Comparing the cost of outfitting a child it seems clear that more families could enjoy the snow play than skiing. There are now many areas quite accessible after a snowfall where families can find a good hill to sled on. The present ski facilities in the Big Bear area can accommodate families who wish to ski. I think the phrase "family winter recreation area" is not a clear discription of the intended development on the high and rugged slopes of San Gorgonio. "Summer family recreation" in the wilderness area requires little more than a plastic bottle canteen and lunch in a sack. The area is certainly not "locked up," but is free for families of all income levels to use and enjoy. I believe that San Gorgonio Wilderness Area is far more valuable to many more people, now, and in the future, fully protected by the National Wilderness Act. Thank you very much. STATEMENT OF BARBARA J. LILLEY, INDIVIDUAL, LOS ANGELES, CALIF. BARBARA J. LILLEY. My name is Barbara J. Lilley. This letter is submitted, for the record, at the hearing on the six bills (H.R. 6891, H.R. 7490, H.R. 7645, H.R. 8033, H.R. 8176, and H.R. 8859) which concern the San Gorgonio Wilderness Area. This hearing is being held in San Bernardino on November 16-17, 1965. The last remaining wilderness area accessible to heavily populated southern California should not be opened up for the building of downhill ski facilities. The Sierra Nevada, the closest wilderness after San Gorgonio, is 200 miles away, and many people who do not have the time nor the money to make this drive, especially young people such as Boy Scouts, Y.M.C.A., and other youth groups, would thus be deprived of the opportunity to enjoy the recreational values that only a wilderness area can provide one does not often find a juvenile delinquent who also likes hiking, camping, and fishing. San Gorgonio is used by hikers summer and winter as long as the road is passable. It is true that San Gorgonio is just that portion which is most suitable for camping, hiking, and fishing and gets the heaviest use. Another reason against the opening of San Gorgonio to the building of downhill skiing facilities is that the skiing is just not that good or that reliable. I personally have visited the area one or two times a year during the past 12 years and only in May, in the 1 or 2 years when snow has lasted that long, have I found skiing above 9,500 feet. On all other occasions-during the months of December, January, February, and March-the snow above 9,500 feet has been so hard packed and icy that I did not feel safe without ice climbing equipment such as an ice ax and crampons. The fact that one can observe a cover of white on the slopes of San Gorgonio from far away-which shows up nicely because there are few trees on those slopes-does not always mean that skiiable snow will be found there. The north side of Mount San Antonio has just about the same exposure-and the same snow conditions and there have been a number of people killed there who have slid down the icy slopes. Unfortunately, these slopes are observed from the Palmdale side only, not from the Los Angeles basin. San Gorgonio is not inaccessible to skiers, of course. It is a very popular area for ski touring and the 2 feet of snow which is really all that can be relied upon, unless it is an exceptional year with much above normal rainfall in southern California, would be worn down to bare ground in a weekend of downhill skiing, yet would persist for 2 or 3 months if skied on only by cross-country skiers. The mild southern California climate makes ski touring much safer and more enjoyable than in the Sierra Nevada even without huts; simple tarp shelters are adequate. Needless to say, a ski resort would spoil the area for ski touring and snowshoeing as well as for summer use. Incidentally, I have been a downhill skier as well as a ski tourer for 15 years, and I would prefer to continue to make the drive to Mammoth and other Sierra resorts than to see downhill facilities built in San Gorgonio. There are other areas closer to Los Angeles than Mammoth, such as Mineral King and Robinson basin, which could be developed as downhill skiing facilities without resulting in what amounts to complete destruction of a wilderness area. And existing local ski areas are doing quite well through the use of manmade snow. In summary, it would appear to be a tragic mistake to build downhill ski resort facilities in an area where it would, essentially, destroy the area for wilderness use (both summer and winter) and where reliable skiing can be counted upon for only 2 months a year. If the promoters of the ski resort do not realize this-that reports of snow depths are highly exaggerated-they will be soon disillusioned; otherwise, it would appear that skiing would really be only secondary and they plan to make their money through summer use such as the San Jacinto tramway does. Thank you very much. STATEMENT OF MRS. GERRIT T. BRATT, INDIVIDUAL, CLAREMONT, CALIF. Mrs. BRATT. I represent one family of five. We love wilderness. We love the tamed out of doors. And we love skiing. We hope Congress will keep the San Gorgonio wilderness as it is. To those of you on this committee who worked so long and hard for the passage of the 1964 Wilderness Act, we thank you, very much. PLEASE FAVOR WILDERNESS We hope the primary concern of this committee in relation to the Wilderness Act will be to review Forest Service recommendations of lands to be included in the wilderness system. Where there is controversy we hope you will favor wilderness, because a wilderness can always be undone but never re-created. Where there is a choice between larger or smaller boundaries we hope you will favor the larger area for the same reason. To the unending proposals for development and withdrawal we hope Congress will answer: "Wait." We hope the wilderness system, just born, will have a chance to grow, mature, and prove it will fill the need in our culture which we believe exists. Withdrawal in less than 10 years, perhaps 25 years, we feel would be premature. WILDERNESS IS PRECIOUS AND MAY BE MORE SO To us, wilderness, the antithesis of civilization, is a respite from noise, machines, asphalt, and foul air, but we think it will become more so. Predictors say in a few years Americans will have more leisure and more money to spend. To us this means we will ski in the Sierra Nevada because the snow is better than southern California snow. Perhaps it means the San Gorgonio wilderness which now serves a population in excess of 9 million people will be even more precious when the population of southern California is 18 million and the community is solidly developed from Santa Barbara to San Diego and even much of the mountains may be solidly built-up vacation com munities. ONE ORDINARY WILDERNESS DAY The summer of 1960 was our most recent visit to the San Gorgonio wilderness. Our Renata was 3 years old and Eddie 1. We joined friends from San Diego whose children are the same ages, camped at Barton Flats, and early Sunday helped the babies into knapsacks made to carry them and set off for the wilderness. We encountered more traffic on the trail from Poopout Hill to Dollar Lake than we have met on any other trail in southern California, among them a troop of Boy Scouts and an elderly couple who had been overnighting. A welcome rest spot was Slushy Meadows where we enjoyed a long drink of sweet clean water from the stream. We had lunch at Dollar Lake which is tiny but beautiful. Natural lakes are very rare in southern California. Dollar Lake and Dry Lake are the only natural wild lakes I know of in the San Gabriel and San Bernardino Mountains. Even though the water was chilly our 3-year-old skipped in for a happy wade. Eddie crawled in the dirt, picked up twigs, looked at rocks. We breathed fresh air and relaxed. Just an ordinary quiet day. Yet the possibility of such a day in the wilderness for us carrying our babies, for Boy Scouts, for elderly people as well as everybody else who cares to visit makes the existence of the San Gorgonio wilderness worthwhile, especially the lovely and friendly Dollar Lake, Dry Lake, Slushy Meadows part. WILDERNESS PRODUCES PURE WATER About the first time I went camping was in 1949 near Lake Arrowhead. On a hot day we took a trail down a hill and through a lovely forest. We came to a stream, aching for a drink. It was posted: "Polluted, do not drink" By contrast, the San Gorgonio watershed produces clean fresh water which is accumulated mostly during winter. A WILDERNESS EXPERIENCE AND GEOGRAPHY LESSON I grew up in Los Angeles. During college I was introduced to real wilderness including San Gorgonio. My first impressions were breathtaking silences, a feeling of kinship with the early pioneers, and in some remote places a fancy of being the first human to walk there. At college I collided with geography. As abstractions the concepts were almost hopeless, words to memorize, which had no relationship to my real world of rivers encased in concrete, flattened hills, and a rectangular grid community without contours. I am still matching the abstractions with the concrete reality of natural landscapes. San Gorgonio is the highest mountain in southern California, the wilderness area a prime example of mountain geography. As a family we hope to visit this and other natural classrooms often enough so our children have a substantial background in real geography before they get to the textbooks. WE SNOWBALL BELOW THE WILDERNESS Part of our family recreation after snowfall is to drive to snowline annually for snowman and snowballs. We join merry crowds of people, in thong sandals, good leather business shoes, whatever, all having & snow experience. This family winter recreation is free, provided by patchy wet snow and clear roads which do not require snow chains. EVEN ON SAN GORGONIO SNOW IS STICKY OR ICY I do not like southern California snow for skiing. It is sticky or icy, or worse, sticky in sun and icy in shade. We made a ski tour into the big draw area of San Gorgonio beyond Dry Lake and found the snow the same combination of ice and glue. Except above timberline, even in the sun the snow was icy on that trip. This is the condition which has taken the lives of people almost every year at Mount Baldy ski area. There, the icy slopes are marked dangerous and off limits, but people are foolish, and too often the result is tragedy. At a Big Bear ski resort my sister hit an isolated icy patch and fell off the trail. She broke her leg and mending it cost our parents $1,700. These conditions also remind me of Jill Kinmont of Bishop, who was Olympic team material when she hit a patch of ice in a competition, broke her back, and is now a paraplegic. MANY SKI RESORTS IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA When the snow falls, my husband, Gary, gets itchy to ski before we can get away to the Sierra Nevada resorts. He has 12 ski resorts in the San Gabriel and San Bernardino Mountains to choose from. Snowmaking machines "guarantee" skiing at Snow Summit resort. Generally the snow in southern California is inferior (understandable in our warm arid climate), and we prefer to go north. EXCELLENT SNOW IN THE SIERRA NEVADA We prefer to ski in one of the many resorts in Congressman Johnson's district, usually at Mammoth. The prospect for a new resort at Mineral King looks good with developers suggesting $45 or $55 million for openers. Southern California loves to be No. 1, but in snow it is not. I think it is practical and just that Olympic ski champions come from Mammoth and Squaw Valley or Colorado, Utah, and Vermont. SKIING IS FOR EVERYBODY WHO CAN AFFORD IT While wilderness and winter snowballing are available to everyone for free, skiing is not. Skiing is expensive, available as winter recreation to families who can afford several hundred dollars a year for it. To begin, lift tickets are $5.50 per person per day. Our family of five spent $250 on one midweek ski trip and some new equipment last winter. Since we still need more equipment we are budgeting $400 for the same trip this year. We are not so frugal that we camp out but we are very thrifty. Even in southern California, with the exceptions of Mount Baldy resort and Mount Waterman-Kratka Ridge area, no local resort is close enough to Los Angeles to permit daily com muting so two or more days skiing requires money for lodging and meals. We thought you might like to see a family ski budget. We have most equipment and clothing on hand. 5-day midweek trip-1965 New equipment and snow clothes-one pair adult skis: Boots 1 pair ski poles.. 1 pair metal skis-rental_. 3 pairs child ski pants- Resort expenses: Cabin with kitchen, 5 days and nights_. 2 adult lift tickets, 5-day discount... 1 child lessons and T-bar half days_ Lunches for 3 Total excluding transportation and groceries---- $36.40 6.19 14.00 11.42 90.00 48.00 16.00 20.00 241.00 $120 35 13 5 22 Resort expenses-slightly higher because 1 more child will be skiing. 197 Total excluding transportation and groceries___. 392 Skiing is fun and good exercise. In a few years all five of us will ski. We think the wilderness potential is much more fun and exercise. We most emphatically believe the San Gorgonio Wilderness Area should remain as it is. Thank you very much. STATEMENT OF FAY LEGG, INDIVIDUAL, FOREST FALLS, CALIF. Mrs. LEGG. I am Fay Legg, a registered nurse. My home is in Fallsvale, which is a small resort at the end of the road, up Mill Creek Canyon, 20 miles east of Redlands. I work as a nurse in Redlands. In the course of my daily work I see much trouble, sadness, and sometimes tragedy. I find I can best maintain my own emotional balance by taking some of my days off duty to go on long hikes. I have been hiking our wilderness area for 4 years now; first with hiking companions, until I got better acquainted with mountain trails. This summer I hiked alone. When a long summer day was still too short to reach the farther peaks, I bought a packboard, and carried my sleeping bag and food for an overnight campout. I had met untold numbers of Boy Scouts, some much smaller than I, and weighing about two-thirds as much, carrying provisions and a sleeping bag; so, |