Lost ski areaColoradoFront RangeRocky Mountains
Hoosier Pass
Ran 1938–1949. A small rope-tow ski area on Hoosier Pass outside Blue River, started by the South Park Lions Club in the late 1930s.
Overview
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Imagery: USGS The National Map · Terrain: Mapzen, USGS and others
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Hoosier Pass Ski Area stood on the pass between Breckenridge and Fairplay, just outside Blue River. The South Park Lions Club began looking at the site in 1938.1,2,3
Read the whole historyTodayThe restaurant building is gone, and trees are filling in the old slopes.1
Timeline
4 events · swipe
Memories
Skied Hoosier Pass, 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 Hoosier Pass
The closest other lost ski areas, as the crow flies.
- 1936–1962 · 7.2 mi away · ColoradoA company ski hill on Chalk Mountain atop Fremont Pass, run mainly for workers at the Climax molybdenum mine from the mid-1930s into the early 1960s.
- 1939–1986 · 7.5 mi away · ColoradoBreckenridge's town learning hill at Carter Park, served by rope tows on and off from 1939 until 1986.
- 1972–1988 · 19.8 mi away · ColoradoA small platter-lift ski area at the Indian Mountain subdivision near Jefferson, in Park County, that ran on and off from 1972 to 1988.
History
Written by aurora.ski from the 3 pages below, each sentence numbered to its sources.
Hoosier Pass Ski Area stood on the pass between Breckenridge and Fairplay, just outside Blue River. The South Park Lions Club began looking at the site in 1938. Colorado Ski History says the first season, 1938, had only a warming hut, and that a restaurant with a bar and a dance floor, cabins and a general store followed the next year. Summit Daily adds several runs, a 200-foot ski jump and a toboggan slide. An 800-foot rope tow, built at a date no source gives, pulled skiers up the two trails.1,2,3
The tow broke in the late 1940s and the area shut down. The Flume says the tow later went to Mercury Hill, which opened in the early 1950s. The years differ by source: 1938 to 1949 for Colorado Ski History, the mid-1930s to 1949 for The Flume, and 1939 to 1951 for Summit Daily.1,2,3
TodayThe restaurant building is gone, and trees are filling in the old slopes.1
Sources for this history (3)
- 1Colorado Ski History · Hoosier Pass Ski Area
- 2The Flume · What happened to Park County's ski mountains? (Meryl Phair, January 30, 2024)
- 3Summit Daily · Gone but not forgotten: Lost ski areas of the High Country (Ryan Spencer, December 31, 2023)
Photos
No photographs of Hoosier Pass 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 Hoosier Pass, in their own words.
Facts
Location
39.3702° N · 106.0577° W · Colorado · Front Range
OpenSkiMap lists it as abandoned.
Years operated
1938–1949
Closed after the 1949 season. It stays here as part of the record of U.S. ski areas.
Its numbers
all 2all 2, in one list
Terrain contours: USGS 3D Elevation Program, public domain