118 FOREST OUTINGS 



officers and members of skiing and other outdoor sportsmen's organizations. 

 More recently commercial interests have joined in the push. But every- 

 where the thing has proceeded in the thought that here is something that 

 millions need and want, and the results have been to the good, in the main. 



Much that is filmed and printed of winter sports in this country plays 

 up naturally from the sports-page angle, professional performances. From 

 the resort standpoint, there is a tendency also to surround skiing, as golf, 

 polo, and horseback riding have been surrounded, with an exclusive aura, 

 to smother its development in snob appeal. This is short-sighted and ridicu- 

 lous. There is nothing essentially expensive about winter sports nothing 

 exclusive. 



It is good, this general spurt of escape from the stuffy and weary prison 

 of overheated houses and head colds by Americans still young, and not so 

 young. It marks, in a way, a break with the past, this discovery that the 

 sun shines also in winter and that the most exhilarating of experiences may 

 be enjoyed in brisk weather, outdoors. For thousands, this discovery has 

 meant a break in that dulling annual hibernation which even open-country 

 Americans have tended to indulge in from the first. The speed with which 

 general participation in winter sports is increasing may be judged from a 

 pleased announcement by sports tradesmen early in 1939. 



In 1935 Americans spent for skis and snowshoes $41 7,000. Last year, 

 1938, they spent $3,000,000 for skis, $6,000,000 for ski clothes, and $15,000,- 

 000 for transportation to and lodging at winter playgrounds, private and 

 public. 



From the Appalachians near the Atlantic, across the Lake States, 

 through the Rockies, and westward to the Cascade Range and the Sierras 

 above the Pacific, each winter week end now brings a colorful throng of 

 enthusiasts to white playgrounds. Probably no other form of outdoor rec- 

 reation offers a wider range of appeal. The small boy with home-made sled 

 or barrel-stave skis has as much fun as the expert with his carefully chosen 

 equipment. Not everyone can learn to ski jump, or should try to, but nearly 

 all can find exhilarating play in simpler ways. There is coasting. Not only 

 the very young can coast, anyone can; on anything from the short easy slope 

 where the youngsters slide "belly- buster" to the long steep toboggan run. 



