Tuckerman Ravine Ski Patch — c. 1970s

A vintage Tuckerman Ravine ski patch, estimated to date from the 1970s, with a ski scene on Mt. Washington worked in blue and red thread on a rectangle of twill.

There is no lift. There has never been a lift. You park at Pinkham Notch, you put your skis on your shoulder, and you walk up about three miles with everything you need on your back, and then you stand at the bottom of the bowl and look at the headwall and decide what sort of person you are.

Toni Matt skied it straight in 1939 during the American Inferno — not because he had decided to, by his own account, but because by the time he could have made a turn he was going far too fast to risk one. The run has been argued about ever since.

Every spring the same thing happens. The snow in the bowl holds long after everything else in New England has gone, the parking lot fills before dawn, and several thousand people make the walk because this is the place you are supposed to go at least once.

It is the closest thing American skiing has to a pilgrimage, and the only equipment required is a willingness to carry your own gear uphill.

Embroidered. Photos are the condition report.