Clear Hill

M. Curtin: "My brother went to St. Mark's in the early 70s, and did indeed ski on that hill often, although I never did. I was at college by then, in western MA, and was skiing mainly in Vermont. I remember Clear Hill clearly though (no pun intended -- actually we never called it Clear Hill. We knew it as St. Mark's hill); it was a decent hill, with a water tower on top, and a trail cut straight down the fall line (if you can call it that), with a rope tow going up the right side, through the trees. The hill was really active in good snow years (mid to late 60's in Worcester County). I don't remember if the hill was open to the public, or only for St. Mark's use."

Since it wasn't a monstrous ski hill and some of us had no skis, we would sometimes use the hill with toboggans. There was a stone wall across the bottom that wasn't any good for the toboggans, but in real powder you couldn't see it "coming". So I remember counting carefully to measure how long it took to descend the hill. All well and good, but I failed to consider how much faster each successive run was down the same track. I learned one time when as front man for a load of five kids, I was carefully counting my last number before shouting "jump" when we crashed into the wall. So I yelled "jump" anyway as we dusted ourselves off for the next run - with another, sharper front man in place.

Tony Peet:

I was also a student, and an avid downhill skier, at St Mark's from 1971 - 1975. I can both assure you that the ski hill existed and that it never operated during the time I was there.

I recall that there was some discussion of trying to restart it, but that never happened to my knowledge. I also recall, vaguely, that we may have only had one winter during that period which would have provided enough snow coverage to make it worthwhile.

I could be fairly bold in those days, and I recall setting off one winter afternoon determined to figure out a way to make that rope tow work. The power box and controls were all quite obvious, and I immediately noticed that the main switch was off.

"Well this will be easy," I thought -- as I pushed the lever up to the "On" position. The next thing I knew there was smoke and the most horrible smell coming from inside the box and/or machinery somewhere -- and I had enough sense to immediately shut it down.

The smoking stopped, and a few moments later I probed around the mess to find a tangle of smoldering straw which had apparently been some small creature's nest. It was stinky and dank, and whatever remaining enthusiasm I had to get the thing working simply evaporated at that point.

I do recall hearing that St Mark's had a ski team within several years before my arrival and that they had used Clear Hill to practice. To my eye, the rope tow was mid 50's to mid 60's vintage....so I am guessing that Clear Hill was most active in the 1960-67 period.

Thanks to Max Ziegler, who attends St. Marks and took the following photos during the winter of 2006-2007.