Skis in the Art of War

By K. B. E. E. Eimeleus, William D. Frank and E. John B. Allen

K. B. E. E. Eimeleus was ahead of his time with his advocacy of ski training in the Russian armed forces. Employing terminology never before used in Russian to describe movements with which few were familiar, Skis in the Art of War gives a breakdown of the latest techniques at the time from Scandinavia and Finland. Eimeleus's work is an early and brilliant example of knowledge transfer from Scandinavia to Russia within the context of sport.

Nearly three decades after he published his book, the Finnish army, employing many of the ideas first proposed by Eimeleus, used mobile ski troops to hold the Soviet Union at bay during the Winter War of 1939–40, and in response, the Soviet government organized a massive ski mobilization effort prior to the German invasion in 1941. The Soviet counteroffensive against Nazi Germany during the winter of 1941–42 owed much of its success to the Red Army ski battalions that had formed as a result of the ski mobilization.

In this lucid translation that includes most of the original illustrations, scholar and former biathlon competitor William D. Frank collaborates with E. John B. Allen, known world-wide for his work on ski history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Northern Illinois University Press
• Release date: Oct 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781501747410

Book preview

A volume in the NIU Series in

SLAVIC, EAST EUROPEAN, AND EURASIAN STUDIES

Edited by Christine D. Worobec

For a list of books in the series,

visit our website at cornellpress.cornell.edu.

SKIS IN THE ART OF WAR

K. B. E. E. EIMELEUS

TRANSLATION AND COMMENTARY BY

WILLIAM D. FRANK WITH E. JOHN B. ALLEN

NORTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY PRESS

AN IMPRINT OF

CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS

ITHACA AND LONDON

CONTENTS

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Skiing in Europe prior to World War I | E. JOHN B. ALLEN

Introduction: The Life and Times of K. B. E. E. Eimeleus | WILLIAM D. FRANK

From the Editor

Preface

Sources

I. THE HYGIENIC AND PHYSIOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF SKIING

II. A SHORT OUTLINE OF SKIING HISTORY

III. THE EVOLUTION OF SKIS

IV. VARIOUS TYPES OF SKIS

V. MATERIAL FOR SKIS

VI. FABRICATION OF SKIS

VII. UPKEEP AND PRESERVATION OF SKIS

VIII. REPAIRING SKIS

IX. THE EFFECT OF SNOW ON SKIS AND HOW THEY RUN

X. POLES

XI. METHODS OF ATTACHING SKIS AND FOOTWEAR FOR SKIING

XII. CLOTHING

XIII. SKI-RUNNING: ITS HISTORY, THEORY, METHOD,AND TECHNIQUE

XIV. RIDING BEHIND A HORSE

XV. RIDING WITH A SAIL

XVI. TURNING IN PLACE

XVII. HILL CLIMBING

XVIII. MOUNTAIN DESCENT

XIX. THE POLE AS A BRAKE

XX. SKIS AS A BRAKE

XXI. TURNS ON THE MOVE

XXII. THE PROPER EXECUTION OF JUMPS

XXIII. A CHRONICLE OF SKI COMPETITIONS

XXIV. SYSTEMATIC INSTRUCTION OF SKIING IN THE MILITARY

XXV. INSTRUCTION OF SKI DETACHMENTS WITH MARCHING AND COMPANY BATTLE FORMATION, REFERENCINGINFANTRY DRILL REGULATIONS

XXVI. SUGGESTED SCHEDULE OF SKI INSTRUCTION IN THE MILITARY

XXVII. ESSENTIAL RULES FOR SKIERS ON THE MARCH

XXVIII.STUNTSAND SKI GAMES

XXIX. GENERAL SETUP OF SKI COMPETITIONS

XXX. SCORING AND RULES OF SKI COMPETITIONS

XXXI. SIGNIFICANCE AND APPLICATION OF SKI DETACHMENTS IN TIME OF WAR

CONCLUSION

MAIN GYMNASTICS-FENCING SCHOOL PRESS

THE SPORTSMEN COMPANY ST. PETERSBURG

Notes

Bibliography

Index

ILLUSTRATIONS

FIGURE 0.1 Lieutenant Carl Kalle Bror Emil Aejmelaeus-Äimä (K. B. E. E. Eimeleus) ca. 1913

FIGURE 0.2 Eimeleus fencing at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics

FIGURE 3.1 Truga

FIGURE 3.2 Snow skis

FIGURE 3.3 The left side ski (lyly)

FIGURE 4.1 Indian ski

FIGURE 4.2 Vologod skis

FIGURE 4.3 Lapland ski

FIGURE 4.4 Military ski

FIGURE 4.5 Telemark ski

FIGURE 4.6 Puolanko ski

FIGURE 4.7 Muhos ski

FIGURE 4.8 Haapavesi ski

FIGURE 4.9 Ylitorneo ski

FIGURE 4.10 Ii [Ijo] ski

FIGURE 4.11 Forest ski

FIGURE 4.12 Normal skis

FIGURE 5.1 Best material for skis

FIGURE 6.1 Profile of a ski showing camber

FIGURE 6.2 Cross-sections of skis

FIGURE 6.3 Sag of a weak ski

FIGURE 7.1 Method of ski storage

FIGURE 7.2 Methods of bending tips

FIGURE 7.3 Bending camber with steam

FIGURE 8.1 Splicing broken straps

FIGURE 8.2 A selection of ski tools

FIGURE 8.3 Attachable tip for Telemark skis

FIGURE 8.4 Mending skis

FIGURE 8.5 Mending skis

FIGURE 8.6 Mending skis

FIGURE 10.1 Ski poles

FIGURE 10.2 Double poles

FIGURE 11.1 Binding

FIGURE 11.2 The Bollnäs binding

FIGURE 11.3 Military binding

FIGURE 11.4 Cane or wire binding

FIGURE 11.5 The Huitfeldt binding

FIGURE 11.6 Binding with buckle-lever

FIGURE 11.7 The Balata binding

FIGURE 11.8 The Ellefsen binding

FIGURE 11.9 The Sigurd binding

FIGURE 11.10 Ski blades and Norwegian heel straps

FIGURE 11.11 Old Finnish boot

FIGURE 11.12 Räsänen boot

FIGURE 11.13 The Eimeleus golovka

FIGURE 11.14 A sewn-welt boot

FIGURE 12.1 A leather toe-gaiter

FIGURE 12.2 Helmet (Balaklava)

FIGURE 13.1 Foot position on Indian skis

FIGURE 13.2 Intermediate type between racquet and ski

FIGURE 13.3 Basic three-cadence, www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTnDbGoppfk&t=10s.

FIGURE 13.4 Basic two-cadence on the same foot, www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTnDbGoppfk&t=10s.

FIGURE 13.5 Basic two-cadence on alternating feet, www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTnDbGoppfk&t=10s.

FIGURE 13.6 Compound three-cadence, www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTnDbGoppfk&t=10s.

FIGURE 13.7 Two-cadence with a crossover of the right (or left) hand, www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTnDbGoppfk&t=10s

FIGURE 13.8 Thrust of the ski pole forward

FIGURE 13.9 Four-cadence (left or right), www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTnDbGoppfk&t=10s.

FIGURE 14.1 Lapp [Sami] on skis behind a reindeer

FIGURE 14.2 Skijoring

FIGURE 14.3 Ride behind a horse

FIGURE 14.4 Skijoring

FIGURE 15.1 Ski sail

FIGURE 16.1 Turn in place (second method)

FIGURE 16.2 Turn in place (third method)

FIGURE 16.3 Turn in place (third method)

FIGURE 17.1 Climb with scissors

FIGURE 17.2 Gentle uphill with scissors

FIGURE 17.3 Steep uphill with scissors

FIGURE 17.4 Staircase climb

FIGURE 17.5 Forward uphill with staircase

FIGURE 17.6 Staircase climb

FIGURE 17.7 Ski with incisions

FIGURE 17.8 Brakes

FIGURE 18.1 Telemark descent

FIGURE 19.1 Incorrect body position while braking with a pole

FIGURE 19.2 Correct body position for first method of braking with a pole

FIGURE 19.3 Another method of braking with a pole

FIGURE 20.1 Braking with two skis

FIGURE 20.2 Braking with two skis

FIGURE 20.3 First method of braking with one ski (right side)

FIGURE 20.4 First method of braking with one ski (left side)

FIGURE 20.5 Second method of braking with one ski and a turn on the move (right)

FIGURE 20.6 Second method of braking with one ski and a turn on the move (left)

FIGURE 21.1 Christiania turn to the right

FIGURE 21.2 Christiania turn to the right

FIGURE 21.3 Christiania turn to the right

FIGURE 21.4 Telemark turn to the left

FIGURE 21.5 Initiating a Telemark turn to the right

FIGURE 21.6 Finishing a Telemark turn to the right

FIGURE 21.7 Telemark turn to the left

FIGURE 22.1 Hill profile for ski jumping

FIGURE 22.2 Relationship between the jump-platform profile and length of a jump

FIGURE 22.3 Profile of the hills at Livbakken and Feldberg-Hügel

FIGURE 22.4 Apparatus for determining the slope angle of a hill

FIGURE 22.5 Schematic representation of a ski jump

FIGURE 22.6 The moment before takeoff

FIGURE 22.7 Correct position during flight

FIGURE 22.8 The flight

FIGURE 22.9 Incorrect position while in flight

FIGURE 23.1 Ski-running behind a horse in Switzerland

FIGURE 25.1 Norwegian soldier-skiers on the firing line

FIGURE 27.1 Skiers of the Finnish Rifle Battalion in halt formation

FIGURE 27.2 Skiers of the Finnish Rifle Battalion on the march

FIGURE 27.3 Skiers moving in doubled-up platoon files

FIGURE 28.1 The double gorelki game

FIGURE 28.2 The day and night game

FIGURE 29.1 Team run—third method

FIGURE 29.2 Team run—fourth method

FIGURE 31.1 Sled for machine guns of the Austrian Army

FIGURE 31.2 Sled for machine guns and mountain cannons

FIGURE 31.3 Ehrhardt Norwegian artillery sled

FIGURE 31.4 Sled fashioned from skis

FIGURE 31.5 Sled fashioned from skis with portable chair

FIGURE 31.6 Sled on skis

FIGURE 31.7 Small sled with long runners

FIGURE 31.8 Small sled with long runners

FIGURE C.1 Austrian military skiers

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

E. JOHN B. ALLEN

Many people have had a hand in making my contribution to this book possible. Some have sent me articles and photocopied materials, others helped in translation and answered questions. From Austria I have had assistance from Michael Huber; from Estonia Enn Mainla; from Finland Merja Heiskanen, Suvi Kuisma, Irina Lukka, and Colonel Niklas von Bonsdorff; from Norway Matti Goksøyr, Thor Gotaas, and Halvor Kleppen; from Sweden Leif Yttergren; from Switzerland Luzi Hitz; and from the United States Ann Blair, William and Ki Clough, Stephen Hegner, Jeff Leich, and Ingrid Wicken. I am grateful to Kari Ellen Gade for help with Old Icelandic. Plymouth State University’s Joyce Bruce of Inter-Library Loan has, as usual, worked her marvels, and I am grateful for technical computer aid—given with endless patience—by Michael Cousma and the students who work at the university library’s help desk. Special recognition must go to three people who were always a computer click away or at hand: Norwegian American Einar Sunde, whose vast bibliographic expertise and understanding of nineteenth-century Norwegian ski history were so freely given; Fabian Rimfors, whose intimate knowledge of Swedish skiing and culture was always ready with unfailing courtesy and humor to answer any query; and last but not least my wife, Heide, whose eagle editorial eye has caught many an infelicitous phrase along with lazy writing and careless spelling. Happily, she was on that bus ride in Finland when Bill Frank and I first talked about this project … and she has seen it through to the end. To all, so many thanks. Errors that remain are my responsibility.

WILLIAM D. FRANK

From an off-the-cuff conversation with E. John B. Allen on a Finnish night bus in 2017, the work of translating, editing, and annotating this volume has evolved into the most challenging and gratifying project I’ve ever undertaken. This book in its final form would not exist were it not for John’s sustained work and our shared obsession with K. B. E. E. Eimeleus, whose name he first brought to my attention in 2009. His introduction and extensive contributions to the chapter commentaries reflect decades of research and a dedication to the historiography of skiing. With unflagging encouragement (even as I was losing confidence that I could ever possibly complete my translation), John bolstered the effort at every stage with additions to the endnotes, with editorial suggestions, and with his eagerness to read each subsequent chapter. Our collaboration turned out to be its own reward.

I have received editorial help and translation advice from an exceptional group of scholars. My thanks go to Laurie Moshier (Central Washington University) for her many ideas on the art of translation, assistance with French and German, and careful reading of each successive draft; to Dinara Georgioliani (Central Washington University) and Miriam Brown for their opinions on the most difficult passages in Russian; to Fabian Rimfors (Kristianstad University) and Leif Yttergren (Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences) for proofreading and correcting in Swedish, Norwegian, and Finnish; and Nadine Cohodas for her incisive editorial suggestions on the final version. I am indebted as well to the manuscript’s peer reviewers, Annette Hofmann (Pädagogische Hochschule Ludwigsburg) and Bruce Menning (University of Kansas), and to David Glantz (Journal of Slavic Military Studies) for his review of my introduction.

Eimeleus’s extraordinary life and the wide-ranging subject matter detailed in his book required extensive reading and research, much of it outside my limited areas of expertise. This entailed a nearly endless stream of queries and pleas for help to specialists around the world, including Mari Aaltonen (Finnish National Board of Antiquities); Anders Ahlbäck (University of Gothenburg); John Barany (JSB Arts); Michael Biggins (head of the Slavic and East European Section of Suzzallo and Allen Libraries, University of Washington); Rebecca Houze (Northern Illinois University); Suvi Kuisma (Lahti Ski Museum); Jason Lavery (Oklahoma State University); Jouni Lavikainen (Sports Museum of Finland); Harold Leich (Library of Congress); Cecil Longino (Salle Saint-Georges); Frank Lurz (La Spada Nemica); Anita Michalak (Slavisches Seminar Bibliothek, University of Zürich); Janice Pilch (Rutgers University); Douglas Smith; John Styles (University of Hertfordshire and the Victoria and Albert Museum); Paul Thomas (Hoover Institute Library at Stanford University); Pinar Üre (Istanbul Kemerburgaz University); André Wessels (University of the Free State of the Republic of South Africa); the research staff at the New York Public Library; and the Inter-Library Loan staffs of Central Washington University, Reed College, Stanford University, University of Washington, and the Yakima Valley Regional Library.

My thanks to Jeff Leich (New England Ski Museum) and Ingrid Wicken (California Ski Library) for providing me with facsimiles of Eimeleus’s book and for the loan of the originals residing in their collections. Also, special acknowledgment goes to Gordon King (Gordon King Photography) for his assistance in preparing images for publication; to Ed Marquand (Paper Hammer Studios) for advice on cover art; and to Amy Farranto, Nathan Holmes, and the talented team at Northern Illinois University Press.

Finally, there are three people to whom I am most indebted but for whom it is too late to convey expressions of gratitude: William S. Moran, my professor of Latin and Greek at the University of Michigan, who took me under his wing when I was a freshman and instilled the fundamentals of language learning; T. B. L. Webster, whose seminars and directed readings on the Greek dramatists at Stanford University informed my approach to translation; and Betsy Shaw Frank, my partner and wife of thirty-two years who taught me a most profound lesson by her example: that one person’s life—no matter how brief—can make another’s blossom.

INTRODUCTION:

SKIING IN EUROPE PRIOR TO WORLD WAR I

The history of Russian skiing prior to the modern era (up to 1880) was written by and for the aristocracy and the church. Since both were heavily involved in fighting, it is hardly surprising that most of what we know in the pre-modern period has to do with various military endeavors. In winter, the importance of troops on skis was vigorously reported century after century. In the present volume, Skis in the Art of War, K. B. E. E. Eimeleus discusses briefly a dozen actions on skis, and in the recent Everyone to Skis! William Frank cites about twenty occasions when soldiers on skis took to battle, an account covering six centuries from the thirteenth to the eighteenth.¹ Perhaps it was their descendants who harassed Napoleon in his retreat from Moscow in 1812 and made up the four-man groups of okhotniki established for scouting and reconnaissance in 1886.²

Lieutenant Eimeleus’s book shows that he was both heir to those past Russian aristocratic accounts and also very attuned to what was new information and how instructive it could be for the sport and the country. And, indeed, a great deal was new in the thirty years from about 1880 until the time he published his book in 1912. Skiing had come to the fore almost entirely because of Scandinavians (especially Norwegians), well illustrated in Eimeleus’s list of sources, which includes the Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen (1861–1930) and early ski mentor Fritz Huitfeldt (1851–1938); two Swedish pamphlets, one by L. A. Jägerskiöld (1867–1945) and one by P. Möller (1858–1951); and three Finnish books, by forester Hugo Sandberg (1845–1930) and gymnasts Ivar Wilskman (1854–1932) and Viktor Heikel (1842–1927). Although there were already a few books in Russian on skiing as a sport,³ Eimeleus hoped that his work would appeal not only to military skiers but also to civilian outdoorsmen and help promote skiing among the young.

Every general history of skiing in Europe, indeed the world,⁴ starts on the wings of myth and speculation about gods and at least one goddess, evidenced by palaeolithic Ostiak myths of the skier Tunk-Pox and strange rock figures on skis that can be found from northern Scandinavia to Russia. Similar rock images in China provide an unsubstantiated claim to the Altai as the birthplace of skiing, a notion currently stirring a great deal of debate.⁵ Ullr and Skade, folkish Norse kings such as Eyestein, made-up heroes such as the Finns’ Lemminkäinen,⁶ along with tales of derring-do from the Sagas, are all the foundations for modern skiing. We also have the remains of ancient skis, many of them over a thousand years old, found mostly in bogs of northern Scandinavia and Russia.⁷ These furnish support for whatever nationalistic cause required, although no ancient ski remains have been found in the Altai. In the early 1960s the oldest extant ski fragment—with a moose head carved underneath its tip—was unearthed at the Vis 1 site 480 miles east-south-east of Archangel near Lake Sindor. Grigoriy Burov, an archaeologist at the site, interpreted the carving as a symbol of speed while it also had the practical value of acting as a brake. The fragment has been carbon-dated to 8300–7000 BCE.⁸ Already, then, in those ancient times, skiers must have developed what we now so scientifically call technique.

This ski technique was also important in military endeavors. To move twenty men on skis, let alone 120, required knowing how to propel the ski and how to control it to avoid impeding other soldiers. Eimeleus emphasizes understanding how to stride—or even run—on skis within a military unit: it doesn’t suffice just to know how to ski along haphazardly: we must understand this type of training thoroughly and on a level equal to the other branches of the military arts.⁹ It was well known by 1912 that Norwegian units were divided into three rows, each man eight paces from the one in front and three paces from his neighbor to the side.¹⁰

Military and civilian explorers provided another crucial source for the history of Russian skiing as they moved ever eastward past the Urals, on to the endless expanses of what became Siberian Russia, to end in Kamchatka and, eventually, the port of Vladivostok. The military commanders acted in normal imperial fashion, garnering land as they traveled, providing garrisons to secure that land, and exploiting economic possibilities. In their romantic way, civilians were eager to understand the tribes they encountered, those Rousseauian children of nature. Westerners such as botanist Johan Gmelin, specimen collector Peter Pallas, and physician Adolf Erman came from an urbanized and by the late nineteenth century industrialized western Europe, to find out how the natural man in a natural state survived.¹¹ Among the Yenesei Ostiak (Kets), Tungus (Evenki), Samoyed (Nenets), and Ostiak (Khanty), they found what they were looking for and marveled at these peoples’ expertise, strength, and stamina while hunting on skis, the simple skills displayed by men—and women—on two boards of plain wood.

However, the publication of Fridtjof Nansen’s Paa Ski over Grønland (On skis over Greenland) in 1890 proved the watershed moment in modern skiing, evoking Nansen fever among Europe’s well-to-do who enjoyed the great outdoors of God’s natural world. They were in awe of Nansen’s exploits while crossing Greenland with five others, two of whom were Lapps (now called Sami), children of nature, as Nansen described them, but who actually came for the money.¹² Nansen devoted his lengthy third chapter to the ski. Citing a number of historians across an entire millennium, from ancient authors Procopius and Jordanes, on to Saxo Grammaticus of 1200 and Olaus Magnus of the sixteenth century, Nansen laid the foundations for the use of skis for travel and for exploration. Although he shrouded his Greenland crossing in an aura of scientific inquiry (he was, after all, finishing up his doctoral thesis on the central nervous system), he merely wanted to get away from his microscope for a ski trip. Various funding agencies such as the university and the government would have nothing to do with him, and it was only at the last moment that Augustin Gamel, a Danish coffee merchant, provided about half the cost of the expedition.

But when Nansen returned, he became this proud Viking.¹³ Since skis and skiing had played the major role in his conquest of Greenland, a factor he emphasized throughout the tale he told, skiing quite suddenly came into a wintertime vogue. But Nansen’s skiing was not just skiing: it was ski-idræt. I know no form of sport which so evenly develops the muscles, which renders the body so strong and elastic, which teaches so well the qualities of dexterity and resource, which in an equal degree calls for decision and resolution, and which gives the same vigor and exhilaration to mind and body alike. Here is idræt for the individual, but Nansen goes on in the same passage to conclude that there is something in the whole which develops soul and not body alone, and the sport is perhaps of far greater national importance than is generally supposed.¹⁴ Nansen’s translator used the English word sport for the Norwegian concept of idræt.¹⁵ In the nineteenth century, idræt became associated with activities in the outdoors that the ancestors had enjoyed. The bookish leaders of the romantic ideal in Norway felt it would turn their compatriots into better people spiritually, morally, and physically. These men, clean in body and mind, would then be bound to affect their wives and children, kith, kin, village, region, and even nation as Nansen had posited. This tie to a national Norway played well to the educated leadership and, in fact, to most Norwegians; even the illiterate knew of Trysil Knud¹⁶ and in 1863 could rhyme along with Andreas Aabel’s poem East of the Border (Der øst ved grensefjeldets side):

Although Knud came from Østerdal, the call was for Norway’s freedom, destined to be gained through skiing and war. This conflation of skiing with militant nationalism was palpable all over the skiing world. Britain’s ambassador to Sweden, for example, described skiing at the Nordiska Spelen (Nordic Games) as all mixed up in the fighting business.¹⁷ And Norway sought to be free from Swedish control; it took another one of Nansen’s trips, this time an attempt to reach the North Pole, to achieve this. It was clear that the Swedes could do nothing to denigrate Nansen’s accomplishment, and in 1905, independence was achieved without war, thanks to accommodations on both sides by Norwegian prime minister Christian Michelsen and Oscar II of Sweden. England—as self-appointed world adjudicator—could only lionize Nansen when he came to the court of St. James as the first Norwegian ambassador. Meanwhile imperial Russia had feted this tall, lithe Norseman in his explorer’s outfit and hat in the twilight of Romanov rule, before Rasputin ever whispered in the ear of the tsarina and revolutionary sentiment was just beginning to stir among the proletariat.¹⁸

This formed the context for skiing in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, often portrayed as the long century of peace—bookended by the two global wars of Napoleon and the Great War (later to become World War I). But one should factor in the political changes wrought by wars in the Crimea, the American Civil War, the Prussian-Austrian War, the Franco-Prussian War, the many conflagrations under the title of Victoria’s little wars, the Russo-Japanese War as well as the revolutions in France in 1830, 1848, and 1871, in the German states in 1848, and the Russian revolution of 1905, precursor to Lenin’s Bolshevik takeover. By the time Eimeleus was learning the military trade, troops no longer went into winter quarters to await spring offensives. Winter war, now, was a real possibility, and Eimeleus felt the need to prepare the tsarist army; after all, it had not performed well against the Japanese. Fitness in freezing temperatures was something that all armies had to worry about since the time Hannibal had lost some twenty thousand of his men and not a few elephants to frost.¹⁹ Eimeleus clearly realized that the health of the troops was vital, and he also had much Scandinavian military expertise to draw upon. When he looked at the rest of Europe’s military on skis, he found examples in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in Germany, France, Italy, and Switzerland. Even the British contemplated controlling recalcitrant tribes in the Hindu Kush along the Indian–Afghan border by equipping troops with skis. Eimeleus thought that Belgium, Luxembourg, and Holland had ski units as well, but who knows where he found that information? He also included Spain in the list, but there is no evidence that any unit was formed.²⁰

Eimeleus chose to emulate Scandinavian military know-how, as did all the other countries. This may not, in fact, have been the best course to follow since Norwegians, Swedes, and Finns were brought up on skis and, therefore, did not have to be taught how to use them. Nonetheless, the Russians had one advantage over the non-Scandinavian ski troops of Europe: they could always rely on their Finnish duchy for experienced ski men, and Eimeleus, born and raised in Finland, is one very good example. After the Russian debacle in the war with Japan, ski instruction for increasing numbers of recruits was vital. Of thirty-one sections of Eimeleus’s book, fourteen are devoted to instruction.

There were other considerations. In Scandinavian units, the relationship between officers and men was not strictly defined. In central European countries there were differences of class, something only the world war would shake up. What right-minded Junker would want to bivouac with some peasant lad from the Allgäu, what monarchist French officer would want to share the bad food of the poilu on skis? Certainly no officer from the Nicholas Officers Academy or the Main Gymnastics-Fencing School in St. Petersburg would want to forsake his sword and spurs, parades, and soirées for the bodily odors of too many men who may have been infected by the spreading socialist call, sleeping in too small tents?²¹ But ski troops had to be raised and trained.

Trained for what? Certainly not defense. Military doctrine before the war considered only offense: the infantry would break the line and then the cavalry would dash through to victory. This élan vital was based on the belief that the spirit of the individual soldier was of far greater importance than mere weapons²²—hence the continued use of the sword in a world of machine guns. In winter, troops would maneuver through impossible conditions, hold the heights of mountain chains, and then sweep down the other side driving the enemy to oblivion. It was necessary, then, to have fit troops prepared, like the Norwegians, to make long marches in the snow on the flats, over the foothills, and beyond to reach the heights. In Europe, ski troops were measured by length of march accomplished and altitude achieved. The French were particularly enthused about training marches accomplished in the environs of Briançon, the garrison town of the Quinze-Neuf, the well-known 159th Alpine Infantry Regiment. Captain Clerc, the major influence in the development of skiing sections of mountain troops, publicized how the ski was more efficient than the snowshoe. Commandant Bernard was proud of the 80-kilometer trek with 1,800-meter altitude difference in twenty hours with men equipped for combat.²³ Norwegian officers were seconded to the Régiment de la Neige (Snow Regiment), not so much to instruct as to inspire the men.²⁴

In Russia, after Nansen’s Greenland crossing, there was excitement for skiing as a sport, albeit one only for the wealthy. The first ski club in Russia had been started in 1889 by ex-pat Englishmen in the Toksovo hills, twenty kilometers from St. Petersburg.²⁵ The Russian Poliarnaia zvezda (Polar Star) club built their first ski jump there in 1906, site of the Russian ski-jumping championship six years later.²⁶ This skiing as sport, involving meticulous organization and particularly competition rules and records, was anathema to Nansen, so imbued with the ski-idræt ideal. Armies, in these times, did not promote individual endeavor but group action, so the general staffs were wary of the interest shown in the sport of skiing. Eimeleus realized that an activity like ski jumping (certainly of no use whatsoever in any military capacity) would, however, cultivate individual qualities of courage, bravery, valor, composure, agility, and determination, so he listed record leaps²⁷ and endorsed competition prizes, long an established practice in Norway. In Grüner’s regulations of 1765, prizes were awarded according to the military value of the event: Slalåm (slalom: turning around obstacles on a descent) and Hopplåm (hoplaam: a downhill run with jumps) rank in the middle at 10 Riksdaler (Rdr). Cross-country, obviously the easiest, received 2 to 4 Rdr. Shooting on the run was the most difficult at 20 Rdr. Considering that a horse at the time was worth about 10 Rdr and a milking cow about 5 Rdr, these were no mean prizes.²⁸

In Siberia, the indigenous peoples had made practical skis: shorter ones for going into the woods, longer ones for distance travel. Most of these skis had the skins of elk, deer, bear, horse, even otter affixed to the underside.²⁹ Toward the end of the nineteenth century, more sophisticated skis began to appear in a number of Norwegian valleys and in Finland too. Simen Rustad (1858–1925) began factory production at Fåberg, near Lillehammer, Norway, in 1882.³⁰ Scandinavian, and particularly Finnish, equipment was near at hand. There was an assortment of locally made skis from which to choose and whose reputation rested on the success of the local ski-runners in competitions. It was not merely because Eimeleus had Finnish roots that he made special reference to Finnish skis; it was that Finnish skis from ca. 1880 suited the Russian terrain and snow conditions better than the skis from Norway’s Telemark hill country or the valleys of Gudbrandsdal. If organized skiing began in Trondheim (far from Christiania) and specialized downhill skiing began in Telemark, Finland’s center of skiing for some twenty years was at Oulu, six hundred kilometers north of Helsinki almost at the head of the Gulf of Bothnia. And from that region came the famous racing names of Luomajoki and Ritola, competing on locally made skis, of which the most successful were those from Haapavesi.³¹ This happened in the late nineteenth century, just at the time of assembling a national folk culture, a core element of which was Oulu/Haapavesi skiing.³² Eimeleus describes with care a number of the best-known skis, but always with an eye to their military use: hardiness and the ability to be handled in differing snow conditions and over a variety of terrain. He mentions countries like France whose Chasseurs Alpins had their own ski factory, obviously hoping that Russian authorities would follow suit.

Once on skis, the Finnish pieksu, the boot with the upturned knob at the front, was the preferred footgear. It enabled the skiing soldier to get in and out of his skis quickly while also providing some sort of control. This control was aided by the general acceptance of Fritz Huitfeldt’s binding—much appreciated by Eimeleus—one that also held the ankle somewhat firmly. The single pole was usual in the years up to 1900, and in some areas up to 1914, but not in Finland where the flat terrain—comprising forests interspersed with lakes—favored the use of two poles. In military matters elsewhere, one pole was preferred, because this left the other arm and hand ready for rifle use and, if the occasion presented itself, for using the pole as a steadying post while firing.

Snow conditions were always changing, therefore some of the skis’ running surfaces fashioned from one certain type of wood might have advantages on a particular day but not on the next. One solution was to strap on the centuries-old skins. Alternatively, a person could rub concoctions (now called wax) on the underside of the skis, such as the ones Eimeleus mentions, Bercolin and Skiolin. Just after his book was published, Norwegian Peter Østbye secured the first patent in 1913 for the famous Klister wax.³³

Eimeleus, then, was writing his book knowing full well that traditional ski culture would have great effect on what he was proposing. With personal knowledge of skiing developments in Scandinavia and a reading knowledge of skiing elsewhere, Eimeleus suggests a standardization where none had existed before. It was clear in 1912 that the Russian Empire might have to fight on snow for its future. He outlines the why and how of skiing, relying on his own Finnish background for much of his extremely detailed analysis. Although not averse at all regarding Norwegian and Swedish sources, most of all he recounts stories of Finns and their ski successes, on their own skis, using their own poles (in the plural). His analysis of required clothing and his knowledge of frost and weather, in general, show keen attention. This sort of information would be virtually unnecessary for Norwegians and Swedes and other Finns, but for prospective Russian ski units it was vital. And he keeps right up-to-date with praise for the thermos, very recently on the market. Eimeleus’s modernism—now over one hundred years old—combines thoughts and ideas from traditional Finnish skiing as well as innovations from Scandinavia, such as wax and Fritz Huitfeldt’s bindings. He transferred this knowledge, both practical and theoretical, to recruits and officers in the tsarist army in the years just prior to the Great War. His analysis is of interest in two significant ways: he was the first to incorporate word and photograph into the description of movement on skis, and his book was the first major work on the development of skiing in Russia, one that was geared to the military but also, he hoped, useful to civilian outdoorsmen. For readers today, unfortunately, he has nothing to say about women’s skiing. But this should come as no surprise since this was a military ski manual published in an overtly male-dominated era.³⁴

Jim Riordan’s Sport in Soviet Society, published in 1977, contained a limited analysis of skiing.³⁵ Very little since then had been written in English or other western European languages on the history of Russian skiing until William Frank’s specialized work on Russian biathlon came out in 2013, the first to use Eimeleus as a source. And therein lies the root of our collaboration. Some fifteen years ago, I was thumbing through copies of La Montagne, the official journal of the Club Alpin Français, when I came across this listing in the bibliographic section of the March 1913 issue: Lt. Eimelejous—Le Ski dans l’œuvre militaire (en russe): édition rédigée par le cap. Th. GOSTEW; Saint-Pétersbourg, 1912. At the time, I was gathering material for a cultural history of skiing as well as building the library of the New England Ski Museum, so I was extremely interested in finding a copy. I approached the Library of Congress, Harvard University, and specialized Russian collections: there was not a single copy in the United States. Then I met William Frank at a conference in Mammoth, California, in 2009: his recollection of that meeting is that my very first question to him was whether he had knowledge of Eimeleus. He hadn’t, but I did pique his interest, and—a few years later—we located a copy on an Ebay site in St. Petersburg, Russia. We bought it for the museum, and William was able to use it for his dissertation and subsequent book, Everyone to Skis!

Fast forward to a bus ride to Lahti, Finland, in late February 2017 when both of us were presenting papers at a ski conference at the University of Jyväskylä. William was entertaining the idea of translating Eimeleus and asked if I would consider writing some annotations to the complete text. This time it was he who piqued my interest, and we began working together on the project in the spring of 2017. Then came a jolt that pulls academics up excitingly short. Through an obscure footnote to an even more obscure Russian journal, William discovered