Pioneers enter ski museum hall of fame
Four pioneers of skiing on Big Mountain are being inducted into the Ski Heritage Center Museum Hall of Fame.
The Class of 2024 inductees include Sverre Askevold, Chuck Creon, Ole Dalen and Lyle Rutherford.
The four men will be honored at the museum’s presentation of “Raising Hell Roaring” at the Whitefish Performing Arts Center on April 4. The homegrown multimedia, feature-length presentation tells the story of skiing on Big Mountain and throughout the region, from
Logan Pass to the Cabinet Mountains beginning in the 1930s.
Doors open at 6:30 p.m. and the presentation begins at 7 p.m. Tickets are available online at
whitefishskimuseum.org. Adult tickets are $20; students, military and seniors tickets are $15.
The inductees are:
Sverre Askevold
Born in Norway in 1903, Sverre Askevold crafted his first skis from pine boards and ski boots from wooden shoes. Surprisingly, these were used for ski jumping as well, which turned out to be where most of his skiing time was spent. Sverre worked as a furniture maker until he emigrated to America in the early 1920s. He soon located an uncle in Saco, Montana, where he moved to work on a switching crew for the Great Northern Railway. After a period of moonlighting as a carpenter, he started Askevold Construction Company, Inc., which was later featured in the “Builders of Montana” publication.
In the late 1940s when the family was living on the east shore of Flathead Lake, Sverre introduced his three young children to the sport of skiing. They soon advanced from climbing and sliding on the hills around their home to the recently opened Big Mountain Ski Resort. As the family’s enthusiasm for the sport grew, Sverre purchased the first lot sold at the ski area and constructed the first residence. Thus the family began a long period of spending every weekend and holiday skiing at Big Mountain.
In 1964, Sverre began construction of the Viking Lodge, which he owned and operated through 1972. This was the first and only hotel developed on Whitefish Lake until it was replaced by The Lodge at Whitefish Lake. When Big Sky Ski Resort opened in 1973, Sverre was recruited by Chet Huntly to build the first private homes at the resort. Sverre always retained his interest in skiing, especially ski jumping. He was a certified competition official in Montana for many years and was invited to participate on the Design and Judging Committee for the ski jumping events at the 1960 Olympics in Squaw Valley, California.
Chuck Creon
Whitefish native Charles “Chuck” Creon was born in 1915 and graduated from Whitefish High School in 1935. He went to work as a machinist for the Great Northern Railroad and then moved on to ply his trade at the Anaconda Aluminum Company. In WWII, Chuck served with the 110th Naval Construction Battalion.
As one of the early skiers in Whitefish, Chuck was a founding Member of the Hellroaring Ski Club in 1935 and helped construct both Hell Roaring Ski Cabins. Chuck also teamed up with Lyle Rutherford to build the first ski lift on Big Mountain – a rope tow connecting the ski cabins with the slopes where much of the club’s skiing was done.
Chuck was also one of the original ski patrollers in the club and became certified by the National Ski Patrol in 1941. In 1947, when the Big Mountain Ski Resort’s new T-Bar Lift failed to start for its final testing, Chuck and Ed Schenck worked through the night to get the lift operational for the Grand Opening on the following day.
Chuck died in 2001 At the age of 86.
Ole Dalen
Although Ole Dalen was born a Canadian in Gardner, BC, he soon became an American when his family relocated to Montana. Ole was a Whitefish skiing pioneer and was one of the first locals to join “Mully” on his exploratory ski outings to the hills around the town. He was an original member of the Hellroaring Ski Club, and in 1935 he teamed up with fellow club member Lyle Rutherford to build the Club’s original Ski Cabin. Ole’s love for skiing and outdoor adventure flourished through the late 1930s as he helped with the construction of the first rope-tow ski lift and second ski cabin. He became a live-in caretaker for the facilities so that he could spend even more time on skis.
Fellow skiing pioneer Otto Ost commented, “Ole was my hero!” Ole signed on with the 10th Mountain Division when the US entered WWII. He was assigned to teach skiing and rock climbing to new recruits until he was deployed to the Apennine mountains in Italy. Once there, he participated in battles on Mont Belvedere, Riva Ridge, Mont Della Vedetta and Mont Serra where he was wounded for the second time and lost his right arm.
Following the war, Ole continued skiing and became the first certified ski instructor in Montana. He worked for many years as an instructor at Big Mountain and the Homestead Resort in Hot Springs, West Virginia. Before he died in 1991 Ole’s love for skiing was infectious, and he was always highly popular wherever he was teaching.
Lyle Rutherford
When Lyle Rutherford died in 1998, he was memorialized as “One of the last of the original Whitefish ski pioneers who were instrumental in starting the Big Mountain Resort.” Young Lyle’s journey to Whitefish had started 82 years earlier from his birthplace in Braham, Minnesota, included a homesteading stopover in Bowdoin, Montana, and culminated in 1926 when his family purchased “40 acres of stumpland” near Whitefish.
Lyle’s skiing days started in the 1930s when a small group of adventurists began hiking and skiing on the mountain north of Whitefish, on slopes that would become Big Mountain Ski Resort. In 1935, Lyle became a founding member of the Hellroaring Ski Club and set out to build the Club’s first on-site cabin with fellow member Ole Dalen. In subsequent years, Lyle teamed with Chuck Creon, Jim Rolette and other club members to build a second cabin along with a rope-tow ski lift. He then joined Ole Dalen as on-site resident caretaker of the facilities.
WWII interrupted most skiing activities from 1940 to 1945, but when skiing resumed, Lyle was a founding member and active participant for the original Ski Patrol. When Big Mountain Ski Area was developed in 1947, Lyle was an ever-present volunteer for the construction of the facilities as well as during the early years of the Resort’s operation. During that same time period, Hellroaring Ski Club evolved into the Whitefish Lake Ski Club, with Lyle as president. The club was involved in hosting many successful events, highlighted by bidding for and hosting the US National Alpine Skiing Championships in 1949 and again in 1951. Lyle lived out his days as a great advocate for skiing and a great source of stories that kept new generations of skiers connected to the roots of the sport in Whitefish.
Chuck Creon
Sverre Askevold
Lyle Rutherford