The darkest Depression times of the 1930s somehow became the decade when Americans really learned how to have fun sliding down snowy hills.

In Woodstock, Vt., someone figured out that if you wrapped a rope around the flywheel of a Ford tractor, you could tow skiers up Gilbert’s Hill. Dartmouth daredevils and their collegiate rivals first established racing on New England’s ultimate terrain — Mt. Washington’s Tuckerman Ravine. Those years also marked the beginnings of the college winter carnival ski race circuit.