“Skiers of the hill, arise!”

The words sound like a parody of some epic movie like The Lord of the Rings, but in truth they come from a 1957 memo to members of the Los Alamos Ski Club. The purpose of the memo was to gather all willing and able members to the task of cutting trees, building tows, and essentially creating the Pajarito Ski Mountain as we think of it today. Since the mountain just opened for a limited season thanks in part to Covid and also the less than prolific winter we’ve been having, I thought it might be fun to look back at the history of one of Los Alamos’s coolest local amenities.

Skiing wasn’t originally part of the New Mexico landscape. In the beginning, members of the Ranch School staff and students made the trek up Sawyer’s Hill for their skiing activities. Sawyer Hill was located West of the NM-4 and 501 intersection. By 1943, the Los Alamos Ranch School had given way to the Laboratory and the European born scientists took Sawyer’s Hill in hand. Who better to clear cut trees in one fell swoop than a demolitions team also responsible for handling charges for one of the world’s first fission reaction weapons? Imagine C-4 strapped to trees and you might get a glimmer of the eccentric way that Sawyer’s Hill was expanded.

Sawyer’s Hill became the site of many incredible tales of DIY ingenuity. The first official “tow” was constructed from a circus rope and an old Chrysler engine and cost $400. Season passes were $7.50 and the “mountain” was more of a “slope”. A good portion of Sawyer Hill’s design was overseen by George Kistiakowski. The Ukrainian born physicist would later become the scientific advisor for President Eisenhower. Kistiakowski was an avid skier. So were other scientific heavy hitters such as Enrico Fermi, Hans Bethe, Neils Bohr, and Robert Oppenheimer, all charter members of the Los Alamos Ski Club which was created in 1944 with the purpose of bettering the available skiing at Los Alamos.

By 1957, the LASC was fed up with the unreliable snow and varying ski conditions at Sawyer’s Hill. A scouting party made the trek to Pajarito Mountain and chose the North face as the future home of the Los Alamos Ski Club. Club members felled trees, worked terrain, and created most of the runs still in use today. Pajarito Ski Mountain is unlike any other. If you’ve ever skied elsewhere, you’ve probably noticed. Even now that the mountain itself belongs to the Sipapu Group, there is still a visible presence of LASC members and old school ski enthusiasts. The sense of pride and ownership that these individuals take in their mountain is part of what makes skiing in Los Alamos unique in the industry.

If you grew up in Los Alamos, chances are that you’ve skied. In the eighties and nineties, missing a few Wednesday afternoons of school or work was a normal occurrence when the snow was good and the mountain was open. At one point the membership in the Los Alamos Ski Club included nearly 4,000 locals.

Regardless of your personal enjoyment of our local ski facilities, it’s important to realize that there has been a lot of Los Alamos blood, sweat, and tears involved in keeping that mountain open and operating. Having a ski mountain “in our backyard” is just one more item on a long list of incredible outdoor opportunities available here in Los Alamos County. In the off season there are plenty of hiking and mountain biking opportunities available as well as “Yoga on the Mountain”, a joint venture between Tribe Yoga & Wellness and the Sipapu Group. Nothing says awesome quite like donuts, friends, and yoga at ten thousand feet elevation!

So, when you’re looking for something to do here in Los Alamos, don’t forget to look up! Whether covered in snow or in varying shades of green, Pajarito Mountain is a vital piece of what makes our community such an amazing place to call home. And if you’re ready to talk housing in Los Alamos, give me a call.