New book tells story of skiing in America

The decades after World War II also saw phenomenal growth in the number of ski areas. By the start of the war, the U.S. had between 200 and 300 rope tow-equipped hills and by 1943, 19 chairlifts. By 1965, there were 662 ski areas, and by 1971, there were 1,000 chairlifts in North America.

And while ski visits began to decline in the 1980s, snowboarding helped turn that trend around in the 1990s.

But eventually, the Colorado Rockies and Utah's Wasatch Range came to be seen as superior to Eastern destinations for discriminating skiers. Not only can you fly to Denver from New York in less time than it takes to drive from Manhattan to Stowe, Vt., but, says Fry, the West is simply blessed with better climate and geology than the East.

"If you're a skier, what you want is vertical drop on a mountain -- the height from the base to the summit. Not that there aren't good vertical drops in the East, but you've got bigger mountains in the West," said Fry.

And despite 21st century concerns over climate change, this season's warm weather is hardly the first time the East has had too little snow to satisfy skiers. Even machines can't make snow in 40-degree weather. Many skiers also prefer the West's powdery snow and numerous sunny days to the wetter snow and sometimes gray days of winter in the East.

Fry lives in Westchester, a suburb north of New York City, and says he still likes to drive to nearby ski areas like Catamount and Butternut Basin in the Berkshires, and Thunder Ridge in Patterson, N.Y. In his book, he laments the loss of hundreds of small community ski areas where kids once learned the sport at low cost.

But he admits that his personal preference is "to be in a place where I can ski out the door. I think it's part of a vacation that you don't have to get in a car. Snowmass (at Aspen) has a lot of ski-out-the-door skiing. So does Alta" in Utah.

Fry acknowledges that a groomed trail of natural and machine-made snow in the East is roughly comparable to the same thing in the West, but "if you've ever skied in 10 inches of fresh powder on a beautiful morning at Vail or Aspen, no machine can duplicate that experience."

MORE FROM WINTER TRAVEL

Winter Travel Section Front

Mountain resorts redline the fun meter Top 10 black diamond ski runs Amazing adventures America's most dangerous slopes Celebrity winter hideaways Top 10 cities for shopaholics Winter Travel Section Front   Add Winter Travel headlines to your news reader: