The word ski comes from the old Norse word ‘skiõ’ which meant split piece of wood or firewood, and there have been almost as many different kinds of skis and techniques as there have been years of use.

Asymmetrical skis, first described over 500 years ago, were used in northern Finland and Sweden, even up until the 1930s. On one foot, skiers wore a long straight non-arching ski for sliding, while the other foot was outfitted with a shorter ski for kicking. The bottom of the short ski was, sometimes, covered with an animal skin to aid in the kicking, while the bottom of the longer ski was treated with slippery animal fat to help with gliding.

But, it was the traditional 10 foot long variety of ski that was used by our Sierra skiing legend, Snowshoe Thompson. Mr. Thompson was born Jon Torsteinsson Rue in Austbygdi, Norway in 1827. He emigrated to the United States with his family when he was 10 years old, and they settled in the mid-west. Fourteen years later, after driving a herd of milk cows from Wisconsin to Placerville, John Albert Thompson settled in the Sierras. There, he tried his hand at mining, eventually saving enough money to buy a small farm.

Because no one had been able to regularly deliver the mail across the Sierra, in 1855 an ad for a federal mail carrier was published in the Sacramento Union newspaper.

Knowing he could do the job, John Albert (Snowshoe) Thompson went to work. He fashioned a pair 10 foot long skis from green oak, with a single piece of leather in the middle of each for bindings, and equipped himself with a long, sturdy pole for pushing, braking and balancing.

Using webbed snowshoes, it had taken the last government mail carrier eight days to cross the mountains from Placerville to Genoa. In contrast, while carrying 50 pounds of mail on his back, and using a pair of skis weighing 25 pounds, Snowshoe Thompson skied the outbound trip in three days, and made the return trip in two days. He’d found his calling.

Snowshoe Thompson made that trip, in that time, for the next 20 years, but was never paid a cent for his work by the United States Government. Being no dummy, Mr. Thompson charged his customers, though many couldn’t or wouldn’t pay. He did the work without a federal contract, as a private “expressman”. He tried more than once to get Congress to pay him back wages, but was never successful.

John-Albert-Snowshoe Thompson died of complications from appendicitis when he was 49 years old. He’s buried in the cemetery in Genoa, Nevada. Stop by, and let him know that he’s not been forgotten.