Lost ski areaMassachusettsNortheast
Ski Blandford
Ran 1936–2020. The Springfield Ski Club's ski area in Blandford, run by the club from 1936 to 2017 and by Ski Butternut's owners until it closed in 2020.
Overview
Look around
Loading the ground…
Imagery: USGS The National Map · Terrain: Mapzen, USGS and others
Counting who skied it…
The Springfield Ski Club was incorporated on November 17, 1936, and that fall won permission to build a slope on Pere Persson's farm in Blandford. A 1,000-foot electric rope tow served it, and a nearby schoolhouse was the warming hut.1
Read the whole historyTimeline
7 events · swipe
Memories
Skied Ski Blandford, 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 Ski Blandford
The closest other lost ski areas, as the crow flies.
- 1960–1998 · 14.4 mi away · MassachusettsA ski area on Mount Tom in Holyoke, Massachusetts, with chairlifts, snowmaking and night skiing, open from 1960 until 1998.
- Years not yet collected · 15.5 mi away · MassachusettsA small ski development with one rope tow on Petticoat Hill in Williamsburg, listed in the 1949 Massachusetts Ski Guide.
- 1935–1964 · 19.7 mi away · MassachusettsA state forest ski area above South Lee, cut by the CCC for snow trains in 1935, that ran with rope tows on and off until the 1960s.
History
Written by aurora.ski from the 3 pages below, each sentence numbered to its sources.
The Springfield Ski Club was incorporated on November 17, 1936, and that fall won permission to build a slope on Pere Persson's farm in Blandford. A 1,000-foot electric rope tow served it, and a nearby schoolhouse was the warming hut. The club bought the land from the Persson family around 1941. Its first double chairlift, the Glade chair, opened in late January 1970 to 450 feet of vertical and 13 trails; the Broadway double and a T-bar followed in the early 1970s, and the North double late in the decade.1
By the early 1990s Blandford had 26 trails, and after Mount Tom closed in 1998 it put lights on two slopes for night skiing. Aging facilities, mounting debt and falling membership left the club insolvent in 2017, and the owners of Ski Butternut bought the area that September. After repairs it reopened as Ski Blandford on December 15, 2018.1,2
The lifts last ran on March 8, 2020. On March 26 Butternut said it could no longer carry Blandford's losses and closed it for good, refunding or transferring season passes. New England Ski History knows of no plans to reopen it.1,2,3
Timeline
- 1936Springfield Ski Club incorporates and opens a rope-tow slope that fall1,2
- c. 1941The club buys the land from the Persson family1
- 1970The Glade double chairlift debuts in late January1
- 1998Lights go up for night skiing after Mount Tom closes1
- 2017Club insolvent; Ski Butternut's owners buy the area in September1,2
- 2018Reopens as Ski Blandford on December 151
- 2020Last day March 8; permanent closure announced March 261,2,3
Sources for this history (3)
- 1New England Ski History · Ski Blandford History
- 2Wikipedia · Blandford Ski Area
- 3Ski Blandford (Ski Butternut) · Ski Blandford — closure announcement and pass updates (March–April 2020)
Photos
No photographs of Ski Blandford 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 Ski Blandford, in their own words.
Facts
Location
42.1889° N · 72.9008° W · Massachusetts
OpenSkiMap lists it as abandoned.
Years operated
1936–2020
Closed after the 2020 season. It stays here as part of the record of U.S. ski areas.
Its numbers
all 6all 6, in one list
Terrain contours: USGS 3D Elevation Program, public domain