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Charles Kerry was born on a rural property on the Monaro Tableland in 1858. A grazier and businessman, he was also an adventurer and an outstanding photographer. He was the first person to promote the Kiandra Snow Shoe carnival outside the Monaro District and to introduce Sydney visitors to skiing at Kiandra. First conducted in 1881, the carnival's races were often won by "ski-runners" who could cover 200m in about 10 seconds. Kerry's earliest known Kiandra photos were taken in 1895 and he personally guided groups of visitors to Kiandra every winter. He drew the attention of the NSW Government to the Kiandra skiing, and the NSW Government Tourist Bureau commenced promoting and organising regular ski trips to Kiandra for the general public. |
Recognising the limitations of Kiandra as a winter holiday destination, he persuaded the government to open up the Kosciuszko area as the main focus for holidays above the winter snow-line. A road was constructed from Jindabyne to the Kosciuszko* Summit and Betts Camp was built in 1905. The Creel (now flooded) was built on the Summit Road in 1907 to house the workmen constructing the Hotel Kosciusko* opened in June 1909. Charles Kerry was elected the first president of the Kosciusko Alpine Club (KAC). [* For over 100 years, the spelling of the name of Australia's highest mountain was Mount Kosciusko. For its entire life the hotel was spelt "Kosciusko". The spelling of the mountain was changed about 1990. Hence the Hotel Kosciusko is on the flanks of Mt. Kosciuszko.] Percy Hunter, the founder of the NSW Government Tourist Bureau, wrote in 1928 of Charles Kerry's significant contributions to the development of Australian skiing and nominated Kerry "as the father of Australian skiing". Hunter also paid tribute to Kerry's splendid vision for the NSW skifields and his unselfish work in bringing part of that vision to fruition. Hunter noted that Kerry "bridged the gap of the development period and saw far ahead the prospect, which is even now only beginning to open up dimly, of a chain of winter sport centres along the main divide from Kosciusko's hoary summit to Kiandra and across the broad bosom of this peak studded plateau in every direction." The construction of the two tin huts (previously described in Instalment 3) and the Chalet Charlottes Pass were projects that Kerry had strongly promoted as part of this vision. |
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The Hotel Kosciusko not only provided much more accommodation than was ever available at Kiandra, but also had much easier access. There were overnight trains to Cooma and then a couple of hours in service cars would often be sufficient to get visitors to the front door of the hotel (Photo 5). |
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The Plains of Heaven, located about one kilometer west of the hotel on the south-eastern slopes of Kerry View Hill (elevation 1777m), was a favourite ski area from where skiers could return to the hotel via the Grand Slam run, visible behind the hotel in Photo 4, which they usually schussed, because few skiers then could make linked turns on an Intermediate Standard ski run. |
BETTS CAMP AND SKI TOURS TO THE KOSCIUSZKO SUMMIT
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Many ski touring parties traveled each year to the summit at a more leisurely pace with overnight stops at Betts Camp. Following the deaths of two skiers who were caught in a ferocious blizzard whilst undertaking this trip in 1928, a shelter hut now exists about 2km east-north-east of the summit. |
SEAMAN'S HUT (Laurie Seaman Memorial Hut)
Searchers reported that there was only one set of ski tracks on the summit although the photos recovered from Seaman's camera showed both men at the summit cairn. It seems that Hayes skied to the summit and Seaman walked up the final climb above Rawson Pass to the summit. After taking photographs of each other at the top, they apparently became separated. Seaman appears to have followed the snow pole line back to where his body was found and where he was apparently still waiting for Evan Hayes to return when he passed away.
he ski tracks seen by the searchers the next day, suggested that Hayes lost the pole line in the fog and was pushed off-course in a south-easterly direction towards Merritt's Lookout over-looking the Thredbo Valley, by gale force winds from the north-west. Hayes apparently realized his mistake and followed his ski tracks back to Rawson Pass where he seems to have missed the snow pole line once more in the fog and headed south, away from the Summit Road, rather than east. In the wild, blizzard conditions reported on that afternoon, such an error is understandable. |
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OPENING THE CHALET AT CHARLOTTES PASS
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WHITES RIVER HUT
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ELYNE MITCHELLThrough her articles and books in the period 1938 to 1985, Elyne Mitchell significantly raised community awareness as to the vast extent and quality of the snowfields in the Snowy Mountains. She inspired two generations to ski to remote places such as Mt. Jagungal, the Cascades and Watsons Crags. Elyne Mitchell (1913 – 2002) began skiing in 1936 with her husband and friends. As they lived on a large rural property on the Murray River at the western edge of the Snowy Mountains, they were able to spend much of each winter in the mountains. They carried their gear on pack-horses, riding from one exciting new slope to another and staying in huts or camping in the snow. Within a couple of years, her skiing had reached such a high standard as to win the Canadian Downhill Skiing Championship in 1938 (Photo 32). Elyne continued to ski up to the age of 77 years.
In 1944 Elyne Mitchell strongly supported the creation of the Kosciusko National Park by writing Soil and Civilization pleading "for a sensitive appreciation and use of our continent, and preservation of our catchment areas". By 1985 Elyne could see "that closing huge areas at the head of river systems, even the greatest river system, and making them into national parks, is not the complete answer to the problems of conservation". Elyne then commented, "Where there has been over-grazing and much burning, something other than stopping both has to be done, and just what that should be is not easily learnt. Certainly it is not by shutting the area up so effectively that there is no one but a too small park staff to cope with rabbits, wild pigs, feral cats and dogs, and noxious weeds – and fires when they occur. In the last few years I have thought that the complete elimination of cattle and cattlemen has not worked out. Dense scrub, dangerously impenetrable for fire-fighting, is growing in many places that were once clear, brought about by the fact that that country has been burnt, and it now provides far more tinder in a dry year. The numbers of tourists walking causes eroding paths. The numbers of campers pollute lakes and streams. Closed up as a national park, the Snowy Mountains are virtually unprotected from weeds because there is insufficient money to have them sprayed. Problems that were recognized in 1944 are now possibly worse, and the answers are not yet found. One wonders why the cattle and cattlemen should be forced out, while tourists and campers are totally uncontrolled." Elyne then considers possible solutions. "I can only suggest that perhaps the careful leasing of land below the tree-line, to responsible cattlemen, could result in better care of the mountains. It would be in the interests of these men to control noxious weeds and vermin, which no national park can afford to do." She then considers possible control of visitors. In conclusion, "Finally I would say that it seems absolutely disastrous to enclose large tracts of land in national parks which no government can afford to look after correctly." (Discoverers of the Snowy Mountains, MACMILLAN 1985, pp210 – 212). Since Elyne wrote these words in 1985, skiers and walkers have observed that the dense scrub is steadily extending through what had previously been open woodland and across what had been alpine meadows that in past years presented magnificent wildflower displays in summer. The slopes surrounding Whites River Hut provide an excellent example. Compare the open slopes in Elyne Mitchell's 1941 photo (Photo 30 in this installment) with the current thick scrub on many of what were the open slopes visible in her photo. It is now necessary to climb quite some distance up-slope from Whites in the direction of the Rolling Ground to find great skiing. |
The alpine bushfires are becoming more intense and almost impossible to control. For example, the 2003 alpine fires burnt for several weeks, destroying many huts of heritage significance and threatening ski villages several times. Ironically the grassy, scrub-free ski runs turned out to be the best fire breaks. Christine Nixon, the Head of the Victorian Bushfire Reconstruction Authority, on 28 April 2009, questioned the size of national parks and has called for a fundamental "rethink" of the community's relationship with national parks. |
In the early hours of 18 April 1951, fire broke out in the swichboard of the Hotel Kosciusko. The destruction was almost complete and an important era in the History of Australian Skiing had ended. Increased interest in downhill skiing meant that this site was of limited suitability and the Hotel Kosciusko was not rebuilt. |