Aspen History: Lindley Hut

“Lindley Hut is dedicated, opened Wednesday,” announced the Aspen Times on January 1, 1960. “This area’s newest and most comfortable mountain cabin, the Lindley Hut, was officially opened at an informal dedication ceremony Wednesday, Dec. 30. Originally scheduled for last September, the dedication and official opening ceremony was postponed when early snows delayed completion. Wednesday’s informal ceremony was witnessed by Mrs. Grace Lindley McKnight and Clarkson Lindley, widow and son of Al Lindley, to whom the hut is dedicated. Lindley was a well-known skier and ski official. A member of the 1932 and ’36 Olympic Ski Teams, he was killed in a light plane accident in Nebraska in 1950 while flying to Aspen to help select a training squad for the 1952 Olympic Games. At the time he was chairman of the NSA [National Ski Association] Olympic Ski Games committee. The Lindley Hut was constructed under the supervision of Stuart Mace, who also designed it. The hut is now open to the public. A charge of 50c per day per person or $1 a night will be made. This, according to Mace, who is in charge of the hut, will be used by the NSA to improve other huts in the area.” The image above shows a man at the Lindley Hut in the upper Castle Creek valley, 1961.