Thomas
Moore School
Harrisville, NH
Before 1964-c1969
According to the 1969 New Hampshire Winter Holidays Guide, the Thomas More School once operated a 535' rope tow for students. The school closed in 1971, andl is now the New England Wellness and Education Center.
Dave Mahoney remembers this ski area and has much more inforamation:
I attended the Thomas More School for one year as a high school freshman for the 1965/1966 school year. I am not sure when the rope-tow lift opened, but it had been operating for at least one year by the time I arrived in the fall of 1965. The tow rope was indeed about 500' long, and was on a steep and short-stop ski area down a roughly logged slope maybe 75'-100' wide on the backside of the property. The snow had to be over 1' deep to avoid the stumps littering it! It was home-made affair built prior to my time attending the school, and was driven by the rear-wheel 'pulley' system on an old truck that was backed into position and fixed in place. You had to have a rope grip or really thick gloves to use it! While I was not a skier at the time, we did use the slope to toboggan down, smashing at least one toboggan to bits on those protruding stumps! The slope also had another feature that was a rite of passage of sorts for incoming freshmen: A LONG rope swing hanging from a tall hardwood tree with a loop for one's foot dangling about 6'-8' above the slope. A log tripod farther up the slope was set such that if you balanced precariously on the tip of the log protruding from the tripod and drew the rope to by some means that now escapes me (like a small rope that extended closer to ground or a rod allowing hooking and transferring of the lop to you on the tripod), your could put your foot into the loop and jump off the tripod, holding onto he rope for dear life. I remember the rope swing being level when drawn to your position in the tripod, and going nearly horizontal at the other end of the swing's arc. At that point, you were about 50-75' off the slope surface, and it was quite exhilarating! Unfortunately, by the time I visited the school in the summer of 1969, it was gone due to it breaking of the rope swing badly injuring one student, I was told. Perhaps that and other incidents that I was told of, contributed to its closing in 1971.
If you remember this ski area and have more info, just let us know.
Last updated: Dec 3, 2015