Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
McCulloch, Ernie F.
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
1926 - August 28, 1987
History
Ernie F. McCulloch was a Canadian alpine ski racer, ski jumper, ski instructor, ski coach, ski school director, and ski technique author. He was born in 1926 in Trois-Rivières, QC. McCulloch's ski career began in 1945; originally a ski jumper, he soon switched to alpine ski racing. He defeated the entire French Alpine team in the Quebec Kandahar in 1949, won the US National Giant Slalom Championship, the North American Championship, and the Harriman Cup in 1950 (therefore the only skier to achieve the 'Grand Slam' of North America, winning its four major races), and was voted the "Skier of the Half Century" in 1950. Throughout the early 1950s, he enjoyed further ski victories (1951 North American Championships, 1951 and 1952 Harriman Cup, 1951 Peruvian Cup, 1952 Kandahar, 1952 US National and International Downhills, and the 1953 Ryan Cup) as well as competing in the 1952 Olympic Winter Games in Oslo, Norway. McCulloch also served as a ski instructor. Early in his his career, he was coach to the young Canadian ski champion Lucile Wheeler, travelling to Banff, AB with her to compete in the 1948 Canadian Championships. He later served as the director of the Mont Tremblant Ski School (1954-1969) and the Blue Mountain Ski School (1969-1976). During this time, he tirelessly re-evaluated and improved his methods for teaching skiing, resulting in Mont Tremblant enjoying a worldwide reputation for excellence under his leadership. He was also made president and chief examiner of the Canadian Ski Instructors' Alliance (CSIA) in 1955, 1957, 1959, and 1961, and coached the Canadian Olympic Alpine Ski Team in 1956. He authored several instructional books on skiing, including Learn to Ski (1955), Ski the Champion's Way (1967), and Ski Easy... The New Technique (1973). Ernie was inducted into the US Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame in 1969, then the Laurentian Ski Hall of Fame and the Canadian Ski Hall of Fame in 1984. He spent the summer months of June and July as one of the four coaches at the well-known summer ski racing school at Timberline Lodge at Mount Hood, OR. He passed away on August 28, 1987.
Places
Trois-Rivières, QC
Mont Tremblant, QC
Collingwood, ON
Legal status
Functions, occupations and activities
Ski jumper
Alpine ski racer
Author
Ski coach
Ski school director
Ski instructor
Ski instructor examiner
Mandates/sources of authority
Internal structures/genealogy
General context
Relationships area
Access points area
Subject access points
Place access points
Occupations
Control area
Authority record identifier
Institution identifier
Rules and/or conventions used
RAD, July 2008 version. Canadian Council of Archives.
Status
Level of detail
Dates of creation, revision and deletion
Catalogued March 2019.
Revised August 2023.