Drive to revive Hickory Ski basked in the glow at Strand

Chronicle editor Mark Frost writes: Downstate videographer Ian McGrew had never even heard of Hickory Ski Center (formerly Hickory Hill) in Warrensburg until he saw a Faceboook post about the effort to reopen it for skiing and as a year-round recreation hub. Ian volunteered to make a video. He said he was thinking 3-to-5 minutes, a little promotional item they could use however they pleased.

Once he got into it, though, he got hooked and a bigger project emerged — a well-done, full-scale 30-minute documentary, Reviving The Legend: The Story of How the Skiing Community Saved a Mountain — that had its premiere showing Jan. 30 at the Strand Theater in Hudson Falls (an ideal choice, it seems to me, because the Strand and Hickory are both shoestring grass-roots efforts).

More than 100 people turned out, mostly Hickory loyalists who cherish the simple pleasure and intimacy of the little family ski mountain founded in 1946 by veterans of the Army’s 10th Mountain Division that fought in Italy.

Ian said he got a big boost when vintage home movie footage was offered to him.

Hickory had not been able to operate so far this season for lack of snow. Now, “conditions are fantastic,” says Clint Braidwood, but they couldn’t get their lifts inspected in time to open this weekend because of the Feb. 8 ski fatality at Gore. Hardy enthusiasts who hike up the mountain are skiing though.

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