Boise News

Big Sky Bum Out

Where Have All the Ski Bums Gone?

By Betsey Weltner, Guest Writer, 2-08-10

Flickr photo care of Stickergiant.

They’re not on the ski slopes. They’re not in the bars. Have all the ski bums left Big Sky?

“A lot of guys are skiing backcountry now because it’s free,” said John the physical therapist. “Also, a lot of them worked construction to support their skiing habits. Those jobs don’t exist any more.”

A footnote to the current recession is its effect on Big Sky’s ski bum culture—girls and guys who live to ski and will work for ski passes or at part-time jobs that permit time off on powder days.

The recession that began officially in 2007 has been annotated in great detail. Millions of jobs have been lost and many will never come back. Nearly 15 million Americans were unemployed in January. The housing and construction industry, especially hard hit, is continuing to lose jobs. According to the Montana Department of Labor’s monthly report, the construction industry in the state suffered a 10.5 percent job loss from November to December 2009, more than any other industry surveyed in the state, and a continuation of a downward trend that has afflicted the trade for more than a year.

The construction jobs that enabled the ski bum lifestyle during the boom years in Big Sky have gone with the wind, and as a consequence, the ski bums have scattered. 

Erica, who owns her own business in Big Sky, considered the question of a ski bum exodus for a minute before answering. “I think there are fewer this season. You still see them at Milky’s and Choppers at night, but maybe not as many. Some of the employers who used to offer free ski passes to employees are no longer hiring as many or no longer giving free passes,” she pointed out.

But Robin, a teacher at Ophir Elementary School, disputed my theory. “The hard cores are still at Big Sky,” she said. “You see them in the tram line with ripped clothing patched with duct tape, and granola bars and sandwiches in their pockets.”

Just this past weekend, Robin said, a few “poachers” (skiers who attempt to load onto the lifts without ski passes) bolted out of the tram line when a liftie started checking passes.

“They may be underground, but they’re still around,” she argued. 

Around perhaps, but not thriving. The ski bum culture is unique to ski resorts, mainly in the West. Having grown up in the South, I was familiar with the east coast counterpart—the indigenous Beach Bum Americanus—but my first exposure to the Big Sky species was shortly after I moved here, during the annual Dirtbag ball, which culminates with the traditional crowning of the Dirtbag King and Queen. The criteria for being anointed Dirtbag royalty: you must maintain a high profile in the tram line and you must drink a lot.

It was as if I were Margaret Mead and had just landed in a remote part of Micronesia. During the Dirtbag Ball, revelers wear traditional native costumes with bright plumage—a retro reference to the 1980s (big hair, one-piece ski suits with exaggerated shoulder pads)—and celebrate the ski bum culture with, of course, the traditional cans of beer. 

Will the current economic diaspora mean the end of the ski bum culture as we know it? What will the ski resorts of the future be like without ski bums? Where did they all go? If they don’t return, the free spirits of powderdom will be gone. Let’s hope we’re not on that slippery slope.

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