Middlebury College Snow Bowl Patch, Felt — c. 1950s-60s

A vintage Middlebury College Snow Bowl patch from Hancock, Vermont, estimated to date from the 1950s or 60s, worked on cream felt in navy chain stitch. MIDDLEBURY COLLEGE across the top of a notched shield, SNOW running over the rim of a stitched bowl with BOWL sitting inside it, and two red skis crossed behind the whole arrangement.

The Snow Bowl has been running up on the Middlebury Gap since the 1930s, which makes it one of the oldest college-owned ski areas anywhere in the country. It started as a rope tow and a cleared slope and it has never grown into anything much larger than that, on purpose.

Generations of students have learned to hate and love the same three trails, in that order, usually within one season.

Student ski areas are a nearly extinct category. Insurance, liability and the cost of running lifts took almost all of them out, and the handful that remain are run on institutional stubbornness.

Chain-stitched on felt, cut edge, no applied border. Photos are the condition report.