23 Working in the Rope Tow Hut. Song: “Little Bit of Soul”. Photo: The View From Outside of the Rope Tow Hut.
I always enjoyed helping people, especially teaching skiing, and knew how much they’d love it once they learned. While working at Brandywine (my father’s ski area), one of my first winter jobs which my parents assigned to me was working in the rope tow hut, and during the first two ski seasons, my father was happiest when I spent more hours in that little hut than anywhere else. During the first season when there was a tractor motor powering the rope tow, there was a lot of carbon monoxide exhaust inside the hut because the tractor motor was so close to the inside. and the operator (which was me). My father actually told me (once) that he actually appreciated me staying working there all winter because he couldn’t keep any other employees doing so, without them walking off and quitting, obviously because the operator had to sit crammed in next to three auto tire wheels which spun dangerously close to your head, and could cause destruction, and easily death, if the rope fell off any of those wheels. Plus, when the wind blew the exhaust in, it gave you big headaches. But, I could either sit inside, or stand outside to do my job which was to assure that skiers made it up the hill safely. A long strong rope whizzed in through a cut out hole in the top of the wood, wrapped around three tire wheels connected to springs, then whizzed back outside through another hole. The fumes from the tractor motor made me sleepy, too, as I watched the skiers being pulled up the hill after grabbing onto the rope. But, I couldn’t fall asleep because I had to always be ready to push the button to stop and start the rope if necessary, for example, when skiers grabbing on would fall, and even be burned from falling on top of the high speed rope, or fell at anytime on their way up the slope, or close to the top. That was why the operator was needed – to stop, and then start the rope again. Just to be sure that I took my job seriously, the head of outside operations (Bob Earl) warned me that in the worst case scenario, someone could get caught on the rope, yanked up the hill, dragged around the top wheel pulley like a rag doll, and be carried all the way back down in the air still caught on the rope! If that happened, he said that they could crash at high speed right through the rope tow hut where I was sitting, and regardless of whoever was injured or killed, a lawsuit would be the end of everything for Brandywine. After I heard that, it kept me more alert while sitting inside, but It was as cold as a freezer, and the tractor motor blew out carbon monoxide whether I was inside or outside, and it gave me headaches.
Eventually, the tractor motor was replaced with an electric motor, the whole rope tow shed was rebuilt, and that was when the rope went much slower (almost at a snail’s pace). You can see a photo of the new rope tow hut (see photo below), as opposed to the first season when it was powered by our tractor engine, when the rope zipped by dangerously fast. And, the hill was a lot longer, like the one at Mont Chalet in Chesterland OH which my dad and Harold Stoneman had started together. We started visiting Mont Chalet before Brandywine ever came into the picture. Mr Stoneman had built an A-frame house at Mont Chalet.
I worked at that rope tow hut after school, and sometimes all day or night on weekends.
We had what my father referred to was called a dickle phone pronounced (dick-el) phone (see photo) for all of the work stations. I have no idea where he got that name from. However, no matter how busy it ever was, my mother was always there to answer that phone when I called. We had radios, too, but my dad never put me in a position where I could carry one. While working outside on long shifts, I often felt like my hands and/or feet would fall off from the cold, so it helped when I could always talk directly, and immediately to my mother via the dickle phone. I was able to suggest to my mother (while calling her on that dickle phone), that all of the stations at Brandywine would benefit greatly by having space heaters, and although I was the last station to get a space heater, I can take the credit for everyone getting one.
I understood the principle concerning my father’s anger when he would see me helping myself to anything from the kitchen, but even like a hot chocolate from our hot chocolate machine? Or, a soda from our commercial soda dispenser? He got mad ONLY when we were open, and it was like he acted like he was going to call the cops to have me put under arrest or something. He just wanted to use me as an example, and keep me at the bottom of the totem pole. From the very beginning, it was very obvious that my father wholeheartedly never wanted me working at, or being at Brandywine, and that was what my father, and my mother completely disagreed about.
Our father even treated our mother as if she was just another employee, while we both worked like slaves for him at Brandywine. But, the whole time that I worked with my mother, she educated me on how to do inventory, count the kitchen, bar, office, ticket, and ski shop totals, skis etc, etc. In fact, she taught me everything she knew at every opportunity that she ever had, but our father only whined like he was physically hurting when he saw me doing anything that might appear to look like upper management related tasks with my mother. It became a tug of war with him not wanting me doing anything that he didn’t specifically approve of, beforehand, and it became a real war with each parent insisting differently.
I worked closely with my mother in administration like that for a long enough time to eventually learn that it was much too easy for anyone to get into the file cabinet drawer where all of the weekly cash was kept. In fact, the cash was kept just inside the rear door to the office which was very often kept unlocked! No one would ever go in to the lodge that way,but me, my parents, and little sister, because we all still lived in the work trailer just steps behind the lodge, but when I discovered how easily I could unlock that file cabinet where all that cash was kept for the weekly cash drop, I also realized how easily we could get robbed! So, because I knew that my father wasn’t involved with the operational end of the accounting, except with the totals, I decided to illustrate (only to my mother, of course) how risky it was to have all of that cash so accessible for anyone bold enough to take it. Plus, I was curious to know whether the records and accounting of all of that cash was accurate or not. (I knew that my mother trusted me enough for me to do this.) And, I thought that both my mom, and my dad should know if their records were accurate. So – only to make my point that 1) I could be trusted, and 2) we’d know how accurate the records were – I moved $8,000.00 cash in hundred dollars stacks from out of the easily accessible to anyone cash file cabinet where all the ski area’s cash was kept, into another locked file cabinet’s drawer where no cash was kept. Then, I waited to see if, or when, it would be missed. I did this long after my mother and I had been into our normal routine of counting cash, and doing payroll, and making routine bank drops on our way to sleep at the rental house each night all winter long. And, I did this only to check (with my mother) whether anyone would have ever even known that it was gone. When I showed her where I had put it, my mother obviously told my father about it, but tried to make him understand that I was only testing them both, and it was my way of convincing them that I could be trusted 100%. Only because he could barely conceal his anger (judging by the looks on his face) was I aware that she told him about that. My mother had obviously insisted that my father not reveal to me that he knew about it, but he didn’t have to say anything for me to know how angry he was over it. My father and I were so completely opposite. My mother wanted us to continue dropping off the night cash bank deposits because the bank was right on our way home, but, my father decided on letting some new employee do it, instead. Ironically, that employee took off with both the cash bag, and our father’s car, but somehow they caught him, and got both the cash, and my father’s car back. I think that it was his Dodge Challanger that was stolen, because I remember when it had all of a sudden disappeared from Brandywine. It’s an example of the times my father would choose someone else besides me, to be closer with.
I very fortunately learned how to make snow from the manager of outside operations director Bob Earl, and the assistant outside operations manager Woodie. In fact, I was
still working at Brandywine when the new ski barn was built (see photo below of one side of the ski barn). Besides having a new Headco snow
maker on a skid, there was a large sized new snow gun mounted high up on the top of a tower (see photo).
See Brandywine’s snow cats used for grooming the snow (below).
My mother often told me to go man the Brandywine kitchen, and I always happily did so. Soon, my mother started giving me jobs which made me feel more worthy of doing, like being a floater loading the T-bar, or chairlift just for relieving employees for their 15 minute breaks, which was a job I felt that I had earned, and deserved. Unfortunately, my father was very angry that our mother had done that, and by the time that he realized that I was getting to know all of the employees by me relieving all of the chairlift operators, he put an abrupt end to me doing that. He actually used the employees getting to know who I was, and used who was recognizing me, to start requiring employees who ever saw me at Brandywine without his permission, to report it to him immediately. It wasn’t until soon after I had established myself as a floater who worked inside, and outside, that I became aware that my father didn’t WANT me working inside, or outside. Regardless of the fact that I had taken over the jobs no other employee would do, like working those long hours in the freezing rope tow hut, and cleaning the toilets daily, my dad still needed absolute complete control of me, everyone, and everything he could. Then, as soon as I realized that my father was grooming his employees, as well as wanting, and trying to groom, and change even me, I was no longer welcome to be working at, or even allowed to be at Brandywine.
I was flabbergasted to hear my sister at age 8 or 9 years old, expressing to me that our father had a prejudicial attitude toward women. And, then for her announce (like at age NINE) that she was a lesbian? Well, I just thought that she was too young. I didn’t even know about my father, and he never talked about it, but obviously wanted me figuring out about it entirely on my own. I clearly remember my father’s expression to my sister announcing that she was a lesbian. He lit up like a Christmas tree. However, I believe that she was way too young for deciding that for herself, and it was what resulted from her not having the adult supervision she needed which I should have been allowed to provide just from being able to remain living at our rented house. But, he wouldn’t have it. I think that when our father moved us all to into a first rented house, it was his quest to get his family away him while he continued living at the lodge. Then, when my father moved us into a second rented house, he told my mother to turn in the key and come sleep at the lodge on the night that the rental house lease expired, but I had nowhere to sleep! By that time, he had secretly moved my little sister up to the house on top of the hill at Brandywine (which I didn’t have any idea about, nor knew that I actually OWNED that house). That was the night that my mother moved back in to live again at the Brandywine lodge, but I had nowhere to sleep because my dad didn’t even think about that (explained). The ski area had become so busy, and he had become so used to not seeing me because I was either glued to the rope tow hut, or had been dropped off in prepaid rooms as far away from him, and Brandywine as possible, that he forgot that he still had to deal with me.
