Horse Mountain Ski Area

Horse Mountain Ski Area near Willow Creek, California, ran rope tows along the top of Horse Mountain, a ridge close to 5,000 feet in what is now Six Rivers National Forest. Skiers from Eureka and Arcata drove inland on Highway 299 to Berry Summit and up Titlow Hill Road, often climbing above the coastal fog to reach the snow. The Humboldt Ski Club, formed in the late 1930s, had first skied lower down at New Prairie, where it built a lodge and ran two rope tows starting in 1948.

Skiing on the summit itself began in the mid-1950s, when Bill Hilfiker and the Grediagin brothers rigged a tow from a donated V8 engine and five-speed transmission. In fifth gear it pulled skiers uphill at about 25 miles an hour. As the snow line at New Prairie crept higher, the county began plowing the road to the top, and in 1958 the ski club moved up and added two more tows for beginners and intermediates. Power lines reached the mountain in the mid-1960s, which allowed electric tows.

Dr. Jack Walsh, a Eureka physician, took over the permits in the 1960s and ran the area with his wife Mary and their large family. Mary sold the tickets. Walsh cut the Ruby Creek tow, a quarter-mile rope up a steep pitch beside the creek that regulars rode with metal clamps called grippers, and posted the word Hiouska above it, which skiers took to mean go for it. A new lodge, a snack shack and a ski patrol A-frame went up, and each spring closed with a Hot Dog, Beer, and Fashion Festival where anyone in costume skied free. Walsh tried a snowmaking machine around 1975, then sold it. Most years the operation broke even.

Gary Wing, who owned a ski shop in Eureka, ran the last seasons in the early 1980s. Thin snow and fewer paying skiers no longer covered permits and insurance, and the tows shut down. The mountain is still used by snowshoers and cross-country skiers, and in 2024 former Horse Mountain skiers put up a history kiosk at Berry Summit.