteers
that this was the way it wasgoing to be.
Steve Rolfe (35:40):
I apologize.
Can you repeat that?
Shirley Cummings (35:42):
I said you had to convince the other
volunteers that this was thefuture.
This was the way it was goingto be with the clothes.
Steve Rolfe (35:50):
The first person that had to be convinced was me,
because I really resisted it.
It was very difficult.
To be honest, I don't talkabout it, but it was a very
difficult experience for meBecause everything changed.
I was used to being innovative.
If there was a problem, I'dfigure out how to solve it and I
(36:12):
didn't have to worry aboutsomeone coming after me and
saying, oh, you should have doneit this way.
Shirley Cummings (36:18):
How long did you stay with ski patrol after
you were the director?
Steve Rolfe (36:22):
So I was only director for two years.
Then it was at least anotherdecade, at least another decade.
But it was frustrating for metowards the very end.
I had wanted to be that 50-yearpatroller, but I made it to 42.
Jodie (36:39):
Wow, that's amazing.
Steve Rolfe (36:42):
Yeah, and you know, so I I feel really tiny
compared to Ferkavish who, whois a good friend of mine, and
that was now 60 years, so maybelonger than that.
Anyway.
Murphy (36:54):
You know, I'm going to tell you, steve, he is amazing
Cause he's what?
At 82 amazing.
He's what 82.
Now.
So I patrol with what's that?
I think he's 83.
Oh, he might be 83.
Yeah, because I remember I'vegot a sticker on my helmet that
it was Steve 80, and that wasseveral years ago.
(37:17):
But even to this day they passout jobs.
Steve takes a job just likeanybody else.
I don't care if it's linemaintenance, and he's working.
He outworks so many people.
It's like you're keeping upwith an 83 year old guy and I'm
just dripping sweat yeah, he isso.
Steve Rolfe (37:38):
So Steve and I, we were part of Ancient Skiers and
so when we go to Sun Valley,everybody else would go in by,
you know, mid-afternoon and at2.30, we would always find
ourselves at the top of themountain, wherever we were
skiing, be, steve and I andmaybe a couple other guys, and
(38:04):
we'd ski non-stop from 2, 30 to3, 30, actually 3, 45.
So we would ski non-stop, uhand uh, and it was hard for me
to keep.
He's nine and a half yearsolder than me and it was hard
for me to keep up with him.
Wow, but then, but, but I did,and we'd ski all the children
and and then two years ago, likenot last year, but two years
ago, I didn't make it to 330.
(38:26):
And I asked Steve and I said,steve, did you make it to the
final chair?
And he looks at me and he goesno, no.
So we did a few days this lastyear in January, a few days we
made it to 3.30 or 3.45.
But we ski hard and my legswere kind of worn out.
Murphy (38:49):
So do you ever come back to Crystal?
I mean, do you ski?
Steve Rolfe (38:52):
I ski there at least once a week.
Oh, you do.
Murphy (38:54):
On the weekends.
Steve Rolfe (38:55):
Yeah, I skied.
Let's see I skied 30 days thisyear.
20,.
Let's see.
19 of them were at Crystal,yeah.
Murphy (39:03):
Oh all right.
Steve Rolfe (39:04):
Well, you have to look me up when you're there.
I skied, you know, Tuesday orWednesday, typically.
Yeah.
Murphy (39:12):
Oh, where there's no lift line.
Steve Rolfe (39:14):
Well, sometimes there are.
But yeah, and if I'm reallylucky, al McEwen, who was an
original patroller, he's 90.
Well, he'll be 90 in a fewcouple of months.
He lets me stay at Billiken'swith the Billiken's, so I get to
stay overnight up there.
Murphy (39:33):
Yeah, that's one of the things that they're going to try
and fix is get overnightaccommodations accommodations,
Apparently.
Let's see here I heard theywere going to get rid or
exchange the restaurant that'sat the top of the mountain, but
that got pushed back becausethey need to replace Rainier
Express, which is starting herenext month.
(39:55):
They're going to yank out theold chair and put in a brand new
quad going up to the top of themountain.
Steve Rolfe (40:02):
Yeah, I'm a little surprised.
It's only a quad.
I thought it might be asix-pack.
Murphy (40:07):
Yeah, we were all guessing, but that's what we
were told.
It was going to be a four, andthat's all based on rumor.
Steve Rolfe (40:16):
Yeah, well, wally and VA Bob Anderson, who also
was a volunteer for many years,but he was the director of the
Pro Patrol for the second halfof the year that I worked there.
Anyway, wally and BA and I weresitting at midweek sometime and
this guy walks up to us who's?
I consider young, probablyaround 50.
(40:40):
I consider young, probablyaround 50.
And he starts talking to us andI said so, what do you do here?
And I figured he was somebodyassistant in that building.
And he said so, no, I run this.
I go.
Oh, you mean this department?
No, no, no, you mean thisbuilding?
No, no, no, I'm the president.
(41:03):
Oh, okay.
And for about 20 minutes heextemporated on the challenges
at Crystal Mountain and why ithasn't moved as fast as it
appears.
It was far more deterioratedthan Altera understood.
(41:23):
They spent a huge amount ofmoney on water systems and sewer
systems, none of which anybodysees, because they were totally
destroyed, and so, yeah, anothernew chairlift and a mountaintop
restaurant and the old daylodge just needs millions of
dollars, right?
Murphy (41:41):
Yeah Well, they put that brand new lodge in there, which
is lovely.
The old day lodge just needsmillions of dollars, right?
Yeah Well, they put that brandnew lodge in there, which is
lovely.
It's small but it's a nicebuilding.
They're going to have to getrid of the other side and put
something in there.
Steve Rolfe (41:54):
So it's still a decade away from being.
From my perspective, they mayhave more challenges than I
understand, but when you go upto Campbell Basin and you can't
get hot food because they don'thave enough staff, I don't quite
get it.
The whole point of I mean Idon't think they're being
aggressive enough at providingadditional services which they
(42:17):
can make money at.
Murphy (42:21):
Well, they got the yurt at mid-mountain, they got the
yurt down, down, you know, atthe bottom.
Steve Rolfe (42:25):
Yeah, well, you don't come on a weekday and you
go.
You walk up and you go.
You can't buy any food atcampbell basin oh, you can't no,
you can get chips oh yeah, yeah, you can get chips and some
jerky and stuff like that, butyou know, I just think that
there's a lot more opportunityto but that's a whole nother
(42:46):
story anyway.
Murphy (42:48):
All right, so let's go back to 1960.
So the biggest change thatyou've seen in Crystal Mountain
over the 25, 30 years, what doyou think it's been?
Steve Rolfe (43:02):
what do you think it's been?
Well on the.
When crystal mountain was stillowned by the 930 or 70 or
whatever it was stockholders, itwas a.
It was I haven't I haven'ttalked about this in a while,
but I've.
It was a very dysfunctionalorganization.
(43:25):
It had a rather narrow visionof itself, an old, backwards
looking vision, and I knew someof the directors and it really
did appear that their primaryinterest in being a director was
(43:45):
being a big guy in thecommunity and getting the
parking spot up in the front,and so they were just trying to
maintain what they had and theprivileges that they had.
That's a bit negative, but Idon't think it's wholly wrong.
And since it was a publiccompany, I could read the
financial statements and I go.
(44:06):
And since it was a publiccompany, I could read the
financial statements and I go.
I was shocked by how tiny itwas, how little income it made
and how you know it was it's themost important area in the
north in Washington and itreally wasn't making any money.
And I think one particular storytells it all that when Chris
(44:27):
Christensen, who I did not likeat all, he was the general
manager not the president, butthe general manager.
When the bullwheel broke on OldChair 5, on a Sunday, on a
Monday morning, he called in andhad the bullwheel ordered and
it was going to take severalweeks or take what?
Three or four weeks to bereplaced.
(44:48):
And he just did it, becausewithout your five you're very
limited.
And he apparently the board ofdirectors absolutely chewed his
ass upside down on the other formaking that decision without
them.
And it's exactly from myperspective as a manager and a
leader.
That's exactly the decision Iwould want them to, a leader, to
(45:09):
make, because every day youdon't have your ski area running
is a day that you're losingmoney hand over fist.
I think that exemplified theboard Then.
So when then they went throughseveral presidents who were
really poor, and then they soldit to Boeing and I have mixed
(45:32):
emotions about Kircher andBoeing, but the first thing they
did is they made it look betterInstead of being sh, and they
just made it look moreattractive and feel more
attractive.
And guess what?
Even more skiers showed up andBoyne made money after spending
(45:58):
a lot of money.
They made much, much more moneythan Crystal Mountain made with
a much smaller operating budget.
So Boyne must have donesomething right for sure.
Murphy (46:11):
Well, they've grown that area.
I'm going to tell you the parkouts.
That is our biggest challengenow is that you know they have
that sign down at Enumcloth thatsays if you don't have a
parking reservation, you're notgetting up there on the weekends
.
Enumcloth and says if you don'thave a parking reservation,
you're not getting up there onthe weekends.
Steve Rolfe (46:27):
It's particularly remarkable because one of the
things I did is I ran a ski swapfor Crystal Mountain for many
years.
I know a lot of the retailersand I know a lot of the people
in the industry.
20 years ago, 20, 30 years ago,skiing was a dying sport.
The demographics did not lookgood and you would not.
(46:51):
No one thinks that today, atleast at this instant in time,
In Utah and Colorado and here inthe Northwest there's too many
skiers, not enough places to ski, so that's a dramatic
turnaround.
Murphy (47:09):
Yeah, I will agree with you there, and they've got to
get some of that stuff figuredout.
Steve Rolfe (47:14):
Yeah, and Crystal is particularly constrained
because of its geography and italso it doesn't have the.
From my opinion, from adistance the relationship with
the Forest Service isn't ascollaborative as you might find
in other places in theIntermountain regions.
If you go to Sun Valley andI've met the snow rangers there
(47:37):
and they feel their mission isto collaborate with Sun Valley-
Valley.
Murphy (47:48):
Well then I might disagree with you on, because
I've been in meetings and I'mjust a cog in the wheel there.
But, um, you know, they bringin the forest service to do, uh,
a little talk.
We're, you know, bounded by thepark service, you know, with uh
Rainier on that backside, soyou can't really go that
direction.
You have the tribe and thetribe winds up having a huge say
over what goes on in that areanow.
Steve Rolfe (48:10):
So you know, you're you have, my knowledge is old,
but the tribe being involved isnot a surprise to me.
But I but I wouldn't havethought about that.
But I will say that that thechallenges compared to Whistler
we're really far afield.
That the challenges compared toWhistler we're really far
(48:30):
afield.
I ran into Tom Leonard at theairport in Chicago once, who was
the president of CrystalMountain at the time, and so we
talked a little bit later.
I was saying, tom, how comeit's so difficult to get things
done at Crystal?
He says well, you remember whenyou saw me in Chicago I was
coming back from testifyingbefore Congress to get four
acres on the back traverse toLucky Shot and become part of
(48:54):
Crystal Mountain, part of theForest Service, so they could do
it Because otherwise theywouldn't let us run grooming
equipment on the trail.
They had been doing it in thepast but the Park Service
wouldn't let them do it.
He says it took an act ofCongress.
You are kidding it literallytook an act of Congress.
Murphy (49:07):
You are kidding.
Steve Rolfe (49:08):
It literally took an act of Congress to get that
to happen.
Murphy (49:12):
Oh, and I ski that on the regular and I had no idea.
Jodie (49:16):
When did this happen, Steve?
Steve Rolfe (49:18):
Oh gosh, this has to be in the 90s, early 90s, I
think, the 90s.
Okay, so then he said, whenWhistler wanted an additional 40
acres, they went to theMinistry of the Interior in
British Columbia and thatafternoon it was done.
(49:40):
So that's the difference in thecooperation.
Now it could well be that theForest Service, the relationship
, has changed a lot in theintervening years and that my
knowledge is not contemporaneous.
I do know that there was a veryacrimonious relationship for a
(50:02):
few years because Wally Statsbecause Wally's Way is named
after Wally Stats was presidentfor a year and did as much as he
could to offend everybody, andI'm full of these stories.
I haven't talked about this inso long.
Wally Stats got a ticket.
(50:23):
He was ticketed by the by theForest Service for illegal
logging and then insulted at adinner.
Insulted the director of theForest Service in Portland at a
big dinner out.
Murphy (50:38):
Yeah, Apparently he didn't read the book how to Win
Friends and Influence People.
Steve Rolfe (50:45):
No, he was a little bit more like Trump but anyway
we won't go there uh, uh, but uh, I hadn't really, you know,
anyway, wally was a difficultman, um, but anyway.
So the biggest change, I thinkwas really, uh, the at crystal
was a totally different visionof itself and some of it being
(51:08):
lost by skiers for skiers, whichis the byword of how Crystal
was created, and there was noquestion about that.
It was a community thing byskiers for skiers.
But it didn't.
It couldn't make the leap tothe next level of being a
well-managed ski area, and Boyne, I think, did that.
(51:31):
It just created a differentattitude.
Right, you won't see it incertain places, but food service
, food service.
All of a sudden it lookedbetter and the services were
better, um, and the staff weremostly better too did you work
(51:56):
at the pass when boeing ran?
Murphy (51:58):
and it's boeing, not boeing.
Um, when boeing ran, uh, likethe three mountains or four
mountains at Snoqualmie.
Steve Rolfe (52:10):
Yeah, and I didn't have much involved.
I didn't have much specificknowledge.
They also owned up in Canada.
What is it?
I can't remember.
Yeah, no, yeah, I can'tremember.
Yeah, no, yeah, I know thatPaul Bogger, who was the patrol
director at the pro patroldirector at Crystal, was also
(52:31):
had responsibilities atSnoqualmie Pass for risk
management, so there was somecrossover there.
Murphy (52:39):
Right.
So, paul, I know the name, paulBogger, because you know Steve
Schwartz, pete Schwartz, I don'tknow if it's Steve Peter
Schwartz, come on, yeah.
So Steve, or sorry, peterSchwartz just stepped down and
Christian's a new volunteerpatrol director.
And didn't, pete, take overfrom Paul Bogger?
(53:00):
Isn't that it.
Steve Rolfe (53:02):
No, no, no, those are two, no, Paul.
Paul was the patrol patrol andhe was the patrol director for a
number of years before I becamethe volunteer director and for
a number of years after me aswell.
The linear let's see, so afterme, see before me was Jim Baldus
(53:23):
John Austin.
Was Jim Baldus John Austin?
Well, I see, if I can rememberthem all.
It was Talbot Savory, talbotGary Eide, jim Hilliker, al Al
Alpaxia, jim Hilliker, and Ican't remember who.
(53:44):
And then my Let me see, jimBaldus John Austin, me, john
Kerner and Pete Schwartz.
So I passed my mental, I havemy, your dementia.
Murphy (54:03):
Yeah, what do they call that test where you can recall
things?
Steve Rolfe (54:06):
So on the pro side there was Gordy.
Burlingame hired me and Gordywas an icon and then he left to
go work for the state foravalanche control for the state.
And Bob Anderson took over fora year and a half, and then Bill
Steele for a while, and thenthere was a series of guys that
(54:29):
were very forgettable.
Murphy (54:32):
On the pro side.
Steve Rolfe (54:34):
On the pro side yeah.
Whom we mostly kind of ignored,and then Jim Mitchell, who was
the pro director.
He became the general manager,and Paul Bogger might have been
there for 20 years.
Jodie (54:55):
So what's the last name on that?
Paul who B-A-U-G-H-E-R?
Steve Rolfe (55:00):
Oh, okay, I don't know exactly, but it was a long
time, and so Paul had been headof Avalanche and then he was
promoted to be the director ofthe patrol and I reported, and
patrol and volunteer directorsreported to the pro director
ostensibly they always did, butin the earlier years we kind of
(55:23):
ignored him.
By the time Paul came along itwas clear he wanted to run his
patrol Right.
Jodie (55:34):
On one level I could understand that so no, no, go
ahead, I'm sorry became quitesignificant.
Steve Rolfe (55:43):
He parlayed that into quite significant in the
industry.
Not only was he highlyrespected in the Northwest for
his avalanche knowledge, but helater became the chairman of the
National Avalanche School andhad his own consulting business.
He got into risk management andwould consult in a number of
(56:07):
court cases across the countryon risk management issues I
think always on the defense side.
So Paul was quite well known.
Plus, I think he was a partnerin a guide service as well.
He did a lot of climbing in thesummer.
Murphy (56:25):
Oh, kind of like RMI or something as well.
Steve Rolfe (56:29):
He did a lot of climbing in the summer, okay,
like rmi or something.
Well, I think he might havestarted at rmi, but he became a
part owner with phil or phil no,not phil, uh, um, uh, I can't
think of the name of the company, but they had the.
They had the uh license on theuh.
They had the license on thesunrise side of the mountain.
Jodie (56:48):
Oh, okay Now.
Paul was involved at Avalancheand you mentioned a gentleman by
the name of Ted, something.
Steve Rolfe (56:57):
Oh, ted Brooks was a boy.
Ted Brooks taught basic class.
He was the perfect example of apatroller who, who?
I mean he was an engineer atboeing and he studied avalanches
and he was a skier and whateverand he became the instructor
for avalanches.
Well, I'm not in any waydismissing him, but he was.
(57:22):
He just had some knowledge init and had read the books and
had been a little bit out, notunlike my early experience with
it as well.
But I remember him because hetaught the class and I mean he
was knowledgeable, but he wasn'tsomeone embedded in the
(57:43):
industry doing avalanche controlwork and throwing bombs.
Most instructors in the NSPdon't have that kind of
experience.
Jodie (57:52):
Right yeah, right yeah, definitely.
Steve Rolfe (57:54):
Now I have a side story for that, and that is
before I was patrolling at Hyatt, but I wasn't at Crystal.
One day I show up, I drive up.
I must have been 19 years oldand it snowed all week and the
north backcountry wasn't open inthose days and I remembered
that Paradise was a great placeto ski in new snow.
(58:14):
So I get to do ski cutting,which is that's not obvious to
you.
You ski across the top of theslope and you push the snow to
see if it's unstable and thenstart an avalanche.
(58:36):
So I get out there and I getright to the top of the ridge I
can still visualize it and I go,and I this is the between
arrogance and foolishness of ayoung person I go, I'm no fool,
I'm going to ski cut it.
Now, the reality is that was avery foolish choice on my part.
(58:58):
So I get out no more than thelength of my skis I had, you
know, but in those cases I had200 centimeters skis, so I had
not progressed even that far andpushed, and the whole slope
went three feet deep all the wayto the bottom, and if I had not
done that I am quite sure Iwould have died.
Wow, no one was with me.
(59:20):
And my immediate reaction thisis kind of a window on me.
I'm going like shit, I screwedup, you know it's, I made a
mistake, you know.
And.
And I'm looking around and Ilook up and there is Lloyd
McGahee, the snow ranger.
30 seconds after this.
What are the odds?
Yeah, maybe, and I go, and Ilook up very sheepishly and I go
(59:45):
did I go through a closed sign?
He goes I don't see one.
And I go, oh, and then he goes.
I need to talk to my patrolpatrollers because they were
supposed to have closed it thatnight so that people wouldn't go
skiing in that area because itwas very dangerous.
(01:00:05):
Uh-oh, so yeah, it was verydangerous.
Uh-oh, so yeah, it was verydangerous.
I mean, I have no doubt that ifI had just skied into it, it
would have gone and I would havebeen buried and nobody would
have known that.
I was there, I mean yeah,because it was three feet
fracture line.
It was probably eight feet deepat the bottom.
Murphy (01:00:27):
Oh yeah Well, and they've had some people die on
that backside, in that area, youknow, with some massive
avalanches.
In fact, I think the biggestavalanche death is, you know,
out back there somewhere.
I can remember the stories thatthey used to tell about that
(01:00:51):
used to tell about that.
Steve Rolfe (01:00:51):
Well, I, I have another, uh, wally and ba, and I
would.
Again, it wouldn't be openuntil the, until weekends.
It didn't open on weekdays.
There wasn't a chair back there.
So I remember by then wally hada bomb and ba had a bomb in in
um, in the Northway area, belowI guess I can't think of the
(01:01:16):
names anyway rather steep spots.
Wally throws his bomb a littleearly, it goes six feet deep and
I'm just watching this.
And then Bob is watching it andhe's with a bomb in his hand.
He's going whoa, and finally Ihave to yell at bob, throw your
bomb, go.
Oh, yeah, anyway.
So it had gone all the wayacross, uh, uh, north there, for
(01:01:38):
what is morning glory bowl,from below morning glory bowl
down to lower to upper north tothe trail, all all went, and the
peak of it was six feet deep,and that's because we had a hell
of a lot of snow in those years.
Murphy (01:01:53):
Right.
Yeah so you're talking about,like Gate 3, gate 4, that area.
Steve Rolfe (01:02:01):
No, that's Paradise .
Murphy (01:02:06):
So Northway Bowl, you've got morning glory bowl that
wraps all the way around.
I don't know the name.
Steve Rolfe (01:02:10):
I don't know if the names of the gates back there,
but if you go to the top ofmorning, glory bowl right ski
down, you know there's into thebowl, yeah, or you ski down.
You can ski west down the ridgea little bit.
Most people don't, but in anyevent it breaks off.
You know, just below morningglory boulder, sorry, it breaks
off into a series of cliffs,penny dogs being on.
(01:02:32):
If you face uphill, penny dogsis on the left all the way to
the snag shoot on the far right.
Murphy (01:02:39):
Uh, uh and and so that whole area went okay one, one
big, well, several avalanches,but they were all started at the
same time wow, yeah, we hadsome avalanches out there this
year that were just natural andthey, you know, were several
feet in the ground and it's uh,that's pretty amazing yeah, my
(01:02:59):
thought when I heard about thatI'm going like that ought to
make everybody a veryuncomfortable when those go
natural.
Steve Rolfe (01:03:07):
Um, that's I'm.
I'm not criticizing anybody,I'm just because these things
happen was like whoa if that hadhappened during the day yeah
instead of in in the earlyevening.
Murphy (01:03:19):
That would have been a disaster oh yeah, well, they
closed all the gates.
We had gates closed all overplus Plus, we had all that, you
know, wind load that blew allthe snow up, so you had those
cornices that were just sittingon the top and they would drop
bombs, you know and try and getthem to go Sometimes they would,
sometimes they wouldn't, sothey just had to leave it closed
(01:03:41):
.
Steve Rolfe (01:03:41):
Sophisticated now the level of understanding of
how the area works is after 62years is much better than when I
was there.
But over the years we throw abomb, a bunch of bombs, nothing
happens.
Two days later it goes on itsown.
There's no way of reallyunderstanding the mechanics
(01:04:05):
inside the geophysics of what'sgoing on inside the snow load.
There it's, yeah.
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