In 1959, an all-day lift ticket at what is now the Santa Fe ski basin cost a grand total of $4. For that sum, skiers could run on 12 miles of trails, although they had to get off the slopes and into their cars before 3 p.m., when the dirt road down to Santa Fe closed. By the mid-1960s, the ski area drew enough outdoor enthusiasts to merit serious discussion of a lodge, but a mere 20 years earlier the resort had been only a dream of Santa Fe skiers.

Discussions of a ski area in the Sangre de Cristos mounted in the 1930s as Santa Feans became jealous of the new resort built in the mountains above Los Alamos. The Rotary Club of Santa Fe and the Chamber of Commerce took action in 1936 and hired a Colorado ski instructor, who suggested lifts at Hyde Memorial State Park. Soon the Santa Fe Winter Sports Club, the U.S. Forest Service and the National Park Service constructed trails and installed a rope tow, the remains of which are still visible.

The trails at Hyde Park drew a small but hearty crowd until World War II, when any plans for expansion and improvement were placed on hold.

The country's postwar transformation led, among other things, to the growing popularity of outdoor recreation. The 10th Mountain Division, which trained to fight in the winter climate and mountainous terrain of northern Italy, also revolutionized the way Americans thought of and equipped themselves for the outdoors. Ernest "Tap" Tapley of Santa Fe helped train the division during the war and redefined wilderness education after it through Outward Bound and the National Outdoor Leadership School.

Beyond that, the outdoors-oriented men of the 10th Mountain became pioneers of the western ski industry, a group that included Bob Nordhaus of Sandia Peak, who had served in the unit, Buzz Bainbridge of Santa Fe, who had fought alongside the division, and Ernie Blake of Taos, who had volunteered unsuccessfully to join the mountain troops.

Blake and his Swiss-German family brought a love of skiing when they came to the United States in 1938. When Blake moved permanently to New Mexico after his wartime service in the OSS, the predecessor of the CIA, he happened upon a Chamber of Commerce initiative and some local ski enthusiasts who were in the midst of pushing to get the ski area moved up Hyde Park Road to the basin.

The greatest struggle lay in the completion of the road. Controversy arose because the planned road would cross tribal land. The skiers got their wishes when the road pushed through in 1949. Construction of a ski infrastructure began. Skiers traveled to Silverton, Colo., where they claimed a British-built bi-cable lift used in the mines. They moved the lift to Santa Fe, and the rusty machine, despite the occasional clutch failure, gave skiers a 600-foot lift.

With Blake as manager, the Santa Fe ski basin opened in 1950. He supervised installation of the chairlift, which used seats from B-24 bombers, outdoor writer Daniel Gibson said in a 2005 story in The New Mexican. Blake moved to Colorado but continued to scout locations for what became Taos Ski Valley, which he opened in 1955 and ran until his death in 1989.

Bainbridge first came to New Mexico in 1946 as a sales representative for a ski maker, and by the next winter was managing the Hyde Park and Big Tesuque operations. "I'd leave Jean (his wife) at Hyde Park running things and head up to Big Tesuque," he told Gibson in 2005. "I would fire up the torch used to warm that old Cadillac engine we used for the lift, get it warming up and then head back down to check on Jean."

Bainbridge spent a year at present-day Sandia Peak and returned to Santa Fe to run the ski school. After serving in the Korean War, Bainbridge ran the Santa Fe ski basin for five years as general manager. Bainbridge told Gibson: "All I wanted was bodies on the slopes, and so I was always working the lift lines forming ski clubs. I'd ask where a group was from, and say I'd give them each a 50-cent discount if they were a club. They'd elect a president right then and there." A former state tourism director, Bainbridge retired in Santa Fe.

Almost 60 years of stability marked management of the ski area. In 1954, after a propane explosion caused major damage that proved costly, oilman Joe T. Juhan bought Sierras de Santa Fe Corp. and financed improvements that attracted wide attention. Kingsbury Pitcher, whose family now owns Wolf Creek Ski Area, operated the ski basin for the next 30 years, making numerous improvements over the period. In 1984, Ben Abruzzo purchased the ski basin. A famous hot-air balloonist, Abruzzo died a year later in a plane crash, and the family company he formed still manages the ski area.

Jason Strykowski is a doctoral student at The University of New Mexico. Editor Rob Dean contributed to the article.