Powder Ridge Mountain Park & Resort

Per New England Ski History, brothers Louis and Herman Zemel, former New Haven appliance retailers behind the Record Centre chain, may have opened a rope tow on Powder Hill in Middlefield as early as 1959; a grand opening was held in early 1961, with more than 2,000 skiers visiting on January 21 and 22. Wikipedia's article on the ski area is internally inconsistent on this point — its lead sentence gives "January 22, 1961" while its History section gives 1959 — a lead-versus-body disagreement, not an infobox field. The area was renamed Powder Ridge in 1970. In 1962, Louis Zemel sued U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk over Cuba travel restrictions in Zemel v. Rusk, which the U.S. Supreme Court decided against him. In 1970 the ski area was slated to host the Powder Ridge Rock Festival, a three-day event planned for late July with a lineup that reportedly included Fleetwood Mac, James Taylor, and Janis Joplin, among others; after local opposition, the event was halted on July 27, 1970, days before the planned start, though up to 30,000 concert-goers showed up anyway. Per Wikipedia, "the planners of the festival skipped town with the money," and Melanie Safka was the only performer who defied the court injunction and played. Both Zemel brothers were arrested for violating that injunction; the charges were later dropped. After local lawsuits delayed construction, the "747" lift opened for the 1972-73 season, becoming the first quad chairlift in New England, per both New England Ski History and Wikipedia. Louis Zemel died in December 1981 at age 70, and his son David Zemelsky took over operations; Herman Zemel died on July 5, 1995. Sources disagree, and are reported separately here, on the 1990s change of ownership: Wikipedia says White Water Mountain Resorts bought the area in 1990, while New England Ski History dates Ken Leavitt's acquisition of the same company to January 1997, backed by $1.72 million in Connecticut Development Authority loan guarantees. Per Wikipedia, citing First Tracks!! Online, a September 23, 2006 announcement that the area would not operate for 2006-07 was itself reversed — the ski area ran that season before permanently closing afterward. The town of Middlefield tried and failed to buy the property in spring 2007; Middlefield Holdings LLC bought it in summer 2008 for $2.75 million, and the town bought it back from Middlefield Holdings on December 29, 2008 for $2.55 million. In July 2012 the town and Brownstone Exploration & Discovery Park agreed on a $700,000 sale, paid in $100,000 annual increments, with a $2 million restoration commitment; the sale closed September 13, 2012. Wikipedia and New England Ski History disagree on the exact reopening date — early January 2014 per Wikipedia, late December 2013 per New England Ski History — and both are reported here rather than merged. At that 2013-14 reopening, Powder Ridge adopted a helmet requirement Wikipedia describes as making it, at that time, the only Connecticut mountain with such a rule. New England Ski History's own news index shows a planned mountain-biking season was announced and cancelled via a July 5, 2014 headline, "Powder Ridge Cancels Mountain Biking Season"; the same New England Ski History page later states that, after restoring operations, "the new ownership added lift served mountain biking starting in June 2016" — that statement belongs to New England Ski History, not Wikipedia. In the summer of 2017, per New England Ski History, Powder Ridge added a synthetic ski and tubing area, with the area describing itself as the "first full service year-round urban mountain sports park and resort."