Museums: Vermont Hall of Fame Class of 2025
Each year, the Vermont Ski and Snowboard Museum welcomes new Hall of Fame inductees. Their accomplishments are part of the museum’s permanent Hall of Fame exhibit. The class of 2025 includes:
Ned Hamilton
A native Vermonter, Edward J. “Ned” Hamilton has spent a lifetime shaping the landscape of skiing in his home state, first as a ski-shop entrepreneur and later as a resort owner. In Montpelier in 1958, he launched a ski department in the basement of his men’s clothing store, the Oxford Shop, which eventually led to the first Peter Glenn ski shop. Hamilton’s retail ventures grew to include stores in many Vermont ski towns, including Stowe, Waitsfield, Bolton Valley, Burke, Norwich, St. Albans and St. Johnsbury.
He then opened shops in Florida and recently in Georgia, as he recognized the demand for ski gear and professional advice among snowbirds and vacationers. The business brought
authentic snowsports culture to the South while preserving its Green Mountain State identity. In 1998, Hamilton made a pivotal move to preserve Vermont’s ski heritage by purchasing the bankrupt Bolton Valley resort, ensuring the continued operation of the ski area.
Hamilton founded the Consolidated Buying Associates, an initiative that empowered independent ski shops—many within the Sports Authority network—to address the growing corporate
retail competition. This effort helped maintain the unique character and expertise of local ski retailers across the country. He also became a sales representative for several Vermont-based equipment brands.
Hamilton’s ski shops have earned Top Shop honors from SKI Magazine, along with multiple Retailer of the Year awards. He is a member of the Sporting Goods Industry Hall of Fame and won a Snowsports Industries America Lifetime Achievement Award.
Harry “Rebel” Ryan
In 1964, as a junior in high school in Rutland, Vermont, Harry Ryan won all three events at the
Junior Eastern Championships in Sugarloaf, Maine. Days later, he astonished the ski world at a post-Olympic giant slalom race in Stowe, Vermont, placing second to Olympic silver medalist Billy Kidd and besting a field of other elite skiers. Ryan followed that up with wins in the downhill and giant slalom, and a second in the slalom at the U.S. Junior Nationals. He then raced for the University of Colorado and the U.S. Army before completing his undergraduate degree at the University of Vermont and earning his J.D. from Boston College Law School.
Ryan competed internationally with the U.S. Ski Team under coaches Bob Beattie and Gordi Eaton, skiing in the Hahnenkamm downhill in Kitzbühel, Austria, and the Lauberhorn in Wengen, Switzerland, and earning podium finishes in Bormio, Italy, and Adelboden, Switzerland. He was named to the 1968 U.S. Olympic Alpine Ski Team but was sidelined by injury before the Games.
Following his racing career, Ryan remained involved in the ski world. He co-founded the Pico Ski Education Foundation and the Killington Mountain Foundation. He has served as a trustee of the Killington Mountain School for more than 30 years and has served on the board of directors of the Heuga Center for Multiple Sclerosis. Ryan built a successful legal career, providing counsel to ski areas, gear manufacturers, ski academies and individuals involved in the sport. He was inducted into the Vermont Alpine Racing Association Hall of Fame in 2013.
Hannah Teter
Snowboarder Hannah Teter is an Olympic gold and silver medalist, a world champion bronze medalist and a philanthropist. Born and raised in Belmont, Vermont, Teter grew up in a snowboarding family as the youngest of five siblings. She took her first lesson at Okemo Mountain and trained at Okemo Mountain School.
She burst onto the scene as a teenager, winning the World Junior Halfpipe Championship at age 15, and soon became the youngest member of the U.S. Snowboarding Team. Teter went on to earn gold in the halfpipe at the 2006 Olympics in Torino and silver at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games, along with a fourth-place finish in Sochi in 2014. Her career also includes seven Winter X Games medals, six World Cup victories, a bronze at the 2005 FIS World Championships and the 2006 ESPY Award for Best Female Action Sports Athlete. She was named the Sportswoman of the Year by the U.S. Olympic Committee in 2006. She also won the 2009 Australian Open and earned second place at the 2011 New Zealand Open.
Teter is a passionate supporter of various humanitarian causes. In 2008, she launched Hannah’s Gold, a nonprofit organization that raises money through the sale of Vermont maple syrup to support clean water and education projects in Kirindon, Kenya. She later created Sweet Cheeks, a line of underwear that donates a portion of proceeds to children living in poverty. A longtime ambassador for the Special Olympics, she helped bring unified snowboarding to the Winter X Games in 2015, pairing Special Olympics athletes with professional riders to promote inclusion in sports. In 2010, Ben & Jerry’s released Hannah Teter’s Maple Blondie, its first flavor named after an athlete.
2026 ISHA Museum Grant Applications are Now Being Accepted
The annual grant is designed to aid museums to better preserve the history of snowsports and their local community.
ISHA is accepting applications for the 2026 Museum Grant of $5,000. The funds are for exhibits intended to help a ski museum increase its awareness and community support. Any nonprofit ski museum in the world may apply. Applications are being accepted in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Norwegian and Japanese.
The application window will close at noon on January 20, 2026. Interested museums should contact Janet White, ISHA executive director, for information on how to access the application. She can be reached at janet@skiinghistory.org. Last year ISHA invited more than 50 museums to apply for the annual grant.
The Rossland Museum & Discovery Centre won the 2025 grant. The museum, located in Rossland, British Columbia, encompasses indoor and outdoor exhibits on the mining and skiing history of the region, including a section on Olympic gold medalist Nancy Greene, who moved to Rossland at 2 years old. Previous grant
winners include the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame in Ishpeming, Michigan, and the Maine Ski and Snowboard Museum in Carrabassett Valley.Vermont Ski an
d Snowboard Hall of Fame Class of 2025
ISHA Launches New International Snowsports Museum Association
Monthly keynote speakers have explored topics such as fund raising, how to optimize social media, digitization, grant writing, exhibit design and the prehistory of skiing.
ISHA announced the formation earlier this year of the International Snowsports Museum Association (ISSMA). The group gathers on the third Wednesday of each month on a Zoom call. During each meeting a keynote speaker presents on topics such as fundraising, optimizing social media, digitization, grant writing, exhibit design and the prehistory of skiing. If your ski museum is interested in becoming a member of ISSMA, contact Wini Jones at wini@fearlessleaderinc.com. There is no membership fee.
Member museums include: Alf Engen Ski Museum in Park City, Utah; Aspen Historical Society, Aspen, Colorado; Canadian Ski Hall of Fame and Museum; Colorado Snowsports Museum, Vail, Colorado; Far West Ski Association; FIS Skimuseum Damüls, Damüls, Austria; Holmenkollen Ski Museum, Oslo, Norway; Norwegian Mining Museum, Kongsberg, Norway; Lake Placid Olympic Museum, Lake Placid, New York; Lahti Ski Museum, Lahti, Finland; Maine Ski and Snowboard Museum, Carrabassett Valley, Maine; McCall Ski Heritage Foundation, McCall, Idaho; New England Ski Museum, Franconia, New Hampshire; Pennsylvania SnowSports Museum, Sinking Spring, Pennsylvania; Rindal Ski Museum, Rindal, Norway; and the Rossland Museum and Discovery Centre, Rossland, Canada.
Other members include: Salzburger Landesskimuseum, Werfenweng, Austria; Sierra Nevada Olympic Wintersports Museum, Olympic Valley, California; Museum St. Anton am Arlberg, St. Anton, Austria; Swiss Ski Museum; Thredbo Alpine Museum, Thredbo, Australia; Tread of Pioneers Museum, Steamboat Springs, Colorado; U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame and Museum, Ishpeming, Michigan; Vermont Ski and Snowboard Museum, Stowe, Vermont; Washington State Ski and Snowboard Museum, Snoqualmie Pass, Washington; Whistler Museum, Whistler, Canada; WinterSportMuseum, Mürzzuschlag, Austria; and the Wood River Museum of History and Culture, Ketchum, Idaho.