The Culture and Sport of Skiing: From Antiquity to World War ll

Chapter 13. Europeans Abroad in the East

chapter 13 Europeans Abroad in the East Japan: Now the Alpine method of skiing is the method of skiing in Japan. The growth of skiing is enormous. All middle and high school students in snow areas have ski clubs. Many ski books are translated, and papers report on ski activities. In the past 15 years, Japan has really taken to skis; it is a real folk sport.—Leopold von Winkler, 1925 India: At Gulmarg, winter sports may be enjoyed in conditions which even Switzerland or Austria could not better. The skiing slopes are many and varied, the place is accessible, and the weather better than Europe.—Illustrated London News, 1935 In the nineteenth century only a very few Central Europeans were on skis. They gained their knowledge, and often their equipment, from Scandinavia, especially from Norway. Nor-­ way was a poor country, and there was an exodus of educated and would-­be educated, particularly missionaries, engineers, and students, to central Europe, to North and South America, to Africa and the East. The height of this emigration occurred when skiing was becoming a sport, taken up by the bourgeois. Skiing in Norway at the turn of the century was a mix of the old utilitarian business of getting about the countryside and a leisure activity for town and city people. When Norwegians individually or en masse emigrated to foreign snowy parts, it is not surprising that they used skis as a means of getting about in winter, and often skied for fun and sport. The majority (they are few in num-­ ber) of Norwegians who traveled to China, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia, and found themselves contending with winter conditions, naturally took to their skis.1 This may be a most interesting piece of historical recognition but, as this analysis will show, the early Norse skiers who first laid western tracks in the East had virtually no effect on the development of skiing in China, Japan, or New Zealand. In Australia it was slightly different, and British imperial offi-­ cers on leave gave a start to skiing in India. Jakob Vaage’s Norske ski erobrer verden, published in 1952, and his subse-­ quent Skienes verden along with a number of other publications, virtually list who, when, and where Norwegians laid their tracks.2 Vaage thought in terms of Norwegian skis “conquering” the world, yet in China, Japan, and New Zea-­ europeans abroad in the east 199 land, Norwegians hardly left a trace. It would be Germans in China, Austrians in Japan, and Englishmen in New Zealand who played the main roles. Vaage had nothing to say about India and Afghanistan. One of the great sadnesses about Vaage’s work is that he never documented his material properly. Norske ski erobrer verden merely lists those with whom he either talked or had cor-­ respondence. He was free with his knowledge, yet when any attempt was made to show him incorrect, or even that there were other factors involved, he became aggressively defensive. He remained feisty to the end.3 There are, therefore, difficulties in evaluating his work. Used judiciously, it can and has added an immense store to our knowledge. china: no converts here Various indigenous people over the vast area of China were on skis for centu-­ ries before any Westerner came. Eighteen-­year-­old Arthur Hertzberg, a mis-­ sionary from Norway, arrived in 1899.4 He had been assigned to Laohokow, about 500 kilometers from Hanchow. When snow came, he ordered some skis as any good Idrætsmann would. Whether Hertzberg expected the ideas behind Idræt to be passed to the Chinese is highly questionable, but many of them melded well with a healthy, Christian outlook. The snow lasted only a few days and Hertzberg returned to Norway. He was back again in 1903, to the province of Hunan, this time bring-­ ing a pair of skis with him. It is not clear if he used them. His son, Gerhard Hertzberg, remembered a deep snow in 1913 or 1914 but could not recall any particular use of skis. Thus it was, according to Vaage, that Norwegian skis “conquered” China. There is nothing to indicate that the Chinese took to Nor-­ dic skiing. However, in Jilin province the ancient ways of skiing continued into the 1940s, according to the recent History of Skiing in China.5 On his return from the Russo-­Japanese war, Alfred Rustad received a pair of skis from his sister in Oslo and used them around...