The chair is a plain thing up close, a bench for two hung from a cable, and it has been climbing the face of Mount Norquay above Banff in one form or another since December 1948. That was the month George Encil, who owned the hill, put in the North American Chair, which the resort’s own history records as the second chairlift in Canada. Skiers still call it the Big Chair. This winter it carries them through the resort’s hundredth season, counted from 1926, when Gus Johnson cut the first runs down the slope above town.
By our arithmetic the lift line is 78 years old and the skiing is 100, which leaves 22 winters when anyone who wanted the top of Norquay had to get there on their own legs, or later, for a nickel or so a ride, on the end of a rope.
Key facts
- Banff Norquay’s published history dates the first ski runs on Mount Norquay to 1926, when Gus Johnson cut them, and records a first ski cabin built in 1928 by Banff Ski Club members led by Cliff White and Cyril Paris.
- The Canadian Ski Hall of Fame and Museum credits Mont Tremblant, Quebec, with Canada’s first chairlift, installed for the 1938-39 season.
- Banff Norquay’s history page states that owner George Encil installed the North American Chair in December 1948 as the second chairlift in Canada.
- Mount Norquay’s first rope tow, installed in 1941 and powered by an automobile engine, charged 25 cents for four trips, according to Banff Norquay.
- A Banff Norquay centennial post dated April 17, 2026 describes a plan, requiring Parks Canada approval, to replace the Big Chair with a two-station gondola and remove the North American Lodge.
What skiing on Norquay looked like before the chair
The first cabin went up in 1928, built by members of the Banff Ski Club with Cliff White and Cyril Paris at the front of it, and the first slalom courses were set the next winter. There was no road to it until 1935. For the first fifteen winters, the resort’s timeline shows no machine on the hill at all, so every run was paid for with a climb, the kind of arithmetic that sorts the curious from the committed before the first turn.
The cabin burned in January 1938. It was replaced in 1940 by the North American Lodge, a building that is 86 years old this season by our count, and in the same year Frank Gourlay became the hill’s first official ski patroller. The rope tow came in 1941, running off a car engine, and it cost 25 cents for four trips. Norquay hosted the Dominion championships in 1937, 1940 and 1948, so for more than a decade some of the best skiers in the country were earning their runs on foot and by rope on this one slope.
Then the chair. Canada’s first had gone up at Mont Tremblant in Quebec for the 1938-39 season, according to the Canadian Ski Hall of Fame and Museum, and Norquay’s arrived a decade later on a hill that had only had a road for thirteen years. The single seats were swapped for doubles in 1966 by the resort’s own dating, although other published timelines put that change in 1961, which tells you something about how a century of record-keeping holds up when it lives mostly in scrapbooks and in the heads of the people who rode it.
Why the lodge deserves the same care as the chair
Chairlifts wear out. Parts stop being made, and no amount of affection keeps a cable turning past the point where it is safe. The resort’s own plan accepts that, and its proposal to replace the Big Chair with a two-station gondola, pending Parks Canada approval, reads like a sensible answer to an old machine. The resort’s centennial post also says the Big Chair will be kept on the mountain as a permanent memorial, which is the right instinct.
The lodge gets a different sentence. The same plan would remove the North American Lodge to restore alpine habitat, and I do not doubt the habitat argument, because the mountain was there first and loving a place to death is a real way to lose it. But a building that has stood on that slope since 1940, raised because the first one burned, carries the whole second chapter of Norquay in its walls, the rope-tow years and the championship winters. If it has to come down, somebody should document it room by room and file the drawings where a student could find them in fifty years.
That is the ordinary work neglect skips. The resort’s own centennial writing leaned on people like Eddie Hunter, close to his hundredth birthday when the resort wrote about him, for what the paperwork never caught, and there will not always be an Eddie Hunter to ask. A hill that Alberta sells to visitors every winter can afford to keep its own record straight.
Picture the Big Chair where the resort says it will stay, one bench hanging still above the slope Gus Johnson cleared, with Rundle across the valley and the lodge below it still lit, for now, against the dark.
Frequently asked questions
When did skiing start at Mount Norquay?
The first runs were cut in 1926 by Gus Johnson on the slope above Banff, which puts the resort in its hundredth season this winter. The first ski cabin went up in 1928, built by Banff Ski Club members led by Cliff White and Cyril Paris. The resort’s own timeline shows no machine on the hill for the first fifteen winters, and no road reached it until 1935, so every run in those years began with a climb.
Was the Big Chair really Canada’s second chairlift?
That is what the record says. The Canadian Ski Hall of Fame and Museum credits Mont Tremblant in Quebec with Canada’s first chairlift, installed for the 1938-39 season. Banff Norquay’s published history records owner George Encil installing the North American Chair in December 1948 as the second in the country, and skiers have called it the Big Chair ever since.
What did Norquay riders use before the chair?
The hill’s first rope tow arrived in 1941, powered by an automobile engine, and cost $0.25 for four trips. Before that, from 1926 on, skiers climbed on foot. By the resort’s arithmetic, the lift line is 78 years old and the skiing is 100, which leaves 22 winters when anyone who wanted the top of Norquay had to get there on their own legs.
What is the resort’s plan for the Big Chair and the North American Lodge?
A Banff Norquay centennial post dated April 17, 2026 describes a plan, requiring Parks Canada approval, to replace the Big Chair with a two-station gondola and to remove the North American Lodge to restore alpine habitat. The same plan says the Big Chair will be kept on the mountain as a permanent memorial. The lodge was raised in 1940 after the 1928 cabin burned in January 1938, so it is 86 years old this season.
