Royal Valley Ski Area
Buchanan, Michigan1972-1989
Browse Royal Valley Ski Area tees, long sleeve tees, hoodies and crewnecks. The Rottmann family opened it in 1972 near Buchanan, Michigan, as an upside-down hill with the lodge on top and a royal theme in run names such as King's Dive, Queen's Walk and Dungeon Dive. Night runs were lit by difficulty, green for beginners, blue for intermediates and red for experts. Pick a style below, then read the full Royal Valley history further down. We are an American small business bringing back the signs and logos of places and teams that are long gone but remembered fondly.
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Royal Valley Ski Area History
Royal Valley Ski Area near Buchanan, Michigan, sat on a pair of wooded hills about three miles north of town on Main Street, with a creek running through the valley between them. Albert and Sybil Rottmann opened it in 1972 and ran it as a family business; their daughter Sharon helped manage it. It was an upside-down ski area, with the lodge, rental building and parking on top of one hill and the runs dropping away below.
The 1981 trail map shows two quad chairlifts, a double chair, a T-bar and rope tows serving 15 runs on about 210 vertical feet. The run names leaned into the royal theme: Prince, Princess, King's Dive, Queen's Walk, Jester's Bowl, Dungeon Dive, Lion's Roar and Cub's Cove, along with Timberline Trail, Wedeler, Brook Run and Challenger, which at 1,800 feet was the longest. One chairlift ran down into the valley and up the far side, a layout rare enough that regional historians list it among the Midwest's unusual lifts. A stone building with a pointed turret and battlements appeared on the map beside the slogan Ski for Fun, Ski to Relax, Ski for Health.
Night skiing was the draw. SKI Magazine reported in 1984 that the runs were lit by difficulty, with green lights on the beginner trails, blue on the intermediate ones and red on the expert runs, so the hillside glowed in three colors after dark.
In October 1985 the Rottmanns, planning to retire, sold the 76-acre resort to Ski World, Inc., an Indianapolis company that already ran a ski hill in Brown County, Indiana. The new owners renamed it Ski World and planned to reopen that Thanksgiving. A string of warm winters followed, and in December 1989 the owners announced it would stay closed that season, citing the weather and the money new snowmaking would take. It did not reopen. The runs have since grown back into woods.