Trademark: National Ski Patrol Logo

First Used: 1938

First Registered: 1961

Current Owner: NATIONAL SKI PATROL SYSTEM, INC. (N.Y. CORP.) [1]

Trademark Type: collective mark; word mark; design mark

Primarily Associated With: indicating membership in an association of individuals designed for the purpose of promoting greater safety and thus greater enjoyment in the sport of skiing [2]

Brief (and likely incomplete) History [3]:

The NATIONAL SKI PATROL® [4] (NSP) was founded in 1938 by Charles Minot “Minnie” Dole following two tragic skiing accidents in Stowe, Vermont. In January 1936, Dole broke his ankle while skiing on Mount Mansfield, where the absence of adequate rescue equipment forced his companions, including close friend Frank Edson, to improvise a rescue using a piece of roofing tin. Just two months later, Edson died from injuries sustained during a ski race. The two incidents convinced Dole that the increasingly popular sport needed an organized system for providing first aid and emergency rescue services to injured skiers.

Although local ski patrols had existed since at least 1934, Dole sought to establish a nationwide organization with standardized training and rescue procedures. In March 1938, he organized a volunteer ski patrol for the national downhill and slalom championships at Stowe, impressing Roger Langley, president of the National Ski Association, who encouraged Dole to expand the program nationwide. Later that year, the National Ski Patrol was formally established as a committee of the National Ski Association, with Dole serving as its first national director. Working with local ski clubs and the American Red Cross, Dole developed standardized first aid and rescue training programs and adopted the organization's longstanding motto, “Service and Safety.”

During World War II, Dole helped establish the U.S. Army's famed 10th Mountain Division, a specialized military unit trained for combat in mountainous terrain. The NSP played a significant role in recruiting and screening candidates for the division, whose returning veterans later helped establish and develop more than 60 American ski resorts. By the time Dole retired in 1950, the NSP had grown to approximately 4,000 members across 300 ski patrols. In 1960, a team of 51 volunteer patrollers provided rescue services during the Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley, California, marking the first time an entirely volunteer ski patrol had handled the Games. Congress granted the NSP a federal charter in 1980 in recognition of its contributions to skiing safety and emergency rescue. Today, the organization has more than 30,000 members serving over 650 patrols throughout the United States and internationally, providing training and emergency services for skiing, snowboarding, and other outdoor activities.

Two of the National Ski Patrol's earliest logos date back to the organization's founding in 1938, when Minnie Dole established two classifications of patrollers: national and local. Nationally appointed patrollers, who were recognized for their leadership, skiing, and first aid skills, wore the National Ski Patrol Logo [5], featuring a distinctive six-pointed star formed by two overlapping triangles. Local patrollers, who served at individual mountains, wore a traditional gold cross, represented by the National Ski Patrol Cross Logo [6]. Both logos are registered as collective membership marks (remember, unlike your typical trade marks and service marks, which identify the source of goods or services, collective membership marks identify membership in a particular organization). In fact, the National Ski Patrol Logo was first registered with the USPTO in 1961, making it one of the oldest still-active collective membership mark registrations in the United States!

In addition to its original logos, the NSP owns registrations for U.S. SKI PATROL® [7] (a special administrative patrol for members whose national leadership responsibilities prevent them from serving at an individual ski area), as well as several variations of its logos, including the National Ski Patrol Circle Logo design mark [8] and National Ski Patrol Shield Logo design mark [9].