The Basis of All Good Skiing ALL PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH J. WILLARD MARRIOTT LIBRARY SKI AND SNOW SPORTS ARCHIVES - ALAN ENGEN SKI HISTORY COLLECTION
Olympian Alf Engen’s Sun Valley Ascent BY BIANCA DUMAS
It was 1940, and the slopes of Sun Valley had become a movie set. Champion skier Alf Engen was dressed in costume as Major Scott Landis, acting as a stunt double in the film My Reputation. In the scene they were to shoot, starlet Barbara Stanwyck was supposed to jump into the Major’s arms. He would carry her while he skied downhill, making for a spectacularly romantic scene. But Stanwyck would have none of it. What was worse, her stunt double also refused to do the job, stating that it was just too dangerous. Filming ground to a halt. Evelyn Engen came to the rescue. She had total confidence in her husband’s skiing ability, having watched him win title after title in international ski competitions. The director got the film rolling, and it was Evelyn, dressed in Stanwyck’s costume,
who jumped into Alf ’s arms while he skied down Ruud Mountain. Decades later, when Alf was inducted into the Intermountain Ski Directors Association Hall of Fame, Evelyn said, “When Alf proposed to me he said, ‘I’ll take you on the ride of your life,’ and he really meant it.” Alf and his two skiing brothers, Sverre and Corey, would star or work as stunt doubles in eight ski films, two of which were filmed in Idaho. One, called Northern Pursuit, was a war movie starring Erroll Flynn, in which Nazi spies sneak into Canada on skis. Alf and Corey worked together as stunt doubles, Alf playing the protagonist and Corey playing one of the spies. The film shows them hitting huge freestyle jumps, sometimes in tandem, as they race down the mountain, their faces concealed in the hoods of their fur coats. www.idahomemagazine.com
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