Heady days recreated

Press, 16 April 1985, Page 13

Heady days recreated

Television Two’s Tuesday documentary at 8.30 p.m. takes an historical look at the Cresta Run, the famous toboggan course in St Moritz, Switzerland. Made to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the St Moritz Toboggan Club, which was started by the British in 1885, the programme features rare archive footage recreating the atmosphere of the St Moritz resort in its heyday in the 1920 s and 19305. There are interviews with some of the international socialites from those heady days and with the tobogganists themselves who risked life and limb on the run. The documentary also includes highlights from the 1984 grand national, a competition held annually for 100 years.

In the middle of last century, St Moritz was an unknown village, although a peaceful and prosperous one. In 1865, however, Edward Whymper, a British climber successfully conquered the Matterhorn. His feat made him a national hero and the publicity surrounding his climb prompted a wave of well-to-do British tourists to seek the clean and healthy mountain air of Switzerland. In its early days the resort of St Moritz was not the exclusive preserve of the super rich. It was difficult to get to, Switzerland was relatively inexpensive, and a whole family could spend the whole season there for a few hundred Swiss Francs. All that changed by the turn of the century. A spec-

tacular railway affording breathtaking views opened up the resort and by the 1930 s St Moritz was the chic and most glamorous resort in Europe. Hollywood discovered St Moritz in the 1930 s and stars like Douglas Fairbanks, Harold Lloyd, and Charlie Chaplin were regular visitors, landing in their private planes on the frozen lake in front of the Palace Hotel. St Moritz has not changed since those days, and diamonds and furs, champagne and caviar are still very much the order of today. In the 1930 s the kitchens of the Palace Hotel boasted, and still do, that they can prepare a seven course dinner at any time of the day or night.