Lost ski areaUtahWasatch RangeRocky Mountains
Becker Hill
Ran 1929–1933. A ski jump at Shanghai Flat in Ogden Canyon, used for competitions from 1930 until 1933 and later lost to the Pineview Dam.
Overview
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Imagery: USGS The National Map · Terrain: Mapzen, USGS and others
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Becker Hill was one of the first ski jumps around Ogden, built at Shanghai Flat in Ogden Canyon to bring visitors to the city. Work began in the autumn of 1929.1,2
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Photos
Memories
Skied Becker Hill, or worked there?
Tell us what you remember, or what this page has wrong. Memories show here, credited to you, after we read them; facts are checked against a source before they change a figure.
Lost near Becker Hill
The closest other lost ski areas, as the crow flies.
- Closed 1968 · 33.7 mi away · UtahA small rope-tow hill nine miles up Emigration Canyon, popular in the 1950s and 1960s, that closed in 1968.
- Closed 2011 · 37.7 mi away · UtahA private snowboard park near Glenwild, outside Park City, built by DC Shoes co-founder Ken Block, with a rope tow serving 10 runs.
- Years not yet collected · 55.4 mi away · WyomingA small ski area about 15 miles east of Evanston, off old U.S. 30, with a single chairlift and two rope tows.
History
Written by aurora.ski from the 2 pages below, each sentence numbered to its sources.
Becker Hill was one of the first ski jumps around Ogden, built at Shanghai Flat in Ogden Canyon to bring visitors to the city. Work began in the autumn of 1929. The Utah Lost Ski Area Project credits the Engens with building it for jumping contests, while Skisprungschanzen.com says Lars Haugen directed the $2,000 job. It had no lifts. The hill took its name from Gus Becker, a brewery owner and jumping promoter who brought the Engen brothers to Utah.1,2
The jump opened on January 19, 1930, in front of 3,000 spectators, and the main opening meet that February drew 13 professional jumpers, though warm weather kept the distances short. On New Year's Day 1931, Alf Engen flew 247 feet in training, an unofficial world record, and a show meet days later drew 8,000 people. Meets went on in 1932 and 1933, but by then jumping had moved to higher hills, and the site was abandoned; the Utah project says the jump moved to Snowbasin. Building the Pineview Dam, begun in the fall of 1934, ended it for good.1,2
Sources for this history (2)
- 1Skisprungschanzen.com · Becker Hill, Ogden — Skisprungschanzen-Archiv
- 2Utah Lost Ski Area Project · Becker Hill
Photos
No photographs of Becker Hill we may republish yet
Its old photos and trail maps live on the sites that collected them, and Google finds the rest.
Memories
What skiers remember of Becker Hill, in their own words.
Facts
Location
41.2529° N · 111.8435° W · Utah · Wasatch Range
OpenSkiMap lists it as abandoned.
Years operated
1929–1933
Closed after the 1933 season. It stays here as part of the record of U.S. ski areas.
No figures from its operating years are collected yet.
Terrain contours: USGS 3D Elevation Program, public domain