California Dreaming
by Ellen Hopkins
Summer or winter, today’s Squaw Valley is a world-class destination. Visitors travel great distances to enjoy the Squaw experience—the mountain, its base village and many amenities—the culmination of Alexander Cushing’s dreams.
Born in 1913 in New York City, Cushing was a Harvard-trained lawyer and retired Navy commander when he and a buddy came west to ski in 1946. On his first day out at Sugar Bowl, Cushing broke an ankle. Later, he would doubtless consider that fate, for as he rested, he overheard a young local comment about a nearby hill with some of the country’s best skiing. Three years later on Thanksgiving Day, Cushing opened Squaw Valley ski resort. Skiers had their choice of two rope tows or a fancy double chairlift. The 50-room lodge was unfinished but offered overnight accommodations for those willing to stay without running water. Four days later, a flood closed the place down. Though Cushing managed to reopen it for Christmas, he found himself, according to his accountant, “flat broke.”
But he persevered. Avalanches claimed that fancy Squaw One chairlift in each of its first three years. Another flood roared through the fourth year, and in the fifth, the lodge burned down. In 1954, he read about Reno and Anchorage bidding for the 1960 Winter Olympics and decided that Squaw Valley would submit its name, too. It was preposterous, of course. But the indomitable Cushing soon became completely serious in his pursuit of the games. When the U.S. Olympic Committee met in January 1955 to consider their choices, Cushing convinced them with the simple idea of “a California valley with an annual snowfall of 450 inches and a downhill event with areas that had never been schussed successfully.” Winning over the International Olympic Committee (IOC) proved much more difficult. Innsbruck, Austria, seemed to have a lock on the games. But Cushing gathered a team of powerful allies, lobbied hard for support from around the world and even went so far as to have a 3,000 pound model of Squaw Valley built in the U.S. Embassy, so IOC members could have a true view of his latest dream. Somehow, his claim that “the Olympics belong to the world, not just one continent” swayed the IOC. In a 32 to 30 vote, they sent the 1960 Winter Olympics to Squaw Valley. There was little time for celebration as the enormity of the commitment became clear, and it did not belong to the Squaw Valley team alone. Over the next four-and-a-half years, local, county and state organizations sent thousands of workers to create infrastructure—freeways, hotels and restaurants—that could support the teams and spectators to come. Squaw Valley itself was transformed, with roads, chairlifts, a ski jump, a speed skating oval and the Blythe Ice Arena. The Olympic Village Inn would house all 665 athletes. It was the first and only time in modern Olympic history that all the athletes would live under one roof. The 1960 Winter Olympics boasted other “firsts”—they were televised, and computers tabulated results. U.S. figure skater Carol Heiss took the Olympic Oath for all participating athletes—the first time a woman had done so. Later, she won the gold medal, with first place awards from all nine judges. It was the first year women competed in speed skating; Russia’s Lidiya Skoblikova took two golds, while Sweden’s Klas Lestander won the first Olympic biathlon, a men’s only sport until 1992. But perhaps the most exciting first came from the underdog U.S. hockey team, who upset the Russians in a 3 to 2 semi-final win. The U.S. “Team of Destiny” went on to defeat the Czechs 9 to 4 and taking the first-ever U.S. gold medal in ice hockey. Each victory belonged, at least in part, to Cushing, the man whose California dreams put Squaw Valley and Lake Tahoe on the global map. TQ contributing editor Ellen Hopkins is a Carson City resident and New York Times bestselling author. www.ellenhopkins.com
