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PrintOne Good Turn
Gene Palmer, a skiing legend in his own time
Photography Courtesy of Grand Targhee Resort
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Here in the Rocky Mountain West—as elsewhere, no doubt—ski areas are often inexorably linked to either the founder of the resort’s ski school or a ski school director of unusually long tenure. The Jackson Hole Mountain Resort at Teton Village will always be connected with the name Pepi Stiegler. Alta, Utah, is rarely mentioned by veteran powder hounds without a nod to Alf Engen. (Engen passed on in 1997, but this writer fondly recalls on numerous occasions back in the early seventies seeing him skiing with his friend, the world-renowned traveler and broadcaster Lowell Thomas.)
While Provo, Utah, native Junior Bounous taught for lengthy gigs both at Alta and at Sugar Bowl in California—and is currently skiing at Utah’s Snowbird—many remember him for the years he ran the ski school at Provo Canyon’s Timphaven, which became Sundance after Robert Redford acquired it.
Similarly, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone who spent time at Grand Targhee Resort in its first three decades and doesn’t recall the name, face, and graceful ski technique of Gene Palmer. Over the past eight years, as an instructor at Targhee, I’ve had the privilege of spending more time skiing with Palmer than probably with any other person (though my wife Wynne Ann would run a close second). I owe him an awful lot for the hundreds of ski lessons, as well as for his friendship.
A native of nearby Rexburg, Palmer had a successful racing career as a youth, winning more than his share of competitions at the old Bear Gulch Ski Basin east of Ashton. (Interestingly, Alf Engen laid out the first runs at Bear Gulch, which was the second ski area to open in Idaho, Sun Valley being the first. Bear Gulch closed in the 1980s.)
Palmer’s initial association with Grand Targhee was as a member of its original board of directors. But once the resort opened on December 26, 1969, he resigned from the board and took on the job of running the ski school as a concessionaire. Almost from the get-go, Palmer recalls, Targhee struggled financially. “Bob Blank was the first general manager,” he says, “and he tried as hard as he could to make it a success. Back then, there was simply no money to be had.”
In 1971, the resort took over direct operation of the ski school, with Palmer serving as the director.
Mark Hanson has been the Targhee Ski School director for the past decade. It doesn’t take much urging to get him to talk about Gene Palmer. “You know, it’s a real gift for me to have an icon here like Gene,” Hanson says. “He is such a great supporter. Gene has always let me know he is behind me. I consider him a dear friend. There is not a day goes by during the season where somebody doesn’t come into the ski school and ask about him....(Continued)
