- Pete Seibert
Infobox Person
name = Pete Seibert
image_size =
caption =
birth_date =August 7 ,1924
birth_place =Sharon, Massachusetts
death_date =July 15 ,2002
death_place =Vail, Colorado
education =
occupation =
spouse = Elizabeth (divorced c. 1971)
parents =
children = Pete Jr., Brant, Calvin cite news |first=Veronica |last=Whitney |title=Seibert family says farewell |url=http://www.vaildaily.com/article/20020718/NEWS/207180101 |format= |work=The Vail Daily News |publisher= |id= |pages= |page= |date=2002-07-18 |accessdate=2007-06-02]Peter W. Seibert (
August 7 ,1924 -July 15 ,2002 ) was the founder ofVail Ski Resort [cite news |first=Bill |last=Pennington |title=The Legacy of the Soldiers on Skis |url=http://travel.nytimes.com/2006/03/10/travel/escapes/10ski.html |format= |work=The New York Times |publisher= |id= |pages= |page= |date=2006-03-10 |accessdate=2007-06-02 |language= |quote=The 10th Mountain Division connections are everywhere in American skiing, whether it's at Vail Mountain, founded by Sgt. Pete Seibert of the 10th Mountain Division, or in Vermont. . . . ] and what would eventually becomeVail Resorts in Colorado. He was a 1980 inductee into the Colorado Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame. [ [http://www.coloradoskihalloffame.com/images_bio_htm_files/Peter_Seibert.htm Colorado Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame - Peter W. Seibert] .]Biography
Early life
Seibert, a
Massachusetts native, graduated from theNew Hampton School inNew Hampshire and served in the U.S. Army's 10th Mountain Division duringWorld War II . He was gravely wounded by a mortar shell blast inItaly and was told he would never again ski.He returned to
Colorado after the war, where he got back into skiing with the help of a homemade knee brace and dozens of other members of the 10th Mountain Division (which had trained atCamp Hale ) who had also returned to Colorado. Seibert joined Aspen'sski patrol and later qualified for the 1950 U.S. Ski Team. He learned his trade of choice, operating aski area , by working at various ski resorts and began looking for a mountain to make into a ski area.Vail
In 1957, Seibert and longtime friend Earl Eaton first climbed the future Vail Mountain and, as the legend goes, decided to build "the most beautiful ski resort in the world." The pair publicly expressed their interest in the area for a rod and gun club, acquiring land for the "Trans Montane Rod and Gun Club" with the help of four partners they invited to buy an interest into the club. The club decided to find 20 investors from around the country to buy in, yet be geographically diverse enough that each could raise larger sums of money when it was needed in the future. This idea became known as the Vail formula. [cite book |last=Hauserman |first=Richard |coauthors=M. Scott Carpenter, John Love, Warren Miller|title=The Inventors of Vail |year=2000 |publisher=Golden Peak |location=Edwards, Colorado |isbn=0970443803]
In 1962, construction on the resort began on the land between the town of Eagle and
Vail Pass . It opened December 15, 1962 with twochairlift s, one gondola and a $5 lift ticket. [http://www.vailresorts.com/ourcompany.cfm?mode=history History] . Vail Resorts Corporate Website.]In just seven years, Vail had grown to become the most popular ski resort in Colorado, and a village had started forming at the base. Seibert hoped that Vail and (the future) Beaver Creek could host the skiing portions of the
1976 Winter Olympics , which had been awarded to Denver in 1970. However, the voters of Colorado rejected funding for the Olympics in 1972, and the games returned to Innsbruck,Austria , which had hosted the1964 Winter Olympics ."Pete's Bowl" in Vail's
Blue Sky Basin was named for Seibert when the second phase of the expansion area opened in December 2000.Death and afterward
Seibert died at age 77 on July 15, 2002, following a nine-month battle with
esophageal cancer . A plaza at the top of Bridge Street in the town of Vail is named Seibert Circle in his honor.Works
* "Vail: Triumph of a Dream" (2000)
References
External links
* [http://www.skiinghistory.org/newsseibert.htm Skiing History.org] - 2002 obituary
* [http://vail.snow.com Vail resort site]
* [http://www.vailresorts.com Vail's corporate parent site]
* [http://www.vaildaily.com/apps/pbcs.dll/tngallery?Avis=VD&Dato=20040830&Kategori=PHOTO&Lopenr=831002&Ref=PH Founder of Vail: A Photo Retrospective] from the "Vail Daily News"Persondata
NAME = Seibert, Peter W.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES =
SHORT DESCRIPTION = Founder of Vail ski resort in Colorado.
DATE OF BIRTH =August 7 ,1924
PLACE OF BIRTH =Sharon, Massachusetts
DATE OF DEATH =July 15 ,2002
PLACE OF DEATH =Vail, Colorado
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