Words: Sakeus Bankson 2017-10-31 17:04:21
Brad Davis is an intriguing character. The son of a renowned United States Forest Service ranger, the young man is a mountaineer, forester, avalanche specialist, ski patroller and CIA operative, famous for his athletic feats and criminal-catching prowess.
If he seems like the stuff of fiction, that’s because he is. Davis is the protagonist of the 1951 young adult novel Avalanche Patrol, in which he journeys to a ski resort in the Rocky Mountains to investigate the disappearance of the local USFS avalanche scientist. The ensuing tale involves snow bunnies, ski bums, timber barons, FBI detectives and bank robbers. It includes real-life historical legends like Alf Engen and Toni Matt. And, as with all good murder mysteries, it has a surprise twist at the end.
But as hefty as Davis’ reputation, there is one whose resume is even more impressive: His creator, author Montgomery Atwater.
Most skiers may have never heard of Atwater, but if they’ve ever scored a powder day at Utah’s Alta Ski Resort—or any big, snowy mountain around the world—he’s most likely saved their life. That’s because, along with inventing the Avalauncher and establishing the first avalanche center in the Western Hemisphere, Atwater is regarded as the founder of modern avalanche science. And that’s just part of a story that seems pulled straight from one of his novels.
Born in Baker City, OR in 1904, Atwater began writing novels and short stories shortly after he graduated from Harvard in 1926 and moved to Montana. Meanwhile, he paid the bills with a gamut of jobs including cowboy, fur trapper and football coach, until he journeyed to Europe to fight in World War II. Atwater had been skiing most his life, and soon found a role instructing in the legendary 10th Mountain Division. But it wasn’t until he was wounded in combat and discharged in 1945 that he truly began to change the ski world.
By the mid-1940s, skiing was booming and Utah’s Alta Ski Resort became a destination for experts looking to prove their mettle—and, as a result, became infamous for its frequent avalanches. The prevention techniques at the time were cowboy at best, based more on intuition than any sort of system. So when the USFS hired Atwater in 1945 as the local ranger, his responsibilities were as vast as his tool set was limited.
But Atwater had two advantages: A meticulous and methodical mind, and an excess of gumption. After only a few months on the job, Atwater and ski jumper Sverre Engen saved a small boy who had been buried in an avalanche for eight hours. Over the next 20 years, along with raising three sons, he developed techniques to forecast avalanche danger based on precise, systematic methods, charting weather conditions, snow variation and snowpack layering. Working from the avalanche research center he founded, Atwater brought in military artillery to remotely trigger slides, a practice that led to the invention of the air-powered Avalauncher, a device still used today. Atwater became the definitive voice of snow science; as an article from the N.Y. Herald Tribune put it, “No one, no matter what his reputation, runs a single track through Alta’s celebrated powder snow if Monty Atwater doesn’t approve.”
Atwater’s expertise brought him all over the globe for all sorts of government and private jobs, including avalanche control director for the 1960 Winter Olympics at Squaw Valley, CA, and the 1966 World Championships in Portillo, Chile. Yet his literary inclinations ran as deep as his scientific prowess, and he continued to write both fictional stories and research papers for the rest of his life. Some of his work was fun, such as three other Brad Davis novels, Ski Patrol, Snow Rangers of the Andes and The Ski Lodge Mystery. Others had serious intentions, bringing the realities of snow science to the general skiing community.
Atwater spent the last years of his life in California, continuing his snow studies until he passed away in 1976. Three years prior, he was officially recognized as the “father of snow avalanche work in the United States” by snow scientists from multiple government agencies, and an avalanche center in Yosemite National Park was named in his honor. He was inducted into the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame in 1979, an honor for a man whose dedication still saves lives every powder day around the globe, and whose own life is best summed up in the last paragraphs of Avalanche Patrol:
“He looked down the tremendous tilted slopes below him and chose a skier’s line. ‘You’ll need wings [to catch me],’ Davis said.
“Then at last he gave himself to the mountain.”
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