The snowboarding world today is mourning the death of an earlier champion for the sport, Paul Alden.
Snowboarder magazine confirms Alden died on April 9. He was 89.
Alden was most recently the general manager at Soldier Mountain, Idaho, where he retired after a career spanning decades. His son, David, was an early pro snowboarder for Burton and convinced his dad to join the company. Snowboarder reports the elder Alden went on the become a “resort liaison” for Burton, fighting resorts that outlawed snowboarding.
In the early ‘90s, Alden convinced the U.S. Ski Team to combine forces with the growing U.S. Amateur Snowboard Association, paving the wave for the debut of snowboard halfpipe at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano. His son, at the time, thought it was a losing battle.
Over the next few decades, Alden taught snowboarding at Grand Targhee in Wyoming and led Burton’s first overseas manufacturing. His other son, Rick, founded Skullcandy headphones.
Read on for Paul Alden’s complete memorial in Snowboarder.
Preview image by the Alden family via Snowboarder with (from left): Eveline Schnorf-Wirth, Paul Alden, Mark Heingartner and Craig Kelly.