When asked out of context, Dave Courtney doesn’t recall the exact year he started working at the Quechee Ski Hill, but he does know that he recently retired in 2018. However, I’m not meeting with Dave to talk about his long, Quechee-based ski career. Dave and I are meeting to talk specifically about an exciting offshoot of his many years on the hill. Dave’s son, Will Courtney, who skied the Quechee Hill with his dad since he was three years old, was hired this year to be a member of the US Alpine Ski Racing Team as an assistant coach and strength and conditioning coach. So, “like father, like son,” it was Dave’s role at the Quechee Ski Hill, and his own passion for skiing, that lit the fire in his son Will to fall in love with the sport and pursue his own professional career.

Will tries on skis at an early age.

Dave was instrumental in turning the Quechee Ski Hill into a member of the Mid-Vermont Council and starting up the Quechee Ski Racing Team. Dave talks about these social gains for Quechee and their positive impact on giving local kids the opportunity to have their own ski hill and to be able to advance into racing and grow as athletes should they choose to take up skiing as a sport. Dave’s passion for skiing and his drive to bring the local offerings to that next level benefitted an entire community, including his own kids who were just toddling when they started, to find excellence on their own hometown hill. Looking back, Dave says with a smile, “It was never about a World Cup Ski Racer coming out of this place.”

It appears that Will Courtney appreciated the old ski hill as much as his father did. Dave and his wife, Claire, knew that Will was enthusiastic and motivated and thus agreed to let him attend the Mount Mansfield Winter Academy for three months during his 8th grade school year. From there, Dave and Claire decided to send Will to Gould Academy in Bethel, Maine, a secondary school long known for its on-snow competition program for young athletes. Will (writing from the World Cup Event in Austria) speaks of the importance of ‘giving back to one’s home program.’ In fact, he credits discovering his affinity for coaching while helping out with the Quechee Ski Team’s Annual Christmas Camp while still in high school.

Will with his first coach, Marilyn Cochran,
and his constant finish-line supporter, Jim. When Dave asked Will that morning how
he thought he would do, instead of his usual “top 5 or 10” answer, Will said he was going to win.

Later, while attending UVM, Will began working weekends with the Quechee Ski Racing Team as a Head J3 Coach.

“Once I graduated from college, my goal was to ski as much as I could. At that time, my most direct path to doing so was to pursue a career in coaching ski racing. I had the opportunity to coach full-time through the winter months at Killington Mountain School (KMS), my first professional’ coaching role. Once I completed that first season, I knew that I wanted to gain more experience and continue to work with athletes on snow. Meanwhile, I was able to support myself on my salary and live a rewarding life. I knew that, like my dad, I could not spend my life sitting at a desk.”

From KMS, Will coached at Green Mountain Valley School’s highly regarded Alpine Ski Program. For a few years, Will coached with former UVM athlete Paul Epstein’s Global Racing Ski Team, after which he was the men’s head coach for the Park City Ski Team in Utah where he was working under Jesse Hunt at Park City Ski & Snowboard. Jesse Hunt (originally from Vermont as well) was the previous Alpine Director for the US Ski and Snowboard Team, a position he returned to in 2018. In the spring of 2019, Will was hired by the US Men’s Alpine Ski team as an assistant coach and a strength and conditioning coach. Will went from learning to coach on the Quechee Ski Hill to coaching on the National Team in about ten years.

When I asked Will what makes him a successful coach, he obviously had a lot to say, but is modest about his own abilities, answering that “…the most important trait to being an effective coach is the ability to connect with an athlete. Effective connections can be derived from  effective communication via open and honest dialogue between the athlete and coach… If the coach fails to develop a connection with the athlete through communication and trust, the effectiveness of the coach is minimal.”

Will’s US Ski Team jacket

Will explained that the highly competitive levels at which he’s coaching makes that personal element all the more important, describing how close coaches and athletes need to become:

“As an athlete achieves higher levels of success, the sport demands more attention to minute details, from sleep and recovery, to strength and conditioning, to extensive travel logistics, and to daily time management, among others. As a result, the role of the coach is to help the athlete manage the entire process effectively so as to maximize the effectiveness of the preparation,” said Will.

When it comes to his success, Will was much more eager to emphasize his family over his own abilities unequivocally stating that his “… parents, without question, supported my decision to pursue ski racing at a young age. They instilled in me a focused and deliberate work ethic, and I understand now that they had no doubt that I would work tirelessly to achieve my goals. My mother and father made tremendous sacrifices… I have my parents to thank for enabling my passion for this sport to grow into an obsession.”

The Courtney family: Will, Dave, Claire, and Jim

Dave and Will both inherently speak to the communities of Quechee, larger Vermont, and New England as being a part of world ski culture through every little hill that is given over to the local ski runs and kids programs. It’s a story of accessible mountains, supportive families and peers. The story, as Dave and Will both tell it, makes the world of alpine skiing sound like another small, tight-knit community similar to Quechee or Hartland.

Familiar names and faces that Will has met through his many lessons, races and jobs grace his presence at the Olympics. As an example, Will
mentioned that he works with Ryan Cochran-Siegle, the nephew of his very own first coach in Quechee, Marilyn Cochran, of the renowned family of ski racers. River Radamus is another coworker and cousin of long time-friend, Andrew McNealus, with whom Will grew up skiing and is now the Assistant Coach at UVM. So the answer to what comes next for Will Courtney may not come as a surprise. Will said he hopes to maintain his role with the National Ski Team through the 2020 Olympics in China. “In the long term, I hope to return to the ski club or academy level to bring my experiences from the World Cup back down to the developmental levels of the sport, with the aspiration of guiding the next generation of athletes to the pinnacle of their abilities.”

Strolling around the woods, contemplating my life as older people are inclined to do, hoping not to get lost in my own backyard, I asked myself, “Self, what talent would you have liked to have had which you are lacking?” It soon began to grow dark as the list grew longer and longer. I made my way home before Kim called the police but, you know something, I believe that the talent I lack most in my make-up is the ability to competently play a musical instrument. I’d also like to be much better at math, but music intrigues me more because I still naively think I have a chance at it: like golf.

Trust me, I’ve tried playing different instruments. For instance, when we were children, my parents had a baby-grand piano in their living room. I’m not sure why, since neither one of them played anything. Perhaps the piano was a symbol of hope, or maybe wealth. I hope that the four children might grow up with a sense of class, or an illusion that we were affluent and were modestly hiding the fact.

Anyway, we were given lessons by an old lady in an even older house in Ambler, PA. I remember that both the woman and the house smelled like camphor, as though moth balls had been stored inside of the piano or in her pockets. Although she tried her best, I could not be coerced into playing a single song or remembering a note. For me, it was all rote memory as I tried to do the notes in the correct sequence. I felt nothing.

That was how my mind worked and that is not music at all. “Wait a minute. Wait a minute,” I would say after almost immediately messing up a simple piano piece. She would get angry and say that she was “tired of waiting a minute. Go home and practice.”

Then she kicked me out of the smelly house, and I would sit on her brick stoop killing ants until my mother picked me up. The old lady had a recital one time in the parlor of her house. I remember it was stifling hot: August and no air conditioning. I played (or attempted to play) Big Chief Wahoo. This is a piece for simpletons and consists of three basic chords played in the manner of an Indian war drum, i.e. lots of pounding. It seemed to suit me but, upon sitting down, I immediately forgot everything and spent the next two minutes ad-libbing something much more complex. It was very embarrassing for all. I took a bow but my parents continued to sweat.

My younger brother, Eric, has that grand piano now. He doesn’t read or understand music, but he plays “by ear,” feeling the notes and making them come alive. It is truly beautiful, and many of his compositions come from somewhere inside of himself. I wish I were like that with a banjo.

Anyway, in high school, I went to the famous Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco during the rollicking hippie days. I came home with strings of love beads and traded them for a guitar from a stoned-out friend. I got a good deal but, alas, the instrument was not magical or blessed by groovy fairy dust as I had hoped. After weeks of practice, I only managed to play a few chords of Michael Row the Boat Ashore (a big hit back then). Hallelujah! I soon quit the guitar.

The modern roads and bridges that crisscross the Quechee/Hartford/Woodstock area allow visitors and residents easy access to almost anywhere they wish to go. Want to go to dinner in Woodstock? Maybe attend the Quechee Balloon Festival? Or get to Northern Stage in WRJ for a performance? If you allow a bit of time to find a parking spot, or compensate for possible inclement weather, the actual travel is usually fairly easy and pleasant. Of course, being so familiar with quick travel, minor inconveniences get us frustrated.

Imagine the frustration, then, that might have occurred with those making trips throughout the area 100 or more years ago. Prior to the advent of rail travel, which took hold in the area in the middle of the nineteenth century, most travel throughout our region took place via horse and carriage or wagon. Transporting people or goods was a slow and tedious process over the trails and roads that existed at the time. The thinly populated area, consisting mostly of farmers, had little in the way of transportation opportunities away from the Connecticut River. The river was the major transportation conduit at the time, allowing goods and raw materials, especially lumber, to move downstream to the larger population centers, and upstream, to supply needed goods to area residents. As a result, the first Upper Valley population centers grew up along the river’s banks.

Of course, boat and barge travel on the Connecticut was not smooth and unencumbered. Rapids existed, including in the Upper Valley region, necessitating the need for a series of locks to bypass the rapids, for shipments on the way downstream to Hartford, CT. Olcott’s Falls, near White River Junction, was the major obstacle that needed to be addressed in our region. In 1796, approval for the building of locks and a canal around Olcott’s Falls, along with a bridge to span the Connecticut, came about. With the completion of the canal and lock project, river travel opened up as far north as Wells River, VT.

The Advent of Rail Travel

Rail travel to the Upper Valley became a reality in 1848, as rail lines connected the area to the region’s larger cities, and beyond. White River Junction became the hub for the area’s rail traffic. It took a bit longer to connect Quechee and Woodstock with rail service, however.

Farmers, business owners, and residents of Hartford, Quechee and Woodstock saw the economic opportunities created by rail service, and
joined together to establish a rail line between White River Junction and Woodstock. Work began on the project in the late 1860s, but a national economic downturn in 1871 halted the project. Finally in 1875, the line was completed, and the first trains operated on the fourteen-mile long stretch of rail line.

Freight was an important part of the work of the new Woodstock Railroad. Farm products and lumber traveled on the freight cars, as did raw and finished products to and from the numerous Quechee mills in operation at the time. The largest of these mill operations, Dewey’s Mills of Quechee, saw tremendous growth with the rail line. Mill founder A. G. Dewey also served as president of the Railroad, signifying the rail lines importance to his mill operation.

The Woodstock Railroad opened up the area to passenger and tourist traffic as well. Business moguls such as Frederick Billings, who established the state-of-the-art Billings Farm in Woodstock, entertained many prominent people in Woodstock. News of the beauty of the area, and the recreational opportunities spread, and soon Woodstock became a popular vacation destination. Vacationers rode the trains from the cities to White River Junction, then rode the Woodstock Railroad (later the Woodstock Railway) to the growing lodging establishments in and around Woodstock. After arriving at the Woodstock station, it was horse, coach and buggy that delivered the arrivals to the doors of the inns and resorts.

Summer and fall were not the only seasons visitors flocked to the area for rest and recreation. Winter sports, including skating, horse and sleigh riding, skiing and snowshoeing grew in popularity, making the region a year round destination, and adding to the viability of the businesses that served these visitors. Travel to the area in winter made for some difficult work for those running the towns, railroads, and resorts. Snow removal, then as now, was a constant ordeal. Extra help and equipment was necessary for keeping the rail lines and roads passable in the winter. Devices could be attached to the front of the locomotive to clear snow from the rail tracks. Before the advent of trucks, town roads were kept passable by means of a huge wooden roller. Pulled behind a team of horses, the roller packed down the snow instead of moving it off the road, which left a good, packed surface for the horse and sleigh travel. The idea behind these snow-packing rollers is far from outdated today – that same technology is used out west, where extreme snowfalls occur.

A side note here about the role of the horse. While the work of the teamster (the term for men moving cargo with horses and wagons) declined somewhat with rail service, horses, carriages and sleighs were still necessary for road travel in and out of town, and transporting guests to the burgeoning resorts and inns. As mentioned the horse teams also pulled those huge, wooden cylindrical snow rollers, making winter road travel possible.

Rail travel in the area peaked in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. But by the second decade of the twentieth century, the introduction of mass-produced gas powered trucks and automobiles signaled its downfall. The local Woodstock Railway fell on hard financial times in the 1920s, and the last run by a locomotive pulling railcars over the tracks took place in 1933.

The Age of The Automobile

The end of rail traffic between White River Junction and Woodstock did not decrease visitor traffic to the area, but increased it. The path of the old Woodstock Railway was designated the route of a new paved road, Route 4. Rail track was pulled up, and in its place a new concrete highway was built. The formidable Quechee Gorge bridge, built and rebuilt to handle more and more rail traffic, As was true at the turn of the century, winter recreation activities brought in many visitors. In the 1930s, skiing was becoming more and more popular, in part because of a local innovation. In 1934, the first rope tow went into operation on Gilbert’s Hill in Woodstock. Ski hills became much more accessible as a result, bringing an even greater influx of winter enthusiasts.

With the new highway bringing in more tourists, particularly those of more modest means, motor lodges and motels sprang up along the route. Along with those, diners and other tourist related businesses resulted. These new economic opportunities brought about new energy for the region.

The biggest change for Vermont and our region with regard to auto transportation was the building of the interstate system. Between the
late 1950s and the 1970s, the construction of I-89 and I-91 further increased the ability of urban dwellers from the metropolitan areas of the east coast to visit and settle in the region. It also affected the economic face of places such as Quechee and White River Junction, as the mills, railroads, and manufacturing concerns gave way to more service and tourist orientated businesses.

Clay Hillgrove is a welcoming and very familiar face to the members of the Quechee Club, who relied on his steady hand to pour cocktails and his knowledge of wines to stock member lockers. After 15 years at the Club, he has taken his expertise and experience to the craft beer, wine and spirits business at Woodstock Beverage on Route 4.

“My claim to fame, I guess, is my BMW motorcycle. We’ve been to every town in the state,” Hillgrove says. “And it happened by accident because I was trying to drive on every road on the highway map. I’ve got about three left to go up by the Canadian border. It’s a beautiful state.”

Thanks partly to his wandering ways atop the BMW 1150RT Sport Touring bike – on which he’s piled up 75,000 miles over the course of 14 years – and partly to spending 25 years behind the bar (15 of those at the Quechee Club), he’s amassed an impressive knowledge of wine and spirits – particularly those produced in the Green Mountain State. And that encyclopedic recall benefits the customers at Woodstock Beverage, which has been in its present location for 10 years, and where he’s worked for nearly three years.

“The previous owner, Michael McCarthy, purchased the store 20 years ago and just recently retired at the age of 80,” Hillgrove says. “I was a bartender for 25 years, and I was also the alcohol beverage buyer as well. I created and implemented a wine society there with private wine lockers, and I’ve been working with fine wine for the last 10 years or more.”

While keeping an eye on options a few years ago, McCarthy presented Hillgrove with an opportunity. “He said ‘come work for me, and when I retire you can take over,’” Hillgrove says. “So, that’s what I did. Now I have my retirement job.”

Woodstock Beverage, with its colonial feel, blue/gray exterior with bright white trim, expansive front porch, eye-catching landscaping and history as a grain and feed store, may also encapsulate a classic Vermont aesthetic. Step inside and customers are greeted by a California wine display. Just beyond, the store is lined with 18 cooler doors packed with craft beer – roughly $42,000 worth. A Vermont-product
section is set aside in the liquor agency (Barr Hill Gin remains a favorite for customers), and the registers are often run by equally engaged staffers.

“My favorite part of being in the store is talking to customers about the product,” Hillgrove says. “Because of my bartending experience, I’m pretty knowledgeable on the liquor front. But I do want to say this: I have a very small staff, but that staff is continuously going to wine seminars and upping their education on our products. I have three employees I inherited with the store, and they’re all wonderful and great, and I couldn’t do it without all of their help.”

Hillgrove says the clientele is split 50-50 between travelers headed to Woodstock or Killington in the winter, and a steady group of locals who have become accustomed to the customer service and selection at the store. “We know the majority of our customers,” he says. “We know the people who come in, and they’ll spend some time here and laugh and joke and hang out, actually.”

Woodstock Beverage is also known for its wide selection of liquors, including a number of high-end options. With a number of restaurants relying on his stock and expertise, customers will sometimes come across highly sought-after items. “Twin Farms (Resort) will come in and get a bottle of Louis XIII Cognac every couple of months, and the Woodstock Inn may purchase a bottle of 18-year-old Macallan [Scotch]. There have also been a few people who won the lottery for a bottle of Pappy Van Winkle {Bourbon], so they’ll purchase that through our store.”

In the coming months, customers may see upgraded landscaping, an interior redesign, new shelving and racks and some higher-end selections. Also – look for an increased presence online, as Hillgrove has recently hired a social media director. “These are things the new generation are looking for and how they’re doing things,” Hillgrove says. “We’re trying to take it up a notch.”

[This article first appeared in and excerpts are reprinted with permission from 802Spirits, a publication of the Vermont State Liquor Agency. Written by William Burke, photo by Jodie Andruskevich.]