Liam Guthrie, Regional History Librarian
As the weather warms and ski season comes to an end, I’m sure many can relate to this group of skiers, donned in short sleeves and straw hats, chasing the last of the spring snow high in the mountains.
This photo is from the personal scrapbook of Jerry Norling, a publicist and noted “popular young rogue” working for Sun Valley in the 1950s. The album features many photos from this particular trip up into the Boulder Mountains, taken by Norling along with his coworkers and friends in the Sun Valley publicity office. The group drove up into the Boulder Mountains in a Willys CJ-3B Jeep, a rugged four-wheel drive vehicle, along old mining-turned-Forest-Service roads, managing to get in some fishing in creeks along the way.
Upon arriving at Boulder Lake, the photos show the group making the best of the contrasting conditions of springtime in the Wood River Valley, performing a wide variety of activities such as skiing, fishing, paddling (on some very rudimentary rafts), sledding, and cooking over a campfire. These Sun Valley employees clearly knew how to find fun even during what is commonly thought of as the region’s off-season.
Norling would eventually leave Sun Valley around 1964, but he kept many photos from his time there in his photo album, including ski trips, picnics, costume parties, and bike rides. In 2000 he sent his photo album back to Sun Valley for a reunion so that “…it can be enjoyed by those who are still around from those Olden Golden days!”
Note this story was originally published in April of 2024 in the Idaho Mountain Express.
