Bogus Basin's beginnings: Carving out history

BOISE, Idaho (KBOI) — Bogus Basin is celebrating 75 years in the Treasure Valley this year.

The mountain is moving forward with plans to become a year-round destination, introducing a variety of new summer activities this summer. But the vision for this mountain, these improvements, and everything still to come was actually carved out several decades ago by some of the area's earliest ski enthusiasts.

Whether you're new or not so new to the Treasure Valley, it's hard to believe how much has changed at Bogus Basin in the last three quarters of a century.

Bogus Basin: Before there was a ski hill

Less than a century ago, in the 1930's, there wasn't even a 'Bogus Basin ski area'; instead just the dream of a ski hill in southwest Idaho.

"When Sun Valley opened, a lot of people went over to see the new sport of skiing," said local historian Eve Chandler. "A group of men from the Boise Junior Chamber of Commerce decided opening a ski resort near the city of Boise and the Treasure Valley would be a great way to boost our economy."

Chandler, a local author, spent years studying the history of the local ski area, which dates back to the Great Depression. Her book, "Building Bogus Basin" journals out some of the mountains beginnings, from how Bogus Basin got its name to how it became the chosen spot for a soon-to-be ski area.

"Alf Engen and a team of people from Boise, they scoured the mountains from Pilot's Peak over to Horseshoe Bend summit," she said. "They did a lot of hiking and a lot of skinning up mountains to see the very best places to ski. When they hit upon Bogus Basin, they just felt like it was a natural place to create a ski area."

That journey, Chandler wrote, spanned 150 miles across Idaho's mountains.

Although the opening was delayed a year because of World War II, Bogus Basin opened to the public on December 20, 1942. Before that, men and women volunteers spent countless hours building the road up to the mountain and clearing the ski hill of trees and other obstacles.

Getting off the ground

Even with the resort town Sun Valley just a few hours away, Bogus Basin caught the attention of early-day skiers from around the northwest.

"It was very accessible, and very affordable," Chandler said. "It was not an expensive destination resort like Sun Valley. But skiing just boomed."

Bob Greenwood moved to Boise in the 1950's from eastern Washington, where he was working at a sports shop and skiing while in college.

"I'd heard there was a nice little ski area here, and i just came to Boise," Greenwood said. "I fell in love with this town when I came here. I wasn't in town 10 days and I was already in love. It's just such a great town. It's still a great town, it's just gotten huge."

But back then, 'huge' would be the last word Greenwood would have used to describe Boise, or the small ski area 16 miles north of town.

"The first trip up there was interesting because you're driving in the mud on that road that was rutted and gravely," he said. "You're excited though because you want to get up there. You ski on what you have."

Back in the early 1940's, a 500-ft. rope tow was the only way to get skiers up part of the hill. A T-bar was added in the mid 1940's, giving skiers a longer ride up (and then down) the mountain hillside. The first chairlift wasn't installed until 1959.

"We just, you did whatever you could do," Greenwood said. "We had to pack it, we had to boot-pack if you wanted to get some snow packed for a run."

Building Bogus Basin Road

In the early days, even getting to the mountain was part of the adventure.

"We've shoveled to get to Bogus Basin," Greenwood said. "It was all gravel and dirt."

The road was dug out by more than 100 volunteers who literally helped pave (or, dig) the way to the future.

"[It was] a dirt, one lane road," Greenwood said. "There were a couple places you could pass. You drove up, and you couldn't drive back down until after two in the afternoon. One way up, one way down."

Eventually, stories about that muddy road became just stories, as it was first paved in the early 1960's.

"I remember them talking about pushing each other up there, and thinking 'there's no way I would have done that,'" Boise resident and long-time skier Mary Thomas said.

Skiing: A sport and a community

Bob Greenwood made a footprint in the skiing world early on in Boise, opening Greenwood's Ski Haus in the late 1950's. But he wasn't the earliest of skiers, nor was he the only one who made a lifetime hobby of it after he started.

Mary Thomas, a native Boisean, picked up the sport in the late 1960's. Like many self-proclaimed 'ski-bums,' she would ski during the day and then work at night after getting off the mountain. For Mary, it took just one drive up the mountain and one run down for her to fall in love with Bogus Basin and the sport of skiing.

"I always wanted to ski," she said. "That was it. When I started, it was mine. It was my kind of sport."

Soon, the sport of skiing snowballed into a community. Eventually, Mary and Bob became friends after meeting at a ski show. They've been friends ever since.

"He was always up there, so I'd always try to follow him on the hill, learn a little bit more," Mary said.

Together, the two skiers watched as Bogus Basin grew up over the coming decades. As the sport grew more popular, more and more people started flocking to the mountain.

"If we had 500 people up there, that was a huge crowd," Greenwood said. "You know, but first it was 500 [people], the next year maybe 600, then 700, then 1000."

The tracks of those early skiers have been traced over time and time again through the years (and decades that followed), and have helped carve out Bogus Basin's history.

"We were there, we were part of it," Greenwood said. "We knew the people and I'm just thankful that I'm still alive and can enjoy it."

Skiing: Then and now

Skiing has come a long way since 1942. In the early days, Chandler said skis cost $13.

"Those boots were pretty tough, some of those way back," Mary said.

Equipment is more expensive these days, but technological advancements are pushing the sport into the future.

Now, Bogus Basin is looking to the future too, making plenty of changes on the mountain in lieu of its 75th anniversary.

Perhaps one of the only things that hasn'tchanged over the years is the one thing that runs deeper than the season's snow: love. Love for the sport, and love for the place where it all started 75 years ago.

"There's no bad day for me ever, ever," Mary said. "It's just always something I'd dreamed, but it came true for me. I'm still livin' it. It's a great life."

"I'm going to be skiing a few more years," Greenwood - now 91 - said. "[Skiing] has meant living in Boise, Idaho to me. I've met a lot of people that I really absolutely love. I just love skiing, and I love Bogus. When you have something like this that's so close to ski on this is as good as anywhere in the world.

Looking forward

Watch KBOI 2News for a follow-up piece digging into the current changes on the mountain and other improvements and slated in the coming years and decades.

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