Bethel

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Sunday River Ski Jumps:

K-Point:

40 m

Year of construction:	1939
Further jumps:	K30, K20, K10
Status:	destroyed
Plastic matting:	no
Ski club:	Gould Academy Ski Team

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History:

Skiing competitions at Gould Academy have a very long tradition, because this private high school at Bethel was already founded in 1835 and has always been one of the main skiing education centers of Maine.
In 1930’s ski jumping was performed on “Anderson Hill”, but there only distances of 20 meters were possible. When the first ski team was set up in 1939 and Gould Academy could make the three mile away Barker Mountain area accessible for winter sports, Sunday River Skiing Areas was developed there including a 30 meter ski jumping hill. The area was easy to reach by cars and busses already in those times and during High School competitions nearly the whole parking lot was filled up. The peak of ski jumping activities was reached in 1950’s, when the enlarged ski jumping hill, which was situated beside a swan farm, had a rope tow as one of the first ski jumps at all. Ski jumping practising and competitions were kept up until early 1980’s, also on an additional 10 meter training hill beside the sports field of Gould Academy. In 1990 floodlights were installed to support Alpine skiing and especially reanimated ski jumping activities, but this success was not enduring. Today winter sports activities at Gould Academy are only alpine skiing, cross-country and snowboarding.

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