Histoire / Patrimoine

Montgenèvre was created more than 100 years ago !

The resort of Montgenèvre dates from 1907, and has seen 100 years of high society and sports events, 100 years of friendship and stories and 100 years of development all of which will be celebrated with pride this year.

Looking at the village today, its frontage onto the slopes, the halfpipe, the dancing ski lifts and the colourful spectacle of skiers on the mountain, who would guess that Montgenèvre is celebrating its 100th birthday this year? It's a very respectable age, and one that the grand old lady wears proudly, but
there's no doubt that the dynamic boost delivered by last year's Winter Olympics has rejuvenated the resort.

At the same time, it's not hard to recall the old days when chic Parisian society flocked here to see and be seen on these terraces.

It was in 1895 that skiing first arrived in the village, when two Norwegian officers gave a demonstration of skiing here and went on to train the French military in the technique.

In 1903, the war ministry set up the first ski school in Briançon, which had trained some 5,000 military skiers by 1914. The regiment also helped to spread skiing amongst mountain communities by distributing skis free of charge to villagers in the high altitude valleys. Many military skiers then found themselves becoming volunteer instructors. In those days, you used a stick for balance, and to stop you simply fell over an empirical technique that lives on as the Briançon Stop.

It's therefore fair to say that today's skiing industry began right here in this region.

Montgenèvre, the society destination

The birth of the resort was marked by the village's organisation of the first international competition.

The resort hosted its first ski jumping competition between 9 and 13 February 1907, at the initiative of the Club Alpin Français (CAF), the Touring Club de France and the French army.

Some 3,000 spectators, including official delegations
from Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden and Norway, invaded the resort to cheer on the champions.

Norwegian Durban Hansen won the ski jumping event with a jump of over 26 metres.
And so Montgenèvre became the first French skiing centre to adopt the status of a resort.

The inter-war years brought a constant stream of France's elite to the resort, where the aristocracy and those living on private means rubbed shoulders with the leisured classes.

The installation of a ski-lift at Prarial in 1936 accelerated interest in skiing generally, and encouraged more people to try it. Gradually, the sport became a social must, to the point where, in the 30s and 40s, Montgenèvre was the place to
be seen for the Paris jet set. M. Moyses, then owner of the famous Parisian cabaret Le Boeuf sur le toit, took over the Grand Hôtel, bringing with him a galaxy of stars and famous writers. During this golden age, it would not have been unusual to bump into Cocteau, Gabin, Colette, Paul Emile Victor or Mistinguett in the resort.