Antique Snowmobile Club Of America Rolls Into Thief River Falls

The Antique Snowmobile Club of America was founded in 1976 in part to preserve the heritage of all brands of snowmobiles produced 1968 and earlier. They gather every summer (and winter) in various locations throughout the snowbelt to conduct official club business and to share their snowmobiles and enthusiasm with others. This was their 49th annual summer meet gathering, and they chose to hold it in the hometown of Arctic Cat, Thief River Falls Minnesota. The Peder Engelstad Pioneer Village was the perfect setting for this, and the weather could not have been better for the two-day event.

Larry B from Michigan (L), and one of the event coordinators Wyatt Anderson (R). Wyatt is from Thief River Falls and has his own impressive collection of historic and interesting Arctic Cats. Here they were discussing the previous winter’s 100-mile rear-engine snowmobile ride that is held in conjunction with the Top of the Lake Snowmobile Museum in Naubinway, Michigan.

These 3 guys have close to 100 years of combined history working at Arctic Cat! L-R: Greg Harris, Kenny Halvorson and Dick Krogstad.

Cole Larson of Chatham Michigan, discussing a 1963 Arctic Cat with none other than Roger Skime. Roger continues to be incredibly gracious sharing his Arctic Cat passion with all.

When you are at a snowmobile event in northwest Minnesota, you are likely to see Randy Adamson (R), a former Arctic Enterprises employee and long-time owner of RV Sports. Here, he and Tom Rowland (L) are shown sharing some stories.

This group likes to have fun, like comparing top speeds of a early-1960s Polaris Trail Tractor, and a 1966 Arctic Cat Cub 2×2.

Long-time ArcticInsider readers might recall the 2018 acquisition of Arctic Cat’s first-ever forklift, hand-built by Roger Skime and a few others back in 1963. The Thomas Sno Sports crew has this running like a top again and Tom brought it up for the antique display. Pictured on it is long-time Arctic Cat employee Dave Beito whom says he operated this countless times while Arctic Cat was operating out of the old “river plant”. He immediately recalled that this was always called “Yogi”, and he has no idea why.

Tom Rowland, Wyatt Anderson, and Cole Larson couldn’t resist the opportunity to drive the old forklift and the 1963 Model 1000 4×4 over to the old river plant where each of these was built, and where the forklift performed all kinds of tasks during much of the 1960s.

This year’s club raffle fundraiser was a perfectly restored Polaris Lil Andy snowmobile. Present here for the drawing is original Lil Andy designer Andy Wells (second from L), and ASCOA president Tony Rolfes of Brainerd, Minnesota (far right). I’m sorry I didn’t get the other two gentlemen’s names; they were instrumental in the success of the fundraiser.

The entire ASCOA group was invited to the Arctic Cat plant for a tour of the facility, it was very well attended.

It never gets old seeing one of the earliest Arctic Cats displayed in the same lobby as some of their newest offerings. Even though public tours are not being offered at this time (is normal when production is not active), get this on your to-do list when they are offered again.

These lines were silent the day we visited, believe me, there is an absolute groundswell of people getting all of the pieces in place to flip the switch and start rolling new Arctic Cats out of this time-honored factory again! And, our inside sources tell us that at least some major unit production may be underway here sooner than some might think.

The ASCOA group. I didn’t count how many different states and provinces are represented by this group, it is many.

When in Thief River for the weekend, why not cruise around with our buddy John Anderson in his latest project: 1978 440 Dodge Truck!