Vermont Hall of Fame inducts
10th Mountain Division troopers

All 62 living Vermonters who served in the WWII 10th are enrolled; 186 deceased vets will be honored later.

By Morten Lund

On November 9, the Board of Directors at the Vermont Ski Museum inducted into the Vermont Ski Hall of Fame all 62 Vermonters still living who had served in the 10th Mountain during World War II. 122 other guests attended the ceremoney at the Grand Hotel at Killington Resort.

The program began with an afternoon gathering of 10th Mountain veterans to share in recording their experiences in the division, followed by a 5:30 reception with a welcoming speech by Scott Noble, president of the museum. During the entire time a large-screen video displayed a series of 10th Mountain photos from personal collections and archives.

At the banquet, the master of ceremonies, Peter Graves, a well-known television commentator on the sport, introduced Erling Omland, who delivered the invocation he had written for the occasion, enumerating the tests and travails of the 10th veterans, from Fort Lewis in Washington where the original 87th Mountain Infantry Regiment trained, to the shores of Kiska Island in the Aleutians, to Camp Hale, Colorado.

At Camp Hale, the 87th's men were split up to create the nucleus of the 85th and 86th, and then the division shipped off to Italy to undertake their famous campaign north across the Apennines and the Po Valley to the Alps.

Vermont Governor Jim Douglas gave the main address, on the impact of skiing on the state of Vermont. He was followed by Vermont's first Olympic medalist in skiing, and the first to be inducted into the Vermont Hall of Fame, Andrea Mead Lawrence.

Gretchen Besser, a member of the board of International Skiing History Association and author of the official history of the National Ski Patrol System, went over the history of the organization's service under its first president, Minot Dole, including its utility as the initial recruiting agency for the 87th Mountain Infantry and later for the whole division. Peter Shelton, author of a book this year on the 10th, We Climb to Conquer, talked about his research for a second book on the 10th.

Brian Lindner talked about the difficulties he encountered in researching the fate of seven Vermonters who lost their lives in the war. Major General Martha Rainville, commander of all Vermont military reserve units, talked about the legacy of the 10th that lives on in the current era.

In the final ceremony, Governor Douglas led the induction of the 62 new members into the Vermont Ski Hall of Fame. Later, 186 names will be added posthumously to the Hall of Fame roster to complete the inclusion of all of Vermont's 10th Mountain veterans.