Episode 1 - The Father of Modern Day Skiing

Welcome to the Ski Heroes podcast! 
The first episode pays respect to the man who started it all. Born in 1825 in Morgedal in Norway, Sondre Norheim was a pioneer with a passion for skiing and an eye for innovation and is rightfully titled the father of modern day skiing. 

Transcript

“The hills are calling and I must answer”

Hello and welcome to Ski Heroes! My name is Eivind, today is Sunday Sunday July 17th 2022 and I’m coming to you from the ski lodge in Houston, Texas, the skiing capitol of the world. I got my Helly Hansen jacket on, I got my Vuarnet sunglasses on, I got my ski helmet on, and I got the air-condition turned to as cold as it will go to try to achieve any resemblance of winter and cold weather as it’s 102F/39C outside. And I’m very excited to kick off the very first episode of the Ski Heroes podcast!

My whole life I’ve been crazy about skiing. I was four years old in the winter of 1986/87 when my hometown of Voss in Norway had a fantastic snow winter. And luck would have it that my mom was staying at home that winter with my new-born brother so I did not have to go to day-care. All day long I was outside skiing on the hills and fields outside of our home. My parents tell the story that they needed to bring me dinner on the steps outside our house, while I still had my skis on, because I was so afraid that if I went inside to eat I would be allowed to go back out. That’s when I learned to ski, and ever since I’ve been obsessed with it. 

Now, for my whole life I have also loved good stories, good stories about people with a passion for something, and maybe also who dared to go out of their way to achieve something they were passionate about. The goal with this podcast is to marry my love for skiing and good stories, each episode will highlight the story a person who one way or another has excelled at and/or had a great influence on the wonderful sport of skiing. Quite simple!

The list to pick from is quite extensive, and I’m sure I’ll tend to gravitate toward stories that I am personally familiar with, at least in the beginning. Although the podcast is in English, not all ski heroes come from English speaking countries! I will do my very best to try to do justice to my many friends around the world and get the name pronunciations correct, however; I do apologize in advance if some of the names come out with either a Norwegian accent, or a charming mix of a Norwegian accent and a southern drawl..

So let’s get this started with the first ski hero, and not just the first one for this podcast, but also quite possibly the first ski hero of all time.  

On a cold winter’s day on the prairie in North Dakota in the United States, March 9th, 1897 and old, poor and homesick man dies at the age 72. Life for the past many years had been a struggle. An immigrant to the United States, he was far away from the snowy valley where he grew up and that he loved so much. With no money to show for, no career, and no name-recognition from anyone in his new home country, he passes away and is buried in an unmarked grave near the small town of Denbigh, North Dakota where he had lived and struggled on a small farm for the past decade or so. But prior to that, he was the most famed skier of the time, a show man, an inventor of the sport, and has since rightfully been titled the father of modern day skiing. 

 Until about 1850, skiing was a means of transportation in wintertime; it was not a sport. This man changed all that. With his own incredible skiing skills and his modifications of the ski equipment, he laid the foundation for a new sport which became global within less than 50 years of his death. Without his influence, there would be no Aspen, no Vail, no Val d’Isère, no Holmenkollen. I even doubt that there would be any Olympic Winter Games. 

So with no further ado, our first ski hero is no other than Sondre Norheim. 

To understand Sondre’s story we have to go back to where it all began.

Sondre Auverson, as he was born, came into this world on June 10th 1825 in the valley of Morgedal in Norway. He was the son to Auver and Ingerid, and he was their second of two children. And as tradition had it, his last name became Auverson, the son of Auver. Born into poverty Sondre, his two year older brother with the wonderful name of Eivind and their parents lived on a small farm the hillside in Morgedal. Sondre’s father was what was referred to at the times as a “husmann”, which is a Norwegian word that directly translates as “House man”. Tenant farmer or cotter are the two best English words I’ve found to describe this arrangement, where the cotter rented a piece of land from a land-owner where he was allowed to build a house on the land that he rented, and he could also farm the land while he  would work for the land-owner. So for the remainder of this episode I will use the term cotter to describe Sondre and his family. 
 Back then it was quite common that people lived at cotters as it was basically the only opportunity for non-landowners to get a farm where they would provide a modest livelihood for their families. 

Sondre was an extremely active kid, and the hills of Morgedal were a perfect place for him. Sondre was high and low, constantly in motion, playing, and getting in trouble as he was far more interested playing outside than helping out on the family farm as the expectation of children were back then. During the winter, he would put on his pine skis that his father had made for him, hike up and ski down the steepest and most daring hills all day long. The young kid quickly caught the attention of the locals in Morgedal as he maneuvered down the hills, often waiving his cap at the spectators as he skied past them. The wild snow dance the locals would call his skiing as he fearlessly came down the hills, and he was snow dancing it was almost impossible to get him to come back inside. “The hills are calling and I must answer them” he often said. 

When he was about 7-8 years old Sondre did his first of many roof-jumps. Story has it that he snuck out at night, laid some planks from the hillside behind the family cottage and up to the roof and then covered them in snow. The next morning he hiked up the hill, yelled as loud as he could, “mom and dad, come look in the window!”, skied down the hill, across the planks, up on the roof, and jumped down on the other side of the cottage where his dad and step mom were looking out the window. Roof-jumps became a signature move for Sondre that he repeated throughout his life and excited spectators. The highest roof that’s we know he has jumped from is on one of neighboring farms to where he grew up and it’s 12 meters high, close to 40ft!

Let’s talk a little bit about the town of Morgedal where Sondre grew up. When we think of a ski-hero like Sondre, it’s easy to think about things happening in a vacuum, and that before him there was nothing, and he somehow created it all by himself. However; it is probably closer to the truth to say that Sondre was an incredibly talented person, with an extreme passion for skiing, and who was able to take advantage of the perfect surroundings and environment that he was born into. Sondre is rightfully titled the father of modern skiing. At the same time, Morgedal is also rightfully called the birthplace of modern skiing. It doesn’t take much research to realize that conditions in Morgedal were perfect for a pioneer like him. Morgedal is s a valley with long hills at a perfect incline for skiing, often sunny weather, and with long stable winters with lots of snow. 
 200 years ago, people did not have much spare time as most days were spent working on the farm. But every Sunday in Morgedal people would meet to hang out. And during the winter, people met to ski. They would start on one side of and the valley work their way across so they always had fresh powder snow to ski in. They made jumps, bumpy runs, and otherwise played in the snow all Sunday long. And it was the cotters that met to ski on Sundays as they could not afford a horse and therefore skis were their vehicle of choice during the winters. The wealthy farmers did not waste time skiing, as horses were a status symbol of the time and they would rather have their sled pulled by a horse than ski like a cotter. Quite a contrast to today’s image of skiing being a very expensive sport mostly enjoyed by affluent people. Also interesting to note is that even back then, powder is what people enjoyed skiing in!

From their Sunday meetups, an active group of skiers formed in the early to mid 1800s in Morgedal that met to ski for the joy of it rather than just use skis as a means of transportation to get around.
 And in the active group of skiers in Morgedal at the time, Sondre was the most active.
 Equipment back then was an issue. Morgedal had, and still have today, long traditions for craftsmanship, where most if not all adult men and women made a living making and selling some sort of craft in addition to their farming, and Sondre was an excellent craftsman, at least when he wanted to be. 

The bindings they had back then were toe bindings, consisting of just a loop or a strap that would stick up from the ski that you would put your boot into. As a consequence, people often lost their skis when jumping or skiing downhill, and one can only imagine some of the spectacular crashes of the time. Sondre was not quite happy with this, so he came up with the idea of throwing a strap behind the heel of his boot in addition to the toe biding. This prevented the skis from falling off and it also made it much more stable to maneuver in the snow, it allowed for much longer jumps, you could put pressure on the ski to turn, and you could go much faster without worrying about skis falling off. Sondre has been credited with inventing the heel-throw binding. He may not have been the first one to do this as other pair of skis have been found that had a similar binding contraption. But he was the first one who did it for the sole purpose to improve his skiing and to be able to enjoy recreational skiing at a higher level.

But Sondre was still not fully happy with the equipment he was working with. Skis back then were often three meters, or 9-10 feet long, and quite hard to maneuver in the snow. Sondre shortened the skis some, and then made side cuts on his skis so that they were widest in the front, narrowest underneath the foot, and wider again at the tail. This is what we call carving skis today. With the new stable bindings, Sondre was now able to put his skis on edge, and with side cuts for better turning, he was well equipped to maneuver down the hills. Now, anyone who has skied knows that there’s a big difference between skiing in powder and skiing groomers. And skiing in powder with a loose heel style binding can easily result in a faceplant. To maneuver through the powder snow, and to land more comfortably after a jump, Sondre further developed his own style. 

Now, I mentioned Sondre was born in Morgedal in Norway. What I didn’t mention is that Morgedal is located in the Norwegian province of Telemark. And the style Sondre developed to turn and land is forever since know as Telemark skiing. One foot in front of the other, a bend at the knee, and then alternate one foot in front as you turn down the hills. Telemark skiing was originally developed to better ski and jump in powder snow, and this is the origin of the weirdoes, like myself, that you still see in ski resorts today lunging their way down the hill while putting in far too much effort compared to those who ski parallel. Sondre and the valley of Morgedal is also the origin of slalom. In fact, slalom is a dialect word which translates a track down a steep inclide and references the crazy man runs he would do through the trees. 

As Sondre grew up, his love for skiing, fun, and excitement continue to prevail over the need to study, work, and other boring adult things. He always wanted to be where the action was, stealing the show at parties with his dancing, fiddling, and of course his flirting. He was in love several times, and he was quite popular among the ladies too, but he found it difficult for a poor cotter’s boy to marry. He eventually met Rannei, a lovely lady who he first noticed in the hills while she was secretly admiring his daring snow dances. Rannei was a determined, hard working, yet mild mannered woman and an excellent craftsman. Word had it that no one did more beautiful needlework than her. The couple married on January 15th 1854 and moved into the first cotter’s farm that Sondre had built for them. Now, January is not the most practical month to have a wedding in Norway, given the cold, the snow, etc, so one can I’m sure easily guess the circumstances of why this wedding happened. And only three months later their first daughter Ingerid was born, the first of 8 children, and of whom six would grow up.  

Sondre and Rannei ran their small cotter’s farm together. Life back then was hard and required a lot of manual labor year around for the family to survive. As I mentioned, Sondre was a craftsman in addition to a cotter farmer. He made tools, furniture, skis, violins, etc that he sold, and he also provided carpenter services to the community to bring some extra money in for the family. But for all of his talents, his work ethic was not the best. The hills kept calling him, and he had to answer. When the powder snow was fresh and deep, and hills of Morgedal were bathing in sunshine he was easy to persuade to quit his work on the farm and rather go skiing.

Poor Rannei had a struggle keeping her family together as Sondre kept sneaking out to ski down his many crazy man’s slopes as they came to be known. Sondre was quoted saying that Rannei’s greatest strength was that she chose to have a bad memory and this was the only thing keeping her sane. 

The family kept moving around to new cotter’s farms in Morgedal, and eventually settled at a place that Sondre named “Norheim”. This is also when he took the family name Norheim, and forever since he became known as Sondre Norheim. 

As the sport of skiing grew in popularity from mid 1800s, so did Sondre’s reputation of being the top class skier he was. In fact, the stories of him are still very much alive in Norway today and I remember growing up hearing them as a kid!
 When skiing competitions became a thing through the 1860s, Sondre, now in his mid-to-late 30s, was an eager participant. In 1866 in a town called Høydalsmo in Telemark, the first known organized ski jumping competition was held with an actual prize for the winner. Although the competition was in a town about 15km, 9-10 miles away from Morgedal, Sondre of course was invited to participate as he was already widely known far outside of Morgedal. In the competition,  Sondre had the longest jumps and the best style and he won the competition with a clear margin to the next competitor. And for that he was a valuable grandfathers clock, valued at 5 speci-daler, a value of 1500 NOK or 150 USD in today’s money. Of the many stories that are told about Sondre, some of the most famous ones are of his crazy mans slopes as they were called where he would hike up a mountain and ski like crazy back down through trees, over cliffs, etc. Freeride skiing is probably what we would call this today, but considering the equipment he skied with I think a crazy man’s slope is a far more fitting name for what he did. 
 After the competition one of the other skiers wanted to challenge him down one of his famous “crazy man’s slopes”. The story goes that the crowd sent a hat around to collect additional prize money for the winner of the race. Sondre and the other skier hiked up to the peak of the mountain, exchanged a few words of encouragement, and raced down, Sondre of course winning by a large margin. So he came home to Rannei with both a new clock and a few pennies to his name. Throughout this time, as skiing and other forms of recreational exercise increased in popularity in Norway, an organization with the lovely name of the Central Association for The Promotion of Physical Exercise and Weapon Use was formed in Christiania, which is the capital of Norway and the city now called Oslo. And after Sondre’s performance at the 1866 ski jumping competition in Telemark, word about the ski-acrobat from Morgedal eventually reached Christiania, just in time for the organization to arrange their first national skiing competition in Christiania in 1868. So the Central Association for the Promotion of Physical Exercise and Weapon Use sent an invitation to Morgedal for Sondre to attend. The competition was to be a mix between Slalom, Ski Jumping, and cross country, where the skier with the highest combined score would win. And there were 10-speci dollars prize money to the winner, roughly 3000 NOK or $300 USD in today’s money. Although this may not sound like much now, it was the equivalent of over half a year’s income for Sondre at the time. 

Now, the journey from Morgedal to Oslo is about 200km, roughly 125 miles. And back then there was no bus, no train, and he also could not afford a horse. So the only option was to cross-country ski all the way to the capitol, making this a 2-3 week endeavor to get there, compete, and get back. But the arranging committee of the competition would cover food and lodging for the skiers while they were there, and the with the potential prize money being over half a year’s pay there was of course no way Sondre was gonna miss out on this. At first glance, the story of a guy doing a 125 mile ski-hike to attend a skiing competition, and being gone for 2-3 weeks doing so just to pursue his passion is kinda cool. But I would love to be fly on the wall for the conversation between Sondre and Rannei when he proposed he would leave her alone with the all kids and all the farm work for a few weeks so that he could go to Christiania to ski. Somehow they made it work, she probably knew how important this was to him, and she probably also knew that there was no use in trying to stop him. Nevertheless, Rannei is probably the true hero to this story, even though Sondre is the one who gets the credit. 

So Sondre took two other friends from Morgedal with him and and ventured out on the 125 mile ski-hike across valleys and mountains to the capitol. 

Over 50 competitors from different districts of Norway came to participate in the competition in Christiania, and most of them were in their early to mid 20s. Among the favorites to win was Elling Bekken, a 28 year old cotter from the town of Honefoss, about 50 miles outside of Christiania, and how had won many of the local ski-competitions in the towns around Christiania in the previous years. 

Sondre, then 43 years old and more than twice the age of many of his competitors, dominated the 1968 competition in Christiania. And I can only imagine that being 43 in 1868 was not the same as being 43 today.. The audience were breath taken by this skinny, pale, and poorly clothed man from Morgedal and his ability to maneuver on skis down the hill and fly through the air like a bird when he jumped.

Where the others only had the toe-binding on their skis, Sondre had his own heel-throw binding that kept them tied to his feet. His skis were also much shorter than the others and he had the side cuts which made them much more maneuverable than his competitors. Many of the competitors would lose their skis down the slope which resulted in some spectacular faceplants and excellent entertainment for the audience. Sondre, however; with his brilliant technique and superior equipment maneuvered around the other skiers with ease down the slope and didn’t fall a single time. He had the best style, the longest jumps and the best time and was announced the clear winner of the entire competition, beating the local favorite Elling Bekken who finished second. And as just to show their dominance, the three guys who came all the way from Morgedal from the competition would finish 1st, 6th and 8th out of the 50 competitors. 

The newspapers were besides themselves when describing Sondre’s performance at the competition. “Of all the excellent competitors, the winner of the first place was far above any of the other skiers. There was something peculiar about this style and his technique, it seemed so natural to him that one could think he had been born to ski. With his ski-pole in one hand, like a walking cane, he would jump so that for 2-3 ski lengths his skis would not touch the ground, and he would land without a trace of being off balance. And when we consider that the man Sondre Norheim is 43 years old we can only imagine what this man could have done were he 20 years younger.”       

The newspapers also caught interest in the stiff heel-through bindings that the skiers from Telemark had and how Sondre could jump much further than his younger competitors and make sharp turns without the risk of his skis coming off. As one paper put it: “he came downhill like lightning and suddenly could stop in a second”.  And the one comment that has probably not aged quite as well came from a paper that said “he made the younger skiers look like they were old women”. 

In the audience that day in Christiania was also 17 year old Fritz Huitfeldt who would later become a skiing pioneer himself in manufacturing skis and bindings.

Modern day skiing had been born, and the competition was a major breakthrough for 43 year old Sondre that launched him into stardom. 

In the years to come, Sondre continued to participate in skiing competitions, astonishing the audience everywhere he went. In 1869 the snow conditions in Christiania were poor and the annual national skiing competition was cancelled. The year after, in 1870, Sondre persuaded his close friend Olav Reisdaul to join him to Christiania. So the guys set out on the 125 mile journey toward the capitol. However; snow conditions this year too were also quite poor and the two men made it all the way to Christiania only to realize that the competition had been cancelled this year too. But the guys from Telemark did not want to take no for an answer. They set up camp at a thinly snow-covered hill outside the city where they could practice. And Sondre, a well known name in Christiania at this point, let it slip to a local news paper that they were planning to hold an ad-hoc skiing event on the following Sunday. The guys managed to scrape together enough snow for a ski jumping hill and a large crowd showed up to watch the skiers from Morgedal astonish them with their skiing skills. Sondre recorded jumps over 15 meters during this event, about 50 ft, while Olav jumped about 12 meters. Both huge distances at the time!
 At the end of the day, Olav skied down the hill on one ski, while keeping the other ski in his hand and waiving it around. The city-crowd were so excited about the performance of the two guys from Morgedal that they let the hat go around to collect some prize money and Sondre and Olav returned to Morgedal with 10 speci-dollars and also a silver-sculpture each. 

In 1871 the Central Association for The Promotion of Physical Exercise and Weapon Use again hosted the skiing competition in Christiania. This year Aslak Smedal from Seljord, another small town in Telemark, won the competition, Sondre Norheim now 46 years old finished second, and Olav Drangstveit, also him from Morgedal in Telemark, finished third. A podium wallpapered by skiers from Telemark in other words! 

The final time Sondre Norheim competed in Christiania was in 1875 and Sondre was 50 years old. Although still an excellent skier, he did no longer have quite what it took to keep up with the competitors who were now 20 to 30 years younger than him and he finished in 16th place. The newspaper article from the competition made reference to that “Norheim’s legs were a bit less agile than we’ve seen before, and even though he still did excellent at the jumping part of the competition he was slower than usual at the cross country part and could not reach the podium this time. Nevertheless, a small silver sculpture and a 10-kroner coin in gold was given Mr. Norheim as an award for his performance”.

This was the last time he competed in a national competition, and it seemed fitting that the hosts awarded him for being who he was and having done what he had done for the sport of skiing even though he didn’t quite make it this time. 

Back in Morgedal, Sondre kept skiing and he also spent a lot of time teaching children how to ski, further cementing Morgedal as an early skiing powerhouse and the birthplace of modern skiing. Of the many other skiers that came from Morgedal in the years after Sondre Norheim is Olav Bjaaland, who joined Roald Amundsen on his expedition to discover the South Pole in 1911. In a skiing competition for adults in Morgedal, Sondre caught eye of some kids who were watching and just itching to participate. So Sondre dug up a 2-kroner coin from his pocket so they would have prize money. The two-kroner coin cost a lot for Sondre, so he had to be without his dearest drink coffee for two weeks, but it was still worth it for him. 

And this is how a legend is formed isn’t it? A guy with a passion for something and who excelled way beyond anyone else at the time. Long before TV or Youtube made athletes superstars, the stories about Sondre were told by generations of Norwegians. And as his stories were spread, they inspired generations of Norwegians to become skiers, myself being one of them. 

 But the story of Sondre Norheim is also a sad one. Times were rough in Norway in the 1800s and vast portions of the population left to pursue a better life in America. In 1884 Sondre then aged 59, his wife Rannei, and three of their children packed up and migrated to America to meet up with two of their children who had left in advance. Sondre and Rannei moved around the United States and eventually ended up on the flat prairie in North Dakota where they were given a piece of land from the Homestead Act. They built a small house, and they finally had their own land and were no longer forced to work for a landlord. Still, they struggled to make ends meet and to grow their crops in the harsh grassland climate. 

Sondre was homesick for the remainder of his life and neighbors said that a pair of skis were always placed outside the door. Whenever conditions allowed they could see him skiing on the flat prairie. But that was a sad substitute for the snow covered hills back home in Morgedal. 

On March 9th, 1897 Sondre Norheim died at age 72 without a penny to his name. He was buried in graveyard of the Norway Lutheran Church near Denbigh in North Dakota in an unmarked grave and it was not until a distant relative of his in the 1960s caught interest of his story and decided to identify his grave. It is now honored with a plaque that reads: 

IN MEMORY OF SONDRE NORHEIM PIONEER AND CHAMPION OF MODERN SKIING. HE DEVELOPED SLALOM AND INTRODUCED THE TELEMARK AND CHRISTIANIA TURNS. BORN 1825 IN MORGEDAL, TELEMARK, NORWAY. DIED IN THE UNITED STATES 1897

And there ends the story of Sondre Norheim, the first ski hero, and one of the greatest skiers of all time. 

The main source I used for this story was the book “Sondre Norheim, the father of modern skiing” by Anne Gry Blikom and Eivind Molde and in addition I also used some open sources on the internet. For those of you who speak Norwegian I can also recommend the two episode series “Sondre Norheim from Morgedal” that is available at NRK’s webpages.  

As I mentioned earlier, being from Norway, I grew up hearing stories about Sondre Norheim. As a kid I had two friends named Sondre and I remember being super jealous of them because they were named after him. I even had several pair skis from the Norwegian ski maker Aasnes that were of the Sondre-model back then. And as of last fall I now also have a nephew named Sondre, and he of course is my favorite person now with that name.  

Growing up, you hear these stories and it’s easy to get a romantic approximation to them: Here was this boy who loved to ski all day, who did all these daring stunts, who invented better equipment, won competitions, and became a legend both of his time and for centuries to come, kinda like a Norwegian Peter Pan who refused to grow up. It was therefore very interesting to revisit some of the stories I had heard as a kid and dig a bit deeper into the man behind the legend. To understand some of the struggles both he and most other countrymen at the time went through in their everyday lives, and to better understand some of the sacrifices that were made by his family, and especially his wife Rannei for him to pursue his passion and become who he did. She is really the true hero of this story. 

Although it’s probably wishful thinking on my end, Sondre and I actually have a few things in common. We’re both from Norway obviously, and we both at some point migrated to the United States. Skiing is the big passion for both of us, and I can definitely relate to being outside all winter long skiing and refusing to come back inside for dinner because I knew I would not be allowed back out. But who am I kidding, that is also where any resemblance of commonalities end. I am obviously nowhere near the level of talent that Sondre must have had back in the day, nor do I have the same eye for innovation of our sport. And in all honestly, I would also like to hope that my work ethic is hopefully a tad better than Sondre’s… 

If you ever travel through Telemark I would highly recommend stopping by the Ski Museum in Morgedal. I did not realize this before I started working on this episode, but the Olympic flame has been lit in Morgedal for three different Olympic games! The 1952 Oslo games, the 1960 Squaw Valley games, and the 1994 Lillehammer games all had the torch lit in Morgedal. I came across a great story of when the flame was transported to Squaw Valley in an airplane back in 1960, my guess is that this would not have been allowed today.. 

Being an eager telemark-skier myself, and having a grandfather from the province of Telemark, Sondre Norheim was an easy choice for this first episode. My goal is to release the next episode within a few weeks, workload, timing, and overall motivation permit. I have not quite decided who it will be yet, but I have narrowed it down to a few good candidates, so I hope you will tune in next time as well as we dig deeper into the story of yet another ski hero.
 I hope you enjoyed the first episode of the Ski Heroes podcast. I have made an Instagram profile for the podcast so if you’d like you can follow Ski Heroes there and stay up to date on when the next episode is available. And if you have suggestions for future Ski Heroes to cover, or if you just want to write me a note, you can do so at skiheroes@gmail.com.

 Until then, do your snow dances and I hope you will tune in next time!