Pioneers: Van Degrift's Ski Hut
A reimagined shoe store helped grow skiing in Southern California in the 1930s and became the model for a future generation of ski shops.
Southern California’s first ski shop, Van Degrift’s Ski Hut, held a gala grand opening on September 25, 1936. But its origins began three decades earlier, as a prestigious Los Angeles shoe store. In 1901, the year he arrived in California, A.S. Van Degrift opened Regal Shoe Store in Los Angeles. Born in 1862, he came to California from Birmingham, Alabama, where he previously co-owned and operated the Francis–Van Degrift Shoe Company. The Regal Shoe Store changed its name to the Van Degrift Shoe Company in 1917 and eventually occupied two locations in downtown Los Angeles.
Photo, top of page: In 1933, after Tyler Van Degrift took over his family's shoe store, he added an alcove to sell ski boots and other gear to his Sierra Club friends. Photo courtesy Ingrid Wicken.
Van Degrift’s son Tyler, trained as an artillery lieutenant too late to serve in France, returned to Los Angeles in January 1919 and joined the firm. Active in the Sierra Club from 1916 to 1943, he served on the club’s executive committee from 1923 to '25 and 1927 to '30 and was chair from 1928 to '29. He was also an adept mountaineer, with four Sierra Nevada first ascents to his name.
When the elder Van Degrift retired in 1927, Tyler took over the shoe business. He became interested in skiing in 1933 and soon joined the Sierra Club Ski Mountaineers. He recognized the sport’s swelling popularity, as well as the difficulty for local skiers, many of them his Sierra Club friends, in obtaining ski equipment and clothing, especially boots.
According to Wolfgang Lert, journalist and coach of the UCLA ski team, “The ski business in Southern California started with a couple of tubes of ski wax next to the cash register in Van Degrift’s shoe store.” According to Tyler’s wife, Ethel Severson Van Degrift, a ski columnist for the Los Angeles Times, “In 1934 he ordered some skis and other equipment for himself and friends, since proper equipment could not be found in Los Angeles. Soon his office became a ski department and in a short time the entire basement transformed into a ski shop.”
The Van Degrift Shoe Company became the first store in Los Angeles to sell ski equipment. The store was a leader in retailing in Southern California for 26 years, not only carrying skis but also apparel, boots and accessories and organizing ski tours. Moreover, Van Degrift’s was the official uniform store for the National Ski Patrol.
In the early 1930s, Southern California skiing was slowly growing. There wasn't any instruction available and skiing for most people meant ski jumping. But more organized skiing was on the horizon. The California Ski Association formed in October 1930, and the first California state championship meet was held shortly thereafter, in February 1931 at Lake Tahoe.
Tahoe then hosted the National Ski Championships in February 1932. The publicity that followed inspired Sacramento’s Weinstock-Lubin Department Store to open a ski department in December 1932. They advertised that their shoppers could get “togged out,” as well as ask for a “how to ski” booklet.
Tyler Van Degrift became a pioneer on the Southern California ski scene. In addition to his activities in the Sierra Club, he was a member of the travel and recreation committee of the California State Chamber of Commerce and, in the early 1950s, was a director-at-large of the Far West Ski Association.
The store’s festive open house in 1936 set the stage for its success and helped the growth of skiing in the region. The guest book of attendees shows a virtual who’s who of Southern California skiers: Lester LaVelle, veteran instructor in the Mammoth Mountain Ski School; George Bauwens, designer of the Sierra Club ski huts on Mt. Baldy and at Keller Peak; Mary Jane Edwards, one of the Sierra Club’s best female ski racers and ski mountaineers; Lert, a partner in Hagermeister-Lert skiwear in addition to being a ski journalist; Will Thrall, editor of the short-lived Trails Magazine; Muir Dawson, multiple winner of the San Gorgonio Downhill; Walter Mosauer, father of Alpine skiing in Southern California; and Ludwig “Vic” Hasher, pioneering California ski racer, instructor and surveyor of California’s Mineral King valley.
The Ski Hut was an immediate success. The November 6, 1937, issue of Boot and Shoe Recorder carried an article titled, “How a Southern California Shoe Store Sells Skis Profitably.” The author exclaimed that the store was “doing one of the best jobs in the country selling ski shoes, skis and winter sports equipment!” The article also explained that “The Sierra Club, a group of mountaineering people, climbing in the summer and skiing in the winter, were brought face to face with the difficulty of obtaining the right shoes. Mr. Van Degrift is a member of this club. So, starting with a small stock of ski shoes, it was only natural to branch out with skis, snowshoes, bob sleds and the dozens of other winter sport necessities, including proper clothing. People interested in skiing came in to talk over their shoe and equipment troubles with Mr. Van Degrift, as he knew every angle of this sport.”
Word spread rapidly that Van Degrift’s was the place to go for equipment and skiing advice, which became the business model for future successful ski shops. The Ski Hut soon added rental, repair and wax departments. The rental business catered to beginning skiers as well as Hollywood studios. It provided skis and props for the films I Met Him in Paris and Thin Ice, starring Sonja Henie.
In addition to managing the ski shop, Tyler Van Degrift was an enthusiastic advocate of ski activities all over Southern California. In December 1936, at the organization of the Long Beach Ski Club, he showed ski movies and lectured on local snow conditions and other topics of interest to novice skiers. He donated the first ski trophy ever awarded in Southern California, for the San Antonio Downhill in 1936. In 1938, when the Ski Mountaineers were attempting to raise funds for the Walter Mosauer Memorial Lodge on San
Gorgonio, Van Degrift reserved a local theater and presented a ski movie for the club’s benefit.
In the late 1930s and early 1940s, Van Degrift’s organized the first Southern California ski trips to Western resorts such as Yosemite; Alta, Utah; and Sun Valley, Idaho. A 1940 train to Sun Valley, carrying 54 skiers, was the first ski train that traveled from Los Angeles to the Idaho resort.
In 1942, longtime Los Angeles Times columnist Lee Shippey wrote, “If the United States Army has to have ski troops it may get many of them from Southern California, where the roses bloom all winter. For skiing has suddenly become the popular winter sport here, and throughout California. Tyler Van Degrift, who knows more about skiing than anyone else here except his wife, Ethel Severson Van Degrift, estimates that there are more than 1,000 or more ski clubs in California.”
As skiing grew in popularity, so, too, did the Ski Hut. By 1950, Van Degrift leased three adjoining spaces at 715, 717 and 719 West 7th Street, giving Van Degrift’s Ski Hut a 62-foot-long retail storefront. A 1951 Los Angeles Times ad announced that the shop has “America’s largest and finest assortment of imported and American made ski boots,” listing Molitor, Henke, Bally, Bergmann, Bass, Tyrol, Chippewa, Le Trappeur and Mt. Tremblant as brands carried.
The store continued its popularity for nearly three decades and established the template for ski shops that would follow in the 1950s and 1960s. An open house was usually held in the fall, giving customers the opportunity to see the season’s new equipment. Occasionally a well-known ski personality would be on hand to talk about the latest news in gear or resort developments. Yosemite’s Nic Fiore was the special guest for the October 30, 1959, affair. Luminaries from all over California and the West attended, including Tommi Tyndall, founder of Snow Summit; Stan Mullin, pioneer of California skiing; Clarita Heath Bright, member of the 1936 U.S. women’s Olympic ski team; her brother Ed Heath, ski instructor; Sigi Engl, instructor at Sun Valley; ski-school innovator Doug Pfeiffer and Howard More, owner of Table Mountain/Ski Sunrise.
Van Degrift's health began to decline in 1954, and after a prolonged illness he passed away in 1957, at the age of 66. As his health declined, so, too, did his ability to commit to the operation of the Ski Hut. Ethel tried to keep the business afloat, but while she was coping with the loss of Tyler, she was also raising two young sons and continuing her writing career. Business was not robust enough for the shop to remain viable. Ethel closed its doors in 1960.
Tyler and Ethel Van Degrift made an extraordinary impact on skiing in Southern California. She wrote “Ski Slants,” a regular column in the Los Angeles Times, from 1939 through 1954, except for three years during the war. People could read about skiing and ski areas in “Ski Slants,” then visit Van Degrift’s Ski Hut for equipment, supplies and advice. It is safe to say that Tyler and Ethel informed, educated and influenced more Southern California skiers in the 1930s and 1940s than anyone else.
In his March 2007 article in Skiing Heritage (now Skiing History) about 1950s and 1960s ski shops, Seth Masia wrote, “For most longtime skiers, their first exposure to the sport wasn’t through a ski school or even a ski resort. It was at a ski shop.” That was never truer than with Van Degrift’s Ski Hut, a pioneering shop that served thousands of skiers before the prominence of organized ski schools and the proliferation of resorts. 
For more than 20 years, award-winning ski historian and author Ingrid P. Wicken has chronicled the history of skiing in California. She is the founder and director of the California Ski Library, the largest private ski library and archive in the world.