Snowboarding

Brief History

Dating the birth of snowboarding is impossible. People have been standing on sleds and trying to slide on snow for hundreds of years. Snowboarding, as we understand the activity today, however, emerged in the late 1960s and 1970s in North America. In 1964, Sherman Poppen invented the Snurfer when he bolted two skis together and added a rope for stability. The Snurfer sold for between $10 and $15 in supermarkets and was seen as a children's toy, much like the Hula Hoop. During the 1970s, several Snurfer enthusiasts began experimenting with foam, fiberglass, steam-bent wood, and vertically laminated wood with the goal of making a board that was more maneuverable and faster than the Snurfer.

Most of the early pioneers of the activity embodied the idealism of the bygone counterculture and, in direct contrast to skiing (which was an expensive and bourgeois sport framed by a strong set of rules of conduct), embraced snowboarding as a free, fun, creative, and individualistic activity. Haakonsen best captured the countercultural ideology among early boarders when he described snowboarding as about making “fresh tracks and carving powder and being yourself” rather than “nationalism and politics and big money.”

Changing Attitudes

Ski resorts initially banned snowboarders. Negative images of surfing and skateboarding from the 1970s contributed to the public dislike and distrust of snowboarding. According to David Schmidt, the national sales manager for Burton Snowboards, ski resort owners, managers, and their skiing clientele “visualize snow-boarders as a bunch of skate rats who are going to terrorize the mountain.” While bans made participation [Page 648]difficult, they did not stop determined and passionate devotees, who hiked up the slopes to test their latest equipment, develop their skills, and play in the snow with their friends.

Freestyle snowboarding is perceived as being a dangerous style of snowboarding, and while injury can and does occur, terrain parks and half-pipes are carefully constructed and maintained to minimize risk.

In 1983 Stratton Mountain in Vermont became the first major ski field to open its piste to snowboarders. Others quickly followed. Skiing had reached a growth plateau, and snowboarding offered ski-fields a newyouth market and ongoing economic prosperity. But, even after gaining access to the ski-fields, snowboarders continued to see themselves as “different” than skiers, and tensions between skiers and snowboarders remained throughout the 1980s. Summarizing the cultural differences during this period, snowboarding historian Duncan Humphreys wrote that whereas “skiing embodied technical discipline and control,” snowboarding “embodied freedom, hedonism and irresponsibility.”

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