It was the winter before the Salt Lake Winter Olympics, twenty years ago, when I sat down with Earl and Carole Holding for the following interview. At the time Earl Holding was getting savaged in the local and national press about a land trade for the base area of Snow Basin, the Trapper Loop connecting road to Snow Basin, an Olympic Downhill Course as well as other real, or imagined controversies. Earl Holding’s reply was silence. He’d been burned by the press before and wasn’t about to risk having his words taken out of context.

My pitch for the interview was simple. “If you don’t respond, readers will believe you’re guilty as charged.” Earl Holding had given three interviews in fifteen years. I figured there would be little or no chance he’d sit down for a fourth. When my land line rang on a late winter day, I didn’t recognize the voice. “Wally (Huffman then General Manager of Sun Valley Company) said you are a straight arrow.” Earl Holding greeted me. He would later use the same term to describe Gray Reynolds. While I tried to maintain a journalistic distance, in all honesty, I was flattered.

In the intervening two decades both Earl and Carole Holding have passed, but the dream they had for Sun Valley, Idaho continues to flourish. Reviewing my questions, and Mr. Holdings answers, I see how fortunate I was to spend those three hours with such a remarkable, latter day Horatio Alger. He was articulate, warm, a consummate host and candid, nearly to a fault. Earl Holding’s vision for Bald Mountain, the lodges and restaurants, the quad lifts, grooming and snowmaking created a world class resort that continues to rate top ten among skiers. The highest compliment I could hope for came during a second call after my article “Earl Speaks” was published in Ski Magazine. “Andy,” Mr. Holding told me. “You didn't kiss my ass…but you didn’t kick it either.”

Why do you go with Earl instead of your given first name Robert?

Well, because my parents called me Earl, I don’t know why they chose that over Robert

You’re 73?

(Laughs) Unfortunately it’s true.

What is your date of birth?

November 29, 1926, (he laughs) Now you don’t need to tell the whole world how old I am?

How many hours a day do you work?

I get up early, and start cranking away around 5:30 or 6:00 a.m. I try to get through my paperwork early.

Until?

I’ve got so many things on my plate right now, but I get pretty weary around 6:00 or 7:00 at night.

That works out to around 13 hours per day?

I like what I do so it doesn’t seem like that much time.

I have heard from others that you and Mrs. Holding are a perfect match, almost soul mates. Where did you meet her?

We were both going to the University of Utah and I met her in the Salt Lake Public library in 1946. We were married in 1949.

Do you have brothers and sisters?

One brother and two sisters.

What did your father do for a living?

My father worked for the Covey Brothers (who would later hire Earl Holding to help run Little America) running a large apartment house.

Where you met the Coveys?

Correct.

Did you ever string wire on their ranches?

No, I have big ranches in Montana and Wyoming, but never worked on the Covey’s ranches.

Do you claim residency in Wyoming or Utah?

Wyoming. It’s still where we have most of our things. I have two refineries in Wyoming; a lot of our pipelines are in Wyoming and a lot of ranch land, some production of gas and oil, two Little Americas it’s the biggest part of our empire, (he laughs at the notion of his empire).

Were you raised in Utah?

I was born in Utah and lived there until I was about seventeen and a half then joined the Air Corps for a couple of years. After that I got my degree in Engineering at the University of Utah. After school, I worked for the Bureau of Reclamation as a construction engineer for two or three years. I had a chance to go out to Wyoming to Little America. It had been built a year or two before and was doing very badly. Later I had a chance to buy part of it then all of it.

I understand you had a chance to go to Iran for the Bureau of Reclamation. Why didn’t you?

Iran would have been exciting, but there was a pretty exciting opportunity in Wyoming (at Little America) also.

Is it true that one of the Covey brothers had gone to rescue some sheep in and was forced to overnight in a blizzard? During that night he promised if he ever survived he’d build a place where travelers could get out of the weather? Little America was built on that spot?

That’s right. The three Covey brothers ran around 150,000 head of sheep and owned every other section, forty miles wide that ran from 30 miles east of Evanston in an area called the Red Desert for 80 miles where they would winter sheep. Little America was built about six or eight miles from where that story took place. It was a very small operation with a dozen rooms and a cafe with a dozen seats, and service station...at that time it also had slot machines. Old U.S. Highway 30, which ran in front of it, was not much more than a trail. You could stay for five dollars per night, hamburgers were thirty–five cents, ice cream cones were a nickel, gasoline was sixteen cents a gallon. Times have changed a lot since then. When I left the Bureau of Reclamation I was making $3120 per year. The first year at Little America, I got rid of the poor quality employees and got some very good people in there, I think that first year my share was two or three hundred thousand dollars .

How old were you at that time?

Twenty-five.

Was Little America successful because there was no place else out there?

We think it was because we gave good service. Through the fifties and sixties 52% of all the cars would stop there. And 25% to 30% of all the trucks would stop there. At one time, it was the largest volume service station in America. Of course there’s more competition now than we used to have.

When did you become interested in skiing?

When I bought Sun Valley.

What originally attracted you to Sun Valley?

Carole and I had driven from Salt Lake City to Montana and on our way back stopped in Sun Valley for a couple of hours. We had lunch in the mall and walked around the lodge and area. We thought it was a nice place, well run.... I liked it a lot, but I didn’t think a thing about buying it. It wasn’t long afterward that Carole and I were in Santa Barbara at a condo we own and Carole came in with a Wall Street Journal and said, “I think I ought to give this to you.” On the front page, in a small column, it said, “Disney is negotiating to buy Sun Valley.” I called Bill Janss and said I might be interested in buying it. I flew up and met him and looked around the lodge a couple of times and struck a deal and bought it. (Laughing) After a year or two here I wondered if it might have been better if I never saw that Wall Street Journal.

1976–1977 was a desperate drought year. Estimates suggest you’ve spent fifteen million dollars in snow making which has insured the season. When did you make that he decision?

Would you mind if Carole sat with us? She may care to add something. (Carol comes in and Earl says, “He’s asking some interesting questions, I thought you might like reliving this). When we made the deal to buy it, I think it was February and neither one of us had ever skied. Bill Janss sent one of the Austrian Ski Instructors to ski with us, I think it was Ferdle and we started on the lower part of Warm Springs. At that time, there was a little bit of snow making on Lower Warm Springs and a little bit on Squirrel but it wasn’t really snow it was ice. Neither one of us knew what we were doing and when we came back to the condo after that first day, Carole was black and blue from falling. I think that first day or two, I saw the lack of any business and the frustration of people working here. I thought I should start with the snowmaking because it’s very difficult to run a business that is so weather dependent. When we started the snow making amounted to mostly water sprayed in the air with a little of air added to it. The first thing we did was add some air compressors that made the snow a little bit better. Since then we’ve spent $22 or 23 million on snowmaking. We didn’t do that all at once and we also cut some new runs. I don’t think the people who were working for Bill Janss were all that knowledgeable about snowmaking. It was only later when we hooked up with York Snowmaking, that we got quality guns that would make dry powdery snow. We continued to add more and more air until between the compressors, pumps and wells we were running 16,000 to 18,000 horsepower. Snow Basin has 20,000 horsepower. I know you ski the mountain and are a better judge than I am about it, but I think we make a good quality snow.

The winters are much warmer now than when you bought Sun Valley.

Without the snow making it would be very difficult. My recollection now is over the last five or six years we’ve been open by Thanksgiving.

You’ve owned the resort for almost a quarter century. Looking back was it a good business decision?

(He pauses) The bottom line is, I think it was a good business decision. I’d say most of our years have been profitable. We own something like 2500 or 2800 acres and we’ve done some things. I’d like to do some more and with the cooperation of the city, I think we could. The value of what’s here has appreciated a considerable amount but it’s not a red-hot investment in comparison to other things we have. It’s been a labor of love. Sun Valley is beautiful. I think you’d have to say it was a good decision financially. Aside from one parcel that Bill Janss had subdivided into lots and which we sold the remainder of, we haven’t sold any of the land. If the land has appreciated, it was, in part, because the lifts, lodges and snowmaking improved the mountain. I hope you won’t print this but it wasn’t only the mountain. The resort was so run down and so many things were worn out. A lot of the metal roof flashing was galvanized and the galvanizing was gone, rusty and worn out. The roofs leaked and there was water running down the walls. You just can’t believe the effort we went to here, the money and manpower to take care of things that just weren’t very glamorous. The first winter I owned it was so embarrassing. The lodge was just like a sieve with water running down the walls and soaking the carpets. Over at the Inn, the plumbing fixtures were worn out, the pools were cracked and broken. The mountain lodges were so bad, you’d walk into the Warm Springs hut and see those movie stars sitting there....it was unbelievable.

Over at River Run we had one tiny cinder block building that you could barely get one cat in to work on it. We went through and tiled the kitchens and replaced the old busted equipment and re–roofed every building in the resort. We rebuilt everything with cold roofs to prevent the leaks then got started inside the buildings, cleaning them up...it was a massive job. I think the railroad let it go because there wasn’t any profit there.

Right after I first bought it Averell Harriman invited me to come to Washington to tell him what I was going to do with it. He indicated how disappointed he was that, while he was in government service, his brother had sold Sun Valley. He had turned Union Pacific Railroad over to his brother Roland and with some force let me know how disappointed he was that Roland had sold Sun Valley. Here was one of the wealthiest guys in America interrogating me on what I was going to do with Sun Valley and wanting to know every detail. For many years afterward we spent time together. We’d go on the mountain and have a picnic together at Trail Creek Cabin. He truly loved Sun Valley. He (Harriman) was pleased that we were putting everything back in good order on the mountain and in Sun Valley.

We’ve worked at it and worked at it hard, but the airline costs are so high from Salt Lake to Sun Valley, you could go to Europe for the same fare. Everything I ever built, I built it the best I know how....as the years go on, I think we’re able to do better than in previous years, but I think we’ve helped this place.

This is not false flattery, but many local skiers say that Earl Holding is the best thing ever happened to Sun Valley.

Well, you remember that bumper sticker that was going around during the first year I bought Sun Valley, (Earl is a Four Letter Word) he laughs.

When did you first see Snow Basin?

That’s an interesting story. I’ll give you ten times more than you want. I was working at the (Sinclair) Oil Offices one day and Siebert (Pete) called and said, “I’d like to sell Snow Basin and I’d like for you to come up and look at it.”

And I said, ”Pete, one ski area is enough, I’m not going to even come look at it.”

Pete gave me a jingle three or four or five other times before he caught me in Wyoming or Salt Lake. I said, “No way, one is too many! I don’t even want to look at it! I might get tempted!”

The last time he called me he said, “Earl just come up and hike it with me. I’m not going to twist your arm to buy it, I just want you to see the area.”

When I went up there I took my youngest daughter with me and we hiked across the top of the mountain from No Name to the far side of Strawberry, where we hiked down through Strawberry Bowl...the Chaparral was clear up to my arm pits and Pete was going like a mountain goat, he was in great shape, and on the way down we were hiking down Penny Lane. My daughter was on one side of me and Pete was on the other and she tugged at my sleeve and when I leaned over, she whispered in my ear, “Dad, you ought to buy this.” When I asked her why, she said, “Because it’s so unspoiled!”

We hiked back to the base camp and it really was unspoiled. Pete hadn’t done anything to hurt it at all. It was quite an impressive place. And we did eventually buy it and I thought if I was going to own Snow Basin, I would like to protect it. There was a 7000 acre block of and that Honolulu Federal owned, and 3000 more that bordered it and so we had 10,000 acres at the base and I know we’re not going to have anything that will spoil it close to it. I think it’s going to be quite a nice place. I never drive over the top (of Inspiration Point on the road to Snow Basin) without stopping.... that view is one of the reasons I bought it.

Mrs. Holding adds, “He always stops.”

Mr. Holding laughs, “Even when I go the other way, I stop to look at the mountain. There is another view that is just as good. You’ll have to drive that new road. You drive straight into the peaks for three miles. When the snow is on the peaks it is absolutely dramatic. You’ve never seen anything like those skiers down there. Coming down off Strawberry Peak there are chutes that are four or five feet wide, my god they come out of there they must be doing 80 or 90 miles an hour, (he shakes his head at the wonder of it.) Scary. Quite an inspiration.

Mr. Holding puts his hand on Mrs. Holding’s shoulder and says, “This is the real power right here.”

She shakes her head and smiles.

Was your decision to buy Snow Basin based on the Land Swap? (For a resort base area).

Mrs. Holding puts her face in her hands at this question and shakes her head. She is clearly exhausted and bothered by the subject.

Mr. Holding sighs then pauses and begins, “Before I did the deal, I talked to the Forest Service Ranger...again I have to tell you you’re going to have to use some judgment so you don’t cause me problems with this issue again. The Forest Service denies it now but it said it would be the number one spot for development. As much as I liked Snow Basin, I wouldn’t have bought the resort if I didn’t believe we would be able to buy land for a base area. The seven thousand acres (Holding purchased shortly after he bought the resort) was at the base of Strawberry. The base of the ski area proper was forest service land. And I did seek assurances from the Salt Lake Office that they would do a trade.

Without that assurance, I don’t think I would have purchased the resort. I think the Forest Service felt we’d done a very good job in Sun Valley completing the building of two lifts and doing all kinds of things...and I think they were pleased when we did buy Snow Basin. When I bought Snow Basin the wiring was so bad that one of the previous owners was electrocuted on one of the lifts. I looked at it and told the local forest ranger, who was a good guy, “I’m not going to open it unless I can put some new lifts in.” The Forest Service really moved their tails and within three weeks I had permission.

There’s so much of it that is controversial, so many articles in the newspaper and so on...I want you to have what you need for your story but it’s been a major controversy for me,

The question clearly distresses Mrs. Holding, who adds, “We’ve had more than enough controversy over this subject.”

Earl Holding shakes his head. “Just because someone in the Forest Service, even if he is the boss says we can do a land trade, it has to go through many steps in Washington before it’s approved. When Salt Lake started to talk about (bidding for) the Olympics, the Save Our Canyon’s People (who did not want any events held up the canyons) started raising hell. The Olympic Bid Committee, Bob Welch and others agreed they wouldn’t hold any events in the Cottonwood Canyons. When the Save our Canyons people got that commitment, they felt that there would never be an Olympics because there wasn’t any other site for a downhill. A downhill had been run at Snow Basin before but it had grown over. When the Olympic Committee learned that we had the potential to hold a downhill at Snow Basin, they wanted to show the IOC. I ordered a lift from Yan to go up there and about the time it was scheduled to be erected, the Save Our Canyons people filed a suit to stop us. The lift was laying down there on Yan's lot and we paid him for it, but the Save our Canyons people fought tooth and toenail against the lift being erected or building an access road to the top of the downhill. They tried to block everything we tried to do, including the land trade...it just went on and on, over and over, second and third times.

Congressman Jim Hansen was up here to speak to our oil group and when I drove him back to the airport he asked me how the trade was going. I told him it wasn’t going anywhere. And he said, “I’d be glad to help with that. I believe in Snow Basin being developed as a major ski area...”

And I said, “Well, I think we’ll probably get it through.”

He said, “Well, I just don’t know.... if you want me to, I’d be glad to help.”

The Save Our Canyons people had us at an absolute standstill. We studied all the things we could possibly study over and over and over again. It was a long, tough, drawn out affair. You could write a thousand page book on the land trade itself.

Have you ever commented publicly about these issues?

If I say anything to the newspapers, I just get ten answers back from the Save Our Canyons people. The Forest Service gave us a list of the properties they wanted. The top priority was they wanted twenty acres that adjoined a boat dock. There was also one ranch of around 300,000 acres that went all the way to the Wyoming line and another section that opened up five or six other sections. But the boat dock was their number one priority. So I bought the boat dock land and then one of¿ the teachers at the local college was invited by the Forest Service to comment on the exchange, and he said, “We don’t want (god damned) motorboats on the lake!”

So after I’d bought it for several hundred thousand dollars, the Forest Service backed away from it. We just went through the process, over and over again...it’s been one of the great frustrations in my life. We bought the first land for the trade, I guess it’s been 10 or 12 years…I’d have to check it but, in that time. we must have bought 10 to 20 parcels of land...the whole process has gone on for so many years... it’s been a real nightmare. Even after it was submitted and approved by Congress... I think the vote was either unanimous or one voted against it.... the process wasn’t easy.

I’m not looking for empathy, but I do think the Forest Service wanted it to go through. I think the office in Salt Lake believed it was the number one choice for ski area development. I don’t know if you know the history of the ski area, but Wheeler Creek is a small stream that runs dry for a few months a year. It comes off the mountain and runs down into the Ogden River. It supplies one or two percent of the water in the river and Ogden bought some of the land up on the hill to protect their water supply. They then turned the land over to the Forest Service that built the ski resort and road with help from the Civilian Conservation Corp. At that time, men worked for $20 a month and room and board. The Forest Service built a day lodge and cut the runs, then a year later wanted out of the ski business.

The story claims that dead cows were ending up in the Ogden water supply?

I don’t doubt that the land was condemned on the basis of overgrazing. Maybe it was some of each; Ogden wanted a ski area at the same time they wanted to protect their water supply. From what I heard, Ogden wanted a ski area first...you knew that Alf Engen and his brothers worked here in Snow Basin then moved on to help develop Alta?

Why did you choose Gray Reynolds for General Manager of Snow Basin?

I didn’t have anyone to manage the place...and I thought Gray was a natural. He knew the forest, he knew the Ogden area and he had ski raced and worked in Sun Valley. He was intimately acquainted with all the ski areas in the eastern part of California and Nevada, Idaho and Utah, he had worked at most of these areas...again I’m telling you these things so you can get a back ground...I met Gray and was really impressed with him. He was a mover and shaker, he knew this country, knew this ski area, knew the employees that had been here for years and years. Gray Reynolds and the present administration did not hit it off well and when he left the Forest Service I was trying to think of a man who was capable of taking care of the things that needed to be done (at Snow Basin). I got acquainted with Gray Reynolds but I didn’t know him all that well when he was the Regional Forester. He was also the ranger in the SNRA district (North of Sun Valley.) During those years he taught his daughters to ski on Warm Springs Run but he left Sun Valley about the time I bought it. I own about 350,000 to 400,000 acres in Wyoming and Montana. Two thirds of it is forested and I had Gray out to look at the timber…I thought he was a natural fit for us, I think he has impeccable integrity and honesty, (though) some of the environmental community has tried to make him something different. He had been a ski racer, a downhiller at Sun Valley and Jackson and loved the sport, loved the skiing, loved the mountains and I think following his separation from the Forest Service, it fit me and it fit Snow Basin. I saw Gray one day and asked him if he’d have any interest in being the Manager of Snow Basin.

The Save our Canyons people cast aspersions about collusion between Gray and I. But there is absolutely nothing to it. He’s as straight an arrow as you’ll find. I’ve heard it said that we hoped he’d facilitate the trade for us but I’ll tell you, I think (hiring him) probably delayed the trade two or three more years. Congress passed the law and I think they mandated for 90 or 180 days for the trade to be completed. It went on for how many more years…4 or 5? I feel really bad (about the accusations of conflict of interest that were leveled against Gray Reynolds) I think Gray knew what the laws of the land were and I think he did the very best to follow those laws which didn’t fit some of the people in the Administration... I probably shouldn’t go any further with this because it’s a sensitive issue. The bottom line is, Gray is a wide-open guy with nothing to hide. I think he’s been maligned very badly. I can’t think of anybody that I’ve ever met who has more integrity than Gray Reynolds. I think of all of his kids, are all guys in the submarine corps, officers at Annapolis or naval pilots.

To tell you something about Gray’s father...the Covey brothers at one time ran 150,000 head of sheep in Nevada and Wyoming. One brother was running 50,000 head just south of Jackson when some masked characters showed up...in the ensuing gun battle, three of those guys were left lying dead.

I asked Gray if he had heard the story. He said he did, but from his dad who was the Ranger on the Hoback. Grays dad was an extremely well educated ranger and actually started the movement to take care of the range.

What were your thoughts when SLOC approached you about the speed events at Snow Basin?

People approached me twelve or fourteen years ago, long before there was even a Bid Committee. They were in the midst of the first feeble attempt to bid for the Olympics and they had no place for a downhill. That’s when they came to see me to ask, if they got the Olympics, could they run the downhill at Snow Basin? I told them, “Sure, you’re welcome to it.”

SLOC offered you $13m to stage the speed events. By some estimates you’ve already spent $70 million.

He pauses. I’m just thinking about it. We did an estimate a year or two ago for SLOC. At that time we’d spent $70m to $75m. The Olympic Base is not where the base of the mountain ought to be––it ought to be in the middle of the mountain. But by the time the ski season starts in November, just for improvements on the mountain such as drilling well for water, cutting runs and installing sewage systems, water systems and snowmaking systems and excavating the massive parking lots that will be used by the Olympics, we will have invested $100m. With my ranches and ski mountains I think I’m a good environmentalist. I try to do it right. I’ve looked at two or three ski mountains that were for sale, big ones, famous ones and small ones and, in comparison to some of the things I’ve seen.... we’ve done a good job with this mountain. We’ve done the things that ought to have been done with it...that’s also true for our ranches. I own some property in the Sun Light basin and I feel that we are great stewards of the land. I think that when we get through with Snow Basin, you and everyone who knows will think we’ve done a great job.

Would you have committed to the speed events if you had known it was going to cost that much?

I think I might have said, you’re welcome to use the mountain, you can put in whatever you need, but you do it (you cover the cost of the improvements).

Could you have kept the cost down to $13 million and still hosted the downhill?

I’m telling you that there are things in there (SLOC’s $13 million) that will get used to take spectators up on the mountains on some of the other lifts, but I will be lucky to spend less than $100m on improvements by the time the Olympics start. The quality of the lodges, lifts, snow making and grooming are 5 stars in Sun Valley and Snow Basin.

Could you do it any cheaper?

Sure...

Why don’t you do it cheaper?

If you don’t understand that I won’t be able to explain it to you. It’s like that first snowmaking system in Sun Valley. We reworked that first snow making system and added this and that, but for it to work, to really be of some value, you have to do it right in the first place. It’s like the day lodges at Sun Valley...everything I’ve done and done well, in the long run has paid its way. I think things that aren’t done well are a waste of money.

We’re getting underway down at Snow Basin now, between the garage and shop. We just let the bid on the food operation building at the base and are letting the retail bid. The building at the top of Middle Bowl will be let in two weeks and the one at the top of Strawberry will be let in three weeks.

Do you build for a time span of 25 years, 50 years, a century?

I just build it the best I know how.

Is it true that you picked the granite, furniture, fixtures carpet etc. for the Grand America Hotel?

Everything going in there is us (Mr. And Mrs. Holding), not our architects, when it’s done you’ll have to come and see it. About a quarter million feet of beautiful Italian Marble is going inside, the outside is white Bethel Granite that is quarried in Vermont, which we’re shipping in 50,000 pound blocks to the St Lawrence Seaway and from there to northern Spain on the French Border where it is fabricated for the exterior. When finished the hotel will have 380 rooms and about 440 two-room suites as well as number of magnificent meeting rooms.

When I started planning the hotel, the mayor of Salt Lake City said, ”If you build that hotel we won’t encourage anyone else!” I’d just gotten the hole dug, which was a massive excavation and was driving pilings when the city started running ads about how badly they needed the rooms. By the Olympics the number of rooms will double which makes it a hard sell.

Are you building the Grand America hotel for Salt Lake in 2002, or Salt Lake 2025?

It’s going to take awhile. Salt Lake is growing. We’ve had 850 rooms there (in Little America) that have done quite will...but so many rooms are being built for the Olympic Fever...when the Olympics were announced there were 9500 rooms in Salt Lake which are now increasing to 19,500 or 20,000

You don’t think about the fact that these buildings will be around in 2050 or 2075?

I think if you build it from a good design, out of good materials, with good trades people, it will last for lifetimes. Everything I’ve built, whether its at a refinery, a pipeline or a hotel, or anything I’ve done, I try to do it the very best I know how.

Who came up the idea to put the participating Olympic countries on one gondola and medal winners on the other?

The Salt Lake Olympic people wanted me to go to Kitzbuhel and see the downhill race, to get some idea of what we were going to have for crowds. I was there with Bernard Russi and when I saw they had some of the names of winners at Kitzbuhel...I liked the idea. I’m going to get plaques of everyone of those people who were winners and put them in the cars. So far I’ve only bought about 70% of the capacity of those two gondolas, I’ve got another, I don’t know, fifty or sixty coming this fall.

What about the Trapper’s loop connector? (The access road to Snow Basin that was partially underwritten by Utah.)

That’s another issue I’ve taken a lot of heat on.... the state made a commitment if I’d do the things needed for the Olympics, they’d cut the road.... when that got to be a hot topic, the political people ran.

Everyone wants to know, what is Snow Basin’s new name?

He laughs. I’ve researched every name that has Sun in it and I don’t t think there is one that doesn’t have problems.

Then the reason you haven’t picked a new name is you haven’t heard the right name. Or is it a deliberately kept secret?

No, it’s not a secret. I like Sun Light very much, it’s the basin east of Yellowstone Park, not the east entrance. There’s a small ski resort in Colorado named Sun Light. I’ve had lawyers check literally a hundred or more of names with sun in it. I quite like the idea of Sun Valley, Utah but I know some of the local people here (in the Wood River Valley) aren’t happy with that. I think the Ogden people are quite excited about it. There are s a few in Ogden that would prefer that the resort remain Snow Basin, but in order to make it go, it needs to be a year round resort with golf, tennis and horses. I really, really, really like the name Sun Valley. I like what it connotes. I think we have a good operation a good mountain and good people.... I don’t have one Little America Hotel, I have several of them. I think about Disney in Florida and Tokyo, Paris and so on and I understand the local feeling that there is only one Sun Valley...but I still very much like the name.

Following the Olympics I think whatever name I pick whether its Sun Light or Sun Valley or Snow Basin will be the name by which it will be successful. I think Sun Valley says to the skiing world is a great mountain, and Snow Basin is also a great mountain. Sun Valley is fine operation and I think Snow Basin is too. I think Sun Valley says quality in the ski industry and I think Sun Valley says a lot to European and Japanese people. There a lot of folks in the IOC that have raced and skied in Sun Valley and some that were ski instructors are now in the elite of the Olympic Committee. Without going through 40 years of proving ourselves, I think Sun Valley has something good to say. I think the two events that everyone watches are the figure skating and downhill. On the opening morning of the downhill several billion people will be watching and I think it would be a spectacular help to Sun Valley, Idaho...and (if the name was Sun Valley, Utah) I think you’ll receive some chatter from the announcers. At one time everyone who skied in Europe knew Sun Valley. It’s not true anymore. The Vail, the Aspen and other resorts in Colorado have passed us by...I’ve been to Europe roughly ten times in the past year buying for the hotel and I meet people and they want to know what we do. When I say Sun Valley, it draws a blank stare.

They know Aspen, Vail and Squaw...but not Sun Valley. Whatever name we call Snow Basin, billions of people will see it. I thought the name Sun Valley would be a two way street that would help both places. Business wise I like it a lot and personally I like it a lot. The only negative are some people are not that happy with it. What would you do?

There are reasons to name it Sun Valley, Utah, but the problem is the undeniably romantic history of Sun Valley Idaho...the connection to Averell Harriman and Hollywood. Snow Basin doesn’t have that strong, history and for that reason you may be accused of trading on Sun Valley.

All right...any other questions?

Just one or two more...do you have plans to retire?

Yea, when I die...

You have a reputation for buying but not selling...and for great patience. What legacy do you hope to leave?

Mrs. Holding smiles.

He pauses, “I think one of doing things well, of integrity and honesty and doing the best I know how with what I’ve got to do it with.

Do you hope that one day your Grandchildren will be running Sun Valley and Snow Basin?

I honestly don’t think much about that...I think they need to get out and do their own things.

Are you defined by what you build?

I’m partially defined by what I build.

Can you conceive of adding a third ski resort?

He laughs, No, I think two are (more than) enough.

Are you optimistic about the ski industry as a whole?

You know, the industry has stayed around that fifty million skier days for so long that I think without the snow boarders it would be going backwards. Colorado has lost quite a bit but I think Utah has a chance.

How would you like others to see yourself?

Long pause...I can’t do much about how other people see me...I think I have great integrity, am hard working, reasonably intelligent, caring...that covers it.