Saturdays On The Hill Good Times Prevail When Group Of Developmentally Disabled Skiers Hits The Slopes At Mount Spokane
A piercing scream can be heard at the base of the Mount Spokane Ski Resort every Saturday morning.
Images of a snow-covered Yeti may at first dance through one’s mind after hearing such a primal scream. But a studied glance reveals that the shouting belongs to Ron Hill.
Hill, 38, slides down the beginning ski slope tethered to ski instructor Paul Ryan. Ryan is behind Hill while instructor Brenda Browder is out in front.
“Aaaahhh….” screams Hill.
No one knows for certain just what Hill - a developmentally disabled person who lives at Lakeland Village - is trying to express, but the wide grin on his face speaks volumes for what he can’t say.
Hill is one of 75 developmentally disabled skiers who are members of Spokane’s Special Olympics. The group, also known as the Powder Hounds, hits the Mount Spokane slopes every Saturday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
“Ronnie just loves it,” Ryan said. “His skills have pretty much plateaued. He’ll probably never be able to ski down the hill by himself. But it doesn’t matter to him. As long as he can have this release, he’s just fine.”
Powder Hounds calls on the help of 33 experienced volunteers - many from the North Side - to help beginning skiers.
The Spokane Parks and Recreation Department and the Mt. Spokane Ski Resort fund the program. The Powder Hounds have been skiing for 26 years.
“I just like to get out in the cold air and get exercise,” said Randy Nicholl, who lives on Spokane’s North Side.
And win medals.
Nicholl has collected three Bronze Medals in Special Olympics competition over the years. Nicholl, 41, has been with the Powder Hounds for 23 years.
Del Bemis is a 77-year-old Valley resident who has been an instructor for 14 years. Bemis got involved with the group after he retired.
“It’s a great opportunity for (the students),” Bemis said. “It’s a chance for them to participate in an outdoor setting.
“I think they take great pleasure in having the chance to operate on their own,” he said. “I also think sometimes the public has a problem accepting them into the community. Here, everyone is accepted.”
In the program, participants are grouped according to the severity of their disability, said Carol Shelley, a 44-year-old Cheney resident who has helped teach skiers for seven years.
Some students may immediately take to the slopes; others may spend an entire ski season just learning how to put on their equipment, she said.
The group’s founder is Dick Doughty, a longtime North Side resident who has been in charge of adult education at Lakeland Village in Medical Lake for 10 years.
When he started Powder Hounds, he had no idea that he would one day have a common bond with beginning skiers.
Doughty, 60, was a skilled competitor as a youth. He was good enough to qualify for the National Junior Ski Championships as a high school student in Jackson Hole, Wyo.
After high school, Doughty went to the University of Wyoming and was a member and captain of the ski team for two years. The team was good enough to earn back-to-back trips to the NCAA Championships.
Doughty competed in the slalom, giant slalom, downhill and cross country events. He was a rising star there, but then he began developing problems with his right leg during a tryout with the U.S. Olympic team in the mid-1950s.
His tibia and fibula were out of alignment. So doctors placed his leg in a cast to straighten it out.
But the cast was placed too tight, and, after it was removed, Doughty’s foot was partially paralyzed. The “drop foot,” as doctors called it, ended his skiing career.
After college, Doughty worked with people with developmental disabilities. He took a small group of people to Mount Spokane in 1971 as part of his job with the state as a recreation specialist.
“I wasn’t even skiing, but a young woman approached me and asked me if I would teach her. I first thought, ‘I can’t do it,”’ Doughty said. “But she was persistent and very genuine, and that’s what made it all go. She wanted to learn so badly.”
In 1972 the Powder Hounds officially started, although the formal name wasn’t adopted until many years later.
Through the volunteer instructors and their pupils, Doughty’s innate competitiveness on the slopes gave way to a camaraderie that helped him appreciate skiing just for the enjoyment of it.
But another accident jeopardized that.
Doughty fell off a cliff on a fishing trip on Prince Rupert Island, Canada, in 1993. He lay for 4-1/2 hours in a rushing stream. His right foot suffered the brunt of the fall.
After being rescued, doctors wanted to amputate the foot because it was so badly damaged. But they also discovered something else during routine tests. Doughty showed traces of cancer in his bladder.
“Maybe this is what you call God’s blessing,” Doughty said. “If I had not had that foot injury, they may have never discovered the cancer until it was too late.”
The cancer was removed and, later, so was Doughty’s foot. Now he wears a prosthesis. But he was a good enough skier that learning to ski on one foot wasn’t that difficult.
He can relate a little more to the Powder Hounds.
“I tell them, ‘I’m okay, so you’re okay.’ We’re still capable people. Nothings gripes me more than to have others calling us disabled people,” he said. “We are people who have disabilities, but we are people first.”
Susie Nees, an instructor of six years, said she probably needs the interaction with the Powder Hounds more than they need it with her.
“I realized a long time ago that they’re probably teaching me more than I’m teaching them,” said the South Hill resident.
“For a lot of them, they’re learning to do things that at first they’re afraid of,” she said. “We’re just teaching them to ski; they’re showing us how to live.”
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MEMO: Changed in South Side Voice