American Skiing Company was one of the largest operators of

alpine ski ''Alpine Ski'' (アルパイン・スキ一) is an Alpine skiing arcade game, released by Taito in 1981. The player controls a skier, who can move left, right, or increase forward speed. The aim is to maneuver a skier through a downhill ski course ...

snowboard Snowboards are boards where the user places both feet, usually secured, to the same board. The board itself is wider than most skis, with the ability to glide on snow."snowboarding." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. 17 Mar ...

and

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

resorts in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. Its resorts included Sunday River and

Sugarloaf A sugarloaf was the usual form in which refined sugar was produced and sold until the late 19th century, when granulated and cube sugars were introduced. A tall cone with a rounded top was the end product of a process in which dark molasses, a ri ...

, in

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and north ...

, The Canyons in

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

, Killington,

Mount Snow Mount Snow (previously known as Mount Pisgah) is a mountain and ski resort in southern Vermont located in the Green Mountains. It is Vermont's southernmost big mountain, and therefore, closest to many Northeast metropolitan areas. In Septemb ...

Haystack Hay is grass, legumes, or other herbaceous plants that have been cut and dried to be stored for use as animal fodder, either for large grazing animals raised as livestock, such as cattle, horses, goats, and sheep, or for smaller domesticated ...

, Heavenly and

Steamboat A steamboat is a boat that is marine propulsion, propelled primarily by marine steam engine, steam power, typically driving propellers or Paddle steamer, paddlewheels. Steamboats sometimes use the ship prefix, prefix designation SS, S.S. or S/S ...

. In the early 2000s, the company sold all assets and shut down in 2007.

History

In 1980,

Les Otten Leslie B. "Les" Otten (born 1949) is the former CEO of the American Skiing Company. Since resigning as its chief executive officer in 2001, Otten has been involved in numerous other businesses and industries, including the Major League Baseball ...

, the son of a German immigrant, purchased the Sunday River resort for $840,000 from the Sherburne Corporation. Sunday River included one double chair and a couple of surface lifts at the time. Sunday River slowly grew to become New England's second most popular resort in the 1990s. In 1994, Otten formed LBO Resort Enterprises Corp and purchased

Attitash Bear Peak Attitash Mountain Resort is a ski area located on U.S. Route 302 in Bartlett, New Hampshire, near North Conway. Constructed in 1938 by the Works Progress Administration, as of October 2019, Attitash is operated by Vail Resorts (after being pu ...

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

. By 1995, Sugarbush, Vermont was added to the portfolio of LBO resorts. In 1996, Otten purchased Mount Cranmore in the Mount Washington Valley of New Hampshire. Later that year, Otten sought to purchase S-K-I Ltd., owners of Killington,

, and

, Vermont, Waterville Valley, New Hampshire, and controlling interest in Sugarloaf, Maine. Because of monopoly concerns, the company was only allowed to purchase Killington, Mount Snow, Haystack, and Sugarloaf. Upon acquiring S-K-I Ltd., LBO Resort Enterprises was renamed the American Skiing Company By 1997, the company expanded west, buying Wolf Mountain in

Park City, Utah Park City is a city in Utah, United States. The vast majority is in Summit County, and it extends into Wasatch County. It is considered to be part of the Wasatch Back. The city is southeast of downtown Salt Lake City and from Salt Lake City' ...

. It quickly was transformed into The Canyons, now the largest resort in Utah. In 1997, the company, now known as American Skiing Company went public on the New York Stock Exchange and purchased Heavenly, California and

, Colorado from Kamori International. All American Skiing Company resorts have a ''Grand Summit Hotel'', a condominium-hotel in which investors were to buy a quarter of a year ownership of the hotel room units. The income from these condo quarter-shares was intended to be key to finances of the company. By the time the new millennium rolled around, Les Otten had left the company amidst a huge debt crises; their earnings had not kept pace with their growth. William (BJ) Fair took over as CEO. As the huge debts racked up, ASC was forced to sell Heavenly to Vail Resorts, Steamboat to

Intrawest Intrawest Resorts Holdings, Inc was a developer and operator of destination resorts and a luxury adventure travel company. The company was founded in 1976 as a privately funded real estate development company. In 2006, Intrawest was purchased by ...

, and Sugarbush to a group of investors. In January 2007, rumors surfaced that ASC might be in the process of selling Killington and Pico to

Powdr Corporation The Powdr Corporation, stylized as POWDR, is an American privately held company that owns and operates ski resorts in the United States and Canada. It is headquartered in Park City, Utah, and was founded in 1994 by John Cumming, co-founder of the ...

, and Attitash and Mount Snow to

Peak Resorts Peak Resorts was a publicly traded company based in Wildwood, Missouri that operated ski resorts in the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic and Northeast portions of the United States. It was bought by Vail Resorts in 2019. History The company was founded ...

. It was later confirmed in a letter to the All For One pass holders that Mount Snow and Attitash had been sold to Peak Resorts and that Killington and Pico had been sold to SP Land Company, LLC, who would join with Powdr in a new venture to operate the two mountains. In June 2007, ASC announced plans to sell Sunday River and Sugarloaf to

Boyne Resorts Boyne Resorts is an owner and operator of ski and golf resorts in the United States. The company employs over 7,000 full-time and seasonal staff. It operates 13 resort properties: 10 ski resorts and 11 golf courses. The company, based in Boy ...

. Finally in July 2007, it was announced that American Skiing Company's last remaining and flagship resort, The Canyons had been bought by the Talisker Corporation for $100 million. This was the final resort sold by the American Skiing Company, in preparation for the dissolution of the company by September 2007.

References

{{Authority control Companies based in Utah Skiing organizations 1980 establishments in Utah Sports companies