Glarus Ski Poster Grosses Ski-Rennen der Schweiz
This vintage Glarus Ski Poster was produced to advertise the fourth edition of the Grosses Ski-Rennen der Schweiz. The two-day event took place over 21-22 January 1905 in Glarus. The poster features an impressive image of a ski jumper in mid-air against a backdrop of the alpine mountains. The poster was designed by an unknown artist but was produced by the recently formed Swiss Association of Ski Clubs. It was created to promote what is now known as the IV Swiss Skiing Championships.
The race was contested on a 20-kilometer course over the Pragel Pass. The route provided 560 meters slope and 1160 meters down The winner was Fritz Steuri from the Grindelwald Ski Club who came in first of 32 participants in a time of 1 hour, 54 minutes and 7 seconds. The event was a great success that was attended by 10,000 spectators.
Erstes Grosses Ski-Rennen der Schweiz 1902
The Grosses Ski-Rennen der Schweiz competition is part of Swiss skiing history. Christoph Iselin, the winner of the 1905 event had been responsible for setting up and organising the inaugural 1902 ski race
The race took place on 26 January 1902, on the Saggberg below the Vorderglärnisch. The race was run over 8.5km from Glarus to Untersack. 14 people entered the race that involved a variety of cross country and alpine skiing with some ski jumps. The winner of the main competition was Feldweibel Müller from Reichenbach in the Bernese Oberland.
The competition was the first official ski race in the whole of Switzerland.
Glarus – a town of skiing firsts
Switzerland’s first ski club
In addition to holding Switzerland’s first official ski race, the small town of Glarus holds several other pioneering ‘firsts’ in skiing. For example, Switzerland’s first-ever ski club, the SkiClub Glarus, was founded in 1893 and it would be a few more years before others followed. But they did follow! Most notably perhaps are SkiClub Berne in 1900, Zurich and Grindelwald in 1901 and 1902 respectively, Davos in 1903 and Adelboden and Wengen, both in 1904.
In that same year, 1904, following a suggestion by Christoph Iselin from the Glarus Ski Club, 16 ski clubs met in Olten in to found the Swiss Ski Association (Der Schweizerische Skiverband – SSV, now Swiss-Ski). The founding clubs came from all over Switzerland; they included Adelboden, Bern, Biel, Davos, Engelberg, Geneva, Gotthard, Glarus, Grindelwald, La Chaux-de-Fonds, St. Gallen, St. Imier, St. Moritz, Vevey-Montreux, Zurich and Zweisimmen.
When the Swiss Ski Association was officially created it initially had 620 members. Such was the rise in popularity of Winter Sports and skiing that by 1914, the number had grown to 5,192. Skiing suddenly became popular in other resorts such as St Moritz, Gstaad and Davos and by 1929 the SSV’s membership had more than doubled to 11,600 members.
Switzerland’s first ski race and first alpine pass by ski
Many of Glarus’s pioneering ‘firsts’ that helped raise the public profile of the resort of Glarus and skiing, in general, were initiated by a local man named Christoph Iselin. At the age of 22, Iselin was a Lieutenant in the Swiss army with an enthusiasm for skiing. Iselin had attempted to make his own skis but wasn’t happy with the results and arranged for three pairs of skis to be brought in from Norway along with two Norwegians to demonstrate them.
In early January 1863, Iselin and a fellow ski enthusiast, Jacques Jenny made an 1820m ascent from Glarus to the Schilt Mountain, a five-hour climb, to try out the skis for themselves. They were enthralled with the results!
Iselin worked hard to spread the word amongst the local community, who at the time were using snowshoes, the only available option for moving about on the snow, Iselin was met with disbelief. Setting out to prove to the disbelieving locals that skis were faster than snowshoes he arranged a cross-country race for 29 January 1893. The race over the Pragel pass was to be between three men who would all be on skis, against one wearing the ‘schneereif’, the native Swiss mountain snowshoe.
Iselin was proven to be right the three skiers came in almost an hour earlier than the walker. The race not only became the first Swiss ski race, the three men on skis inadvertently also became the first men to cross an Alpine pass on skis!
Switzerland’s first ski factory
In 1893, a carpenter from Glarus named Melchior Jacober opened up Switzerland’s first ski-making factory. He fabricated Telemark and Mountain skis made from ash and elm. The bindings were made by his cousin, Josef Jacober, a saddler from Glarus. At the end of the 1893 season, Melchior had sold close to 100 pairs. And, by the end of the next year, he had sold 300, at 20 Swiss Francs a pair. It was a lucrative business.
In fact, it was so lucrative that in 1900 Josef also began producing skis under his own brand “Gotthardsoldat” – Soldier of the Gotthard mountain range. The Gotthardsoldat brand became so successful that armies as far away as Chile, Persia and Russia purchased them. Over the next 20 years, Josef Jacober had sold over 250,000 pairs.
Our reproduction Ski-Rennen Glarus poster
This fabulous Vintage Ski Poster dates back to a time when the resort of Glarus was one of the pioneering ski areas. Original copies of this Glarus Ski Poster are hard to find and don’t come to auction very often. That coupled with the resort’s historical heritage, makes it a little bit surprising that the poster doesn’t realise higher prices in the salerooms. An original stone lithograph print of this Ski Rennen Glarus poster sells for around £1000-£1500.
If you can find an original copy at this price, and you can afford it, we reckon it would be well worth picking up. For everyone else or stunning reproduction prints are available for a fraction of the price and what’s more, they look fantastic framed and mounted on a wall.
Our posters are carefully and professionally created from vintage originals. Whilst great care is taken in the production of these posters, we also try to maintain a vintage feel, so there may be small imperfections, fold marks, scuffs, tears, or marks that were part of the original poster master. If these do appear they should be visible on the larger views of the item on this listing. The originals of many of the posters we offer can cost many thousands of pounds, so whilst these posters look great, especially framed and mounted on a wall, they are intended as fun, affordable reproductions and not intended fine art prints.
The 50x70cm version has been specially produced to be used in conjunction with Ikea’s 50x70cm Ribba picture frame which currently retails for around £15. So you can bag a bargain of print and frame for a great price.
