winter Photo Archives - LIFE

Wild and Frozen: Minnesota at Its Coldest and Most Remote

Bill Syken — Mon, 11 Nov 2024 14:22:54 +0000

Today Alaska holds a well-earned place in the American imagination as the country’s final frontier, and a host of reality shows use the 49th state as a backdrop for its rugged adventures.

In 1950, eight years before Alaska officially joined the union, LIFE took its readers to the what was then America’s northernmost territory—a chilly and remote part of Minnesota known as Northwest Angle. This patch of land seems like it should really be part of Canada—it does connect with the rest of The Gopher State by land and has physical borders with Manitoba and Ontario. Northwest Angle is only part of the U.S. because people got confused while the details of the U.S.-Canada border were being negotiated.

If you’ve never heard of the Northwest Angle, you’re not alone. LIFE began its 1950 story by explaining just what this place was, and what life was like there:

Jutting out like a tiny bell tower at the top of Minnesota is a strip of woodland-and-lake wilderness called the Northwest Angle. … Its inhabitants, cut off from the rest of the U.S. by the 1,500-square mile Lake of the Woods, are an isolated, frontier people. For a brief period during the summer they live in a paradise of thick green forests and deep blue lakes. They hunt, fish, eat wild berries and trap for lynx. But when the long winter sets in, they live in an inhospitable land which is more like Siberia than the U.S. Blizzards roar down out of the North. The temperature drops to 50 degrees below zero, cold enough to split the logs of a cabin. Even on warmer days it seldom gets to more than 20 below zero.

In 1950 this isolated piece of America was out there in more ways than one. “The Angle has no telephones, roads, telegraph, movies, churches or doctors,” LIFE wrote. “The log homes have neither running water nor plumbing. The main meat dish is venison.”

The frontier aspects of the Northwest Angle were a large part of its appeal to residents, most of whom were living there by choice. They had vacationed there during the summer and fallen in love with the place.

The photos by George Silk capture the unique way of life in Northwest Angle. Women made their own butter in hand-cranked churns, and gathered for quilting bees for amusement. Residents traveled in horse-drawn sleighs to collect firewood. Kids amused themselves by playing tag in the deep snow. One man described as a “hermit” spent his winters reading the Congressional Record.

The winters drove most residents indoors. The attitude of the locals, LIFE wrote, was “They don’t particularly like the winters, but they don’t dislike them either.”

The reward for enduring the winter, as they saw it, came when the snow thawed, the geese returned, and the Northwest Angle became an outdoor paradise. LIFE wrote, “Then the citizens of the Angle tell each other that there is no other place on earth where they could enjoy so good a life at so little cost.”

Men cross a frozen lake in a horse-drawn sleigh while on a firewood-gathering expedition. Because the Northwest Angle has no roads, gathering firewood can actually be easier when the lake is frozen..

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Twelve-year old David Colson of Northwest Angle, Minnesota, photographed after walking home two miles from school, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Two boys and a girl hid up to their necks in a snowdrift, nibbling at the snow.while playing a game of tag in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Scenes of wintertime in remote Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Twevle-year-old David Colson rode a cow to get water from a hole drilled through ice in the lake in Northwest Angle, Minn., 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mrs. Joe Risser of Northwest Angle, Minn., carried in wash that had frozen on the line, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mrs. Edison Risser used a hand-operated butter-making machine like virtually every other family did in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Postmaster Jake Colson ran the smallest post office in the U.S in a six-by-four-foot corner of Northwest Angle’s general store; only twelve homes received mail up there.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Eli Olson, a reclusive trapper and 34-year resident of Northwest Angle, Minnesota, liked to read the Congressional Record during the winter, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A women carefully wove a rug during the extremely cold winter months in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Grandfather Oscar Risser whittled while his grandchildren watched during a long winter in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Kids in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, generally took baths once a week, on Saturdays, during the winter.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Quilting bees like this one were a popular winter pastime in Northwest Angle, MInnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A winter quilting bee in Northwest Angle, Minnesota including a break for a two-hour lunch that featured chicken, baked beans, canned vegetables and pie, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Newlyweds Sid and Skippy Hanson, ages 23 and 19, struggled to keep their cabin warm enough over the winter in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Two Canadians braved the wind and snow to come into Northwest Angle, Minnesota, to buy provisions, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A dog made its way through three-and-a-half feet of snow In Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A lone lighthouse sat amid a stark frozen landscape during winter in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, 1950.

George Silk/LIfe Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post Wild and Frozen: Minnesota at Its Coldest and Most Remote appeared first on LIFE.

Skiing’s Early Days as a Popular American Pastime

Thu, 28 Jan 2016 08:00:04 +0000

Skiing is somewhere in the vicinity of 22,000 years old not as sport or recreation, but as a critical mode of transportation for early hunters. But skiing as Americans know it today, complete with high-speed chairlifts and cozy lodges selling overpriced French fries, only began to boom in the mid-1950s. With the advent of artificial snow and metal skis during that decade and plastic boots the next, more Americans took up the sport. Ski resorts, in turn, introduced new amenities to attract bigger crowds with each passing year.

LIFE photographer George Silk hit the slopes in 1957 to capture the building frenzy. A record 3.5 million skiers ad made their ways down America’s mountains the previous year, and several of the resorts he visited in Vermont—Stowe, Mount Snow, Mad River Glen—were host to ever more luxurious lodges, high-end apparel and, most of all, epic crowds. “As the peak late-February season approached,” LIFE declared, “the question was where all the skiers would find room to ski.”

The more skiers there were, the more the businesses rose to meet their demands. Mount Snow served up almost 20,000 hot dogs in a single weekend. Equipment rentals, previously unavailable, now came with free lessons. At Mad River Glen, skiers at the end of a long run could shed their gear and slip into a Catholic Mass. The only folks who weren’t pleased were the “old-line ski addicts,” who viewed new adopters of their sport as “a nuisance that crowds the slopes and inns they once had to themselves.”

But the newcomers were there to stay. Before long they would have snowboarders up on the mountains too.

Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter @lizabethronk.

On Spruce Peak, VT., Harry Larsen climbs from her new lodge.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Skiers unload from a train at Stowe, Vermont, 1957.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Skiers board a chairlift at Mount Snow in Vermont, 1957.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fashion on the slopes at Mt. Snow, Vermont, 1957.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Workers maintain the slopes at Stowe, Vermont, 1957.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A family before a run at Stowe.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Patty McMahon gets a push from her mother at Stowe.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The McMahon kids get comfortable on their skis, Mount Snow, Vermont, 1957.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Learning how to fall is an important part of the sport, 1957.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A packed chairlift at Mount Snow in Vermont, 1957.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hooded skiers shuffle slowly toward a chair life at Mt. Snow. Cloaks were provided by lift operators to keep skiers warm on windy ride up the mountain.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The double-chair lift at Mt. Snow gave novices a luxury usually enjoyed only by crack skiers.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Manufactured snow, blowing from nozzles, veils skiers in mists at Bousquet’s, near Pittsfield Mass. During a January thaw, Bousquet’s was jammed with skiers unable to ski elsewhere.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

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The Great Blizzard of 1947: New York, Buried in White

Tue, 18 Nov 2014 21:09:12 +0000

Something about snowstorms brings out the kid in most of us. Memories of those blessed, reprieves from school “Snow day!” undoubtedly plays a part in the collective excitement, and whether it’s in a vast metropolis or a remote, small town, the prospect of a blizzard can elicit, along with some apprehension, great anticipation, a sense of thrill.

There’s concern, certainly, about our families, our neighbors, our power and heat, our ability to get out and about in the snow and its aftermath, but there can also be a pure, underlying excitement.

In December 1947, a huge, historic storm dumped record levels of snow on the northeastern United States. In New York City, where the snow fell quietly, and steadily, for hours and hours, several LIFE photographers stepped out of the magazine’s offices, cameras in hand, and recorded the scene. Here, we remember the Great Blizzard of 1947 with some photos that ran in LIFE, and many others that were never published in the magazine.

As LIFE put it to its readers in its Jan. 5, 1948, issue:

“At 3:20 in the morning it began to snow in New York City. By the time most New Yorkers were going to work the blanket lay three inches deep. But the city, used to ignoring all natural phenomena and reassured by a weather forecast of “occasional flurries,” went about its business. But as the day wore on this characteristic blasé attitude vanished. The air grew filled with snowflakes so huge and thick it was almost impossible to see across the street. They fell without letup all morning, all afternoon and into the night.

Long after night fall the illuminated news sign of the New York Times flashed an announcement to little groups of people huddled in Times Square that the snowfall, which totaled an amazing 25.8 inches in less than 24 hours, had beaten the record of the city’s historic blizzard of 1880. A faint, muffled shout of triumph went up from the victims.”

Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LizabethRonk.

A snowbound automobile in the middle of New York City’s West 22nd Street between a long line of other cars buried at the curb.

Andreas Feininger The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Andreas Feininger The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Al Fenn The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

On the floor of Grand Central Station a father and his two young sons waited through the night for the train home.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Al Fenn The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Andreas Feininger The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Al Fenn/The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1947 Blizzard in New York City

Al Fenn The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

January 5, 1948 Issue of LIFE Magazine

LIFE Magazine

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The Eiffel Tower: A Paris Landmark Captured in a Classic Photo

Mon, 05 May 2014 17:04:54 +0000

The popular French writer Guy de Maupassant (1850 – 1893) reportedly ate lunch in the Eiffel Tower’s restaurant every day for years—not because he loved the great iron monument but because, so the story goes, it was the only place in Paris where he could sit and not see the tower itself. Maupassant, like countless French artists and aestheticians of the late 19th century, despised Gustave Eiffel’s creation, seeing it as a vulgar eyesore and a blight on their beloved Parisian skyline.

Whatever. For the rest of the world, the Eiffel Tower is and has long been one of the singular architectural emblems anywhere on earth: a formidable, graceful, soaring structure that connotes Paris as surely and as indelibly as the Empire State Building, Il Duomo, Hagia Sophia and other enduring landmarks signify their own great, respective cities.

Here, LIFE considers the phenomenal edifice through a single picture: Dmitri Kessel’s classic 1948 portrait of La Dame de Fer as seen on a winter’s day.

Perhaps it’s the absence of a single, visible human form that lends Kessel’s photograph its timeless power. Maybe it’s the ill-defined look of the structure, almost phantasmal as it looms in the Parisian fog, that somehow draws the viewer even deeper into the scene—as if, given enough time, the fog itself might clear and, even as we watch, the spire might grow more defined in the stark winter light.

Whatever the source of this one picture’s abiding appeal, the allure of the tower itself remains undimmed 125 years after wondering, awestruck crowds first encountered what was then, and remained for the next four decades, the tallest manmade structure on the planet.

Eiffel Tower, 1948

Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

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Winter Scenes, Winter Fashions: Photos From Canadian Ski Slopes

Mon, 17 Feb 2014 15:26:23 +0000

In February 1945, LIFE magazine declared Mont-Tremblant, a resort in the Laurentian Mountains 90 miles north of Montreal, the “ski-fashion center of the world.” The reasons for Mont Tremblant’s surpassing winter-style meccas like St. Moritz and Sun Valley, according to LIFE, were two: “Many of the guests are rich, well-dressed friends of the owner, Joseph B. Ryan, grandson of financier Thomas Fortune Ryan, [and] one of the instructors is a beautiful former model, Blanche Rybizka.”

In the midst of one of the snowiest, most unsettled winters in decades, LIFE.com remembers that long-ago issue of LIFE — and the lovely Blanche Rybizka’s singular fashion sense — with a series of Alfred Eisenstaedt photos of Canadian winter scenery and winter finery.

Mont-Tremblant 1945

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

LIFE Magazine cover, February 19, 1945

LIFE Magazine

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1952 U.S. Olympic Skiers: Stunning Images from Squaw Valley

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 12:53:35 +0000

In February 1952, when (as LIFE magazine phrased it) “a gay and gaudy invasion” of athletes descended on Norway’s capital, Oslo, to take part in the sixth Olympic Winter Games, “a select band of winter warriors paused there only long enough to catch their breath and another train.”

Leaving behind the main force of 1,200 athletes, this small group pushed on north to a sterner battleground. These were the true daredevils of winter sport the downhill ski racers. Their destination, 62 miles from Oslo, was Mount Norefjell, a snow-capped peak whose terrain is considered rugged enough for the most hazardous of all Olympic events. No sport on earth matches in danger the downhill race: the course at Norefjell drops a breathtaking 2,400 feet in a mile and half.

Among the men en route there this week, with less chance of winning a race than of losing a limb, was the underdog eight-man American team. All in their 20s and pink-faced from weeks of outdoor training, they included three college boys from New England, a lumberjack from the Pacific northwest, a ski-tow mechanic, a yeoman 2/c on leave from the U.S. Navy, an Air Force private and one fellow who had no other occupation than skiing for the fun of it. With them in the role of keeper was one middle-aged Frenchman named Emile Allais, their trainer and technical adviser.

Norefjell looks no more formidable than a dozen other mountains they have conquered: it is no tougher than the “rock garden” at Sun Valley or skiing down the side of the Empire State Building.

LIFE was right, in the end, in its estimation of the team’s chances in Norway or rather, LIFE was right about the men’s chances. No one on the American men’s ski team medaled in 1952. But a young native Vermonter on the women’s squad, 19-year-old Andrea Mead Lawrence (a future National Ski Hall of Fame inductee), made up for the dearth of laurels on the male side, winning gold in both the Slalom and Giant Slalom.

Here, LIFE.com presents photos of the men’s squad by George Silk as they trained for the ’52 Oslo games in Squaw Valley, California. These pictures that capture the rigor and the beauty of, as LIFE put it, “the most hazardous of all Olympic events.”

American skier Jack Reddish training for the 1952 Oslo Winter Olympics, Squaw Valley, California, 1950.

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A skier trains for the Olympics, Squaw Valley, California, 1950.

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

American skiers in training, Squaw Valley, California, 1950.

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Original caption: ” “Over the edge and seemingly off into space goes U.S. Olympic team member Dick Buek at Squaw Valley. On straight drops skiers have gone 73 mph.” Buek, an adrenaline junkie nicknamed “the Madman of Donner Summit,” died at the age of 27 in a plane crash.”

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Skiers train for the 1952 Winter Olympics, Squaw Valley, California, 1950.

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

“Avalanche of men and snow plunges down steep side of mountain at Squaw Valley in California as American team gets ready for the Olympics. This dramatic picture was taken in early morning before the sun had touched the snow.”

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

U.S. Olympic skier training in Squaw Valley, California, 1950.

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

U.S. Olympic Skier training in Squaw Valley, California, 1950.

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A skier trains for the Olympics, Squaw Valley, California, 1950.

George Silk Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

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