View from Mount Mansfield, Vermont, in Autumn Poster

"View from Mount Mansfield in Autumn" by Catherine Sherman. The view is great from the gondolas that traverse Mount Mansfield, Vermont, in every season. Autumn is especially gorgeous as the foliage countryside bursts into brilliant oranges, reds and yellows. The downtown area of the charming town of Stowe is about eight miles away. Mount Mansfield, at 4395 feet, is the tallest mountain in Vermont and is one of two mountains that comprise the Stowe Mountain Resort. The other mountain is Spruce Peak. The lift-served vertical drop of Mount Mansfield is 2,360 feet (719 m), the fifth largest in New England and the fourth largest in Vermont. The first recorded ski run performed purely for fun on Mount Mansfield was on Feb. 1, 1914, when Dartmouth librarian Nathaniel Goodrich hiked up a trail known as the Toll Road and skied back to the base. Ski lifts and gondolas make the trip up the mountain so much easier. Alpine skiing came to Vermont on a large scale when the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) cut the first trails on Mount Mansfield in 1933. The National Ski Patrol was based on the Mount Mansfield Ski Patrol, the oldest in the nation founded in 1934.