Have you heard people say, Black people don’t ski? The Chicago Sno-Gophers ski club, a southside treasure, has been busting that myth for 55 years. This January the club is headed to Crystal Mountain in Thomasville, Michigan for their annual winter carnival. Downhill skiing, snowboarding, racing and cross-country skiing are all on the schedule for a good time on the slopes. And after a day of skiing, relaxing with a cocktail or hot toddy at happy hour sounds good. Then dinner and dancing to round out the evening activities. In February, they’ll head to National Brotherhood of Skiers Summit in Snowmass, Colorado meeting up with other clubs around the country.
Covid has been hard on skiing, like it has for other sports. Generally ski resorts were not crowded when they re-opened. No waiting in the lift lines, and eating meals in your car or tailgating became the new normal without restaurant indoor seating. “I am beyond excited to be returning to a normal ski season in 2022,” says Angelic Faith, president of the Sno-Gophers Ski Club. Skiing is an enjoyable outdoor sport and great exercise, she says. But for me it’s also a social sport, filled with camaraderie and the chance to meet new people every time you sit on a lift carrying you to top of the mountain. While we will still practice covid protocols, it will be wonderful to see everyone together at live events.”
“We are celebrating 55 years as a club having fun, teaching people to ski, and still going strong with 137 members,” says Pauline Washington, Sno-Gophers’ membership chairperson. “What people may not know is that we do activities year-round. In the summer we go camping, pitching tents and increasingly renting RVs. We have an annual picnic in the forest preserve and a ski show every fall.”
The Sno-Gophers have skied in resorts around the world from Canada to Colorado, Lake Placid, NY to Squaw Valley, Ca, Spain to Brazil. In late January, some members will join the Chicago Metropolitan Ski Council on their international trip to Val d’Isere, France & Barcelona, Spain.
For more information and full trip schedule this season visit: https://www.snogophers.org/
National Brotherhood of Skiers (NBS)
The Sno-Gophers are one of the 13 founding clubs of the National Brotherhood of Skiers, the largest African-American snow sport organization in the world. The NBS will turn fifty in 2023, and now has 52 chapters across the country and 3,000 members. Black skiers from international clubs like the Nubian Club in London also participate in NBS events.
Since its inception in 1973, the National Brotherhood of Skiers has been about much more than just having fun on the mountain. Their mission is to identify, develop and support athletes of color who will win Olympic and International winter sports competitions representing the United States and to increase African American participation in winter sports. They have several youths in training and competing in these competitions. The cost of training these elite athletes is expensive, often over twenty-five thousand dollars per young skier, per year. The NBS annual summit is a major fundraiser for their youth program.
Henri Rivers, NBS president, stated, “the NBS is going into it’s second season as a PSIA certified traveling ski school and with a grant from one of our partners we will be expanding our winter outreach program to reach over 1000 new participants and train four (4) new Snowsports instructors.
In March, 2020 over 600 skiers were attending the Black Summit at the Sun Valley Ski Resort in Ketchum, Idaho. They gathered in the town square, dancing to the music and wearing their club colors and joyously calling out their club names to kick off the Summit. Unbeknownst to the citizens of the town, or the Black skiers on vacation, the Corona virus was claiming victims as it spread across the United States. Following a week of racing, partying and fundraising, the Corona virus followed some skiers home. In a tragic turn of events, over 125 skiers were stricken with the disease, including Ben Findley, one of the NBS founders. Four skiers died, overshadowing what should have been a tribute to diversity in the sport. Coronavirus outbreaks hit ski resorts around the world, from Colorado to Austria, forcing the premature end of ski seasons and costing the industry $2bn, according to the National Ski Areas Association (NSAA).
The NBS group’s fundraising efforts have helped to elevate the careers of athletes such as Bonnie St John, the first black woman to win a Paralympic medal for skiing, and Andre Horton, the first black man to compete for the US alpine team. And they have some very promising athletes in their current development program. You can support these athletes with a donation to the Olympic Scholarship fund on the NBS website.
Arthur Clay, South Shore Resident Inducted into the Skiing Hall of Fame
NBS founders Art Clay, and Ben Findley are the first African-Americans to be inducted into the skiing hall of fame. “We were inducted into the U.S. Ski and Snowboarding Hall of Fame because of our contribution to the ski industry,” said Art Clay. The two shared a vision for providing a community for the small number of black skiers in the country and a commitment to increasing African-American participation that went far beyond securing lodging and lift ticket deals for their group. “In the early 1970’s few Black people knew how to ski but, we knew how to have fun,” said Clay. “At the time there were very few blacks on the slopes so every time we went out and saw another black person, before the day was over we were friends.”
Clay and Findley’s trailblazing efforts and nearly 50-year vision has created tens of thousands of Black snow sports enthusiasts, generating hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue across the winter sports industry. The NBS’ annual gathering is one of the largest ski events in America.”
Initially, the induction ceremony for these very first African Americans to be enshrined for the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame was to take place in Sun Valley in 2020, but it has been postponed twice due to the ongoing threat of Covid-19 and its variants. The official induction ceremony for Clay and Findley, now in their early 80’s, is scheduled to take place March 26, 2022, in Sun Valley, Idaho.
The first NBS Summit took place in 1973 in Aspen, Colorado and was attended by 350 Black skiers. The NBS 2022 Summit will take place February 5th -12th in Snowmass, Colorado and thousands will be in attendance. For more information visit: https://www.nbs.org/
Now you know, Black people do ski, in ski resorts around the world. Last winter I was so bored from having to stay inside. This winter I’m going to travel more, explore the great outdoors, commune with nature and make some new friends. Skiing can help you do the same.
Donna Beasley has been a skiing enthusiast for over 30 years, and is a vested member of the Chicago Sno-Gophers Ski Club. She also loves riding snowmobiles, snowshoe hiking up the mountain, and Hot Chocolate with peppermint snaps in the ski lodge after a fun day on the slopes.
