Lost ski areaAlaskaWhite Mountains
Cleary Summit
Ran 1949–1993. The first downhill ski area in Fairbanks, run by the McCann family on both sides of the Steese Highway at Cleary Summit from 1949 to 1993.
Overview
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Imagery: USGS The National Map · Terrain: Mapzen, USGS and others
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Cleary Summit was the first downhill ski area in Fairbanks, at Mile 21 of the Steese Highway northeast of town. Bob and Sylvia McCann started it in 1949 with a partner, Link Imeson, and the McCann family built and ran it.1,2
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Memories
Skied Cleary Summit, 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 Cleary Summit
The closest other lost ski areas, as the crow flies.
- Opened 1960 · 232.2 mi away · AlaskaA rope-tow ski hill at the old Independence Mine in Hatcher Pass, above Palmer, that ran from 1960 into the late 1970s.
- Opened 1936 · 746.7 mi away · AlaskaA small club ski hill with a rope tow on Mitkof Island, south of Petersburg's airport, run by the Petersburg Ski Club from 1936.
- 1956–1978 · 1,504.3 mi away · WashingtonA ski area in Mount Pilchuck State Park, east of Granite Falls, Washington, that opened in the mid-1950s and had its last season in 1977–78.
History
Written by aurora.ski from the 3 pages below, each sentence numbered to its sources.
Cleary Summit was the first downhill ski area in Fairbanks, at Mile 21 of the Steese Highway northeast of town. Bob and Sylvia McCann started it in 1949 with a partner, Link Imeson, and the McCann family built and ran it. It had slopes on both sides of the highway, about 900 feet of vertical in all. For years the highway was not plowed past the summit, so skiers crossed it on snow. A ramp over the road was later considered but never built.1,2
Rope tows came first. A T-bar went in below the road around 1960, a second T-bar later replaced the upper tows, and a beginner Poma and homemade snowmaking followed in the 1980s. The area was never lit. Of its four lodges, three stood above the road and all burned. The fourth, a three-story A-frame below the road, dated from the early 1960s.1,2
Cleary Summit shut down in 1993, and its Poma, T-bar and snowmaking gear went to Hilltop Ski Area in Anchorage. The empty lodge, by then owned by the operators of Mount Aurora Skiland less than a mile up the road, burned on January 29, 2008.1,2
Timeline
- 1949Bob and Sylvia McCann start the area with partner Link Imeson1,2
- 1960First T-bar built below the highway1
- c. 1960Fourth lodge, a three-story A-frame, built below the highway1,2
- c. 1980Beginner Poma lift and homemade snowmaking added1,2
- 1993Cleary Summit shuts down1,2,3
- 2008The abandoned lodge burns on January 291,2
Sources for this history (3)
- 1Alaska Lost Ski Areas Project · Cleary Summit
- 2Fairbanks Daily News-Miner · Cleary Summit Ski Lodge Burns Down — Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, January 30, 2008, by Tim Mowry (reprinted on the ALSAP Cleary Summit page)
- 3Wikipedia · Skiland
Photos
No photographs of Cleary Summit 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 Cleary Summit, in their own words.
Facts
Location
65.0506° N · 147.4481° W · Alaska · White Mountains
OpenStreetMap still maps 3 lifts and 19 downhill runs here; OpenSkiMap lists it as abandoned.
Years operated
1949–1993
Closed after the 1993 season. It stays here as part of the record of U.S. ski areas.
Its numbers
all 3all 3, in one list
Terrain contours: USGS 3D Elevation Program, public domain