History of Whistler BC
The history of Whistler BC extends far back before the first Whistler ski condo or Whistler resort ever popped up. The Whistler Valley was once an isolated trading route between the Squamish and Lil’wat Nations. After the area was surveyed and documented in 1858 by the Hudson Bay Company, the name “London Mountain” was given to what soon became locally known as “Whistler” because of the shrill whistling sounds of the local Western Hoary Marmot.
An adventurous American couple, Myrtle and Alex Philip, opened the first Whistler resort, a fishing lodge on Alta Lake, in 1914. That same year the Pacific Great Eastern Railway linked Vancouver to Alta Lake, and the area became the most popular summer destination on the West Coast. It was just the very beginning of the influx of Whistler resort, home and Whistler ski condo development to come later in the century.
In the early 1960s, a group of Vancouver businessmen formed the Garibaldi Olympic Development Association, choosing to develop Whistler BC as the site for the 1968 Winter Olympic Games. Although their bid was unsuccessful, the first road from Vancouver was completed in 1965 and the mountain’s first ski area, known today as Creekside, opened to the public in 1966.
The fast growth of Whistler BC led to the creation of the Resort Municipality of Whistler in 1975, the first resort municipality of Canada. Quickly following this announcement, development proposals were issued for Blackcomb Mountain, as well as a new town centre situated between the two mountains (on the site that was then the community garbage dump).
When Blackcomb Mountain opened in 1980 with a modern Whistler Village at its base between the two mountains, the modern ski experience was re-invented and a competitive rivalry began, resulting in remarkable improvements to alpine lift access. The luxury Whistler ski condo became a ubiquitous feature, and a world renowned ideal. After many years of accolades for being the number one ski destination in North America, the two independently run mountains eventually merged under the direction of Intrawest in 1997, creating Whistler Blackcomb, one of the biggest mountain resort complexes in the world. In 2003, Whistler Village, in partnership with Vancouver, won the bid to host the 2010 Winter Olympics and finally realized its historical dream.