Jack Fisher - Jack Fisher, founder of Catamount and Jiminy Peak ski areas

John Falconer Fisher III – Jack Fisher – died June 14, 2011 in Barre,Vt., at 97.

In 1939, Fisher took advantage of snow trains hauling skiers from New York City to nearby Hillsdale, N.Y., to open a couple of rope tows on land he bought 2.5 miles east, on the Massachusetts state line, naming the area Catamount. During World War II he served as a flight instructor at Ryan Army Air Force Base in Arizona, but after the war he reopened Catamount, and built a T-bar and two rope tows at Jiminy Peak, 30 miles north in Hancock, Mass., about 30 miles east of Albany.

By 1957, Fisher had installed snowmaking systems at the ski areas. In 1961 he built a chairlift to Catamount’s summit, providing 1,000 feet of vertical, and opened theToniMattSkiSchool. In 1964 he installed a chair to serve Jiminy’s full 1,150-foot vertical.

Beginning in 1955, Fisher was also involved in founding and developingConnecticut’s Lime Rock sports car racecourse. He sold Jiminy Peak to Brian Fairbank in 1969, and Catamount to Bill Gilbert and Don Edwards in 1973.