Snow Crazy

On 6 May 1903, twelve men sat down to dinner at the Café Royal in London and founded what became the Ski Club of Great Britain. There were no lifts and no resorts to speak of. Val d'Isère and Courchevel did not yet exist as ski destinations, and Zermatt was known to climbers for the Matterhorn rather than for its slopes. To most Britons, skiing was a peculiar pastime for eccentrics, yet it was the British who pioneered Alpine skiing.

Arnie Wilson draws on the club's almanac, which over the decades gathered an amusing and frequently bizarre store of stories from Brits on the snow, to trace how a minority diversion grew into a worldwide obsession. It suits anyone who has spent a winter week in the Alps, and anyone who likes their history told through its stranger moments.