Sverre Engen (1911-2001) was a Norwegian-American skier, ski coach, and film maker.

Sverre Engen was born in Mjøndalen, Norway to famous skier Trond Sorli Engen and thus grew up skiing his whole life. In 1918, his father, Trond, died of the Spanish Flu, causing Sverre and his family to move. When Sverre was 18, he immigrated to the United States, first to Chicago then to Salt Lake City, Utah. There he continued to ski, becoming national ski jump champion, ski resort operator, and a pioneer of ski patrol work. He was the first snow ranger in America.

Because of his extensive work and success coaching ski teams and producing ski-related films, the sport was greatly popularized in Utah and Idaho during his life. For all these contributions, he was inducted into the U.S. National Ski Hall of Fame in 1971. At the age of 90, in 2001, Sverre died in Sandy, Utah.

Alta Ski Area (1939) is a ski area in the Western United States, located in Alta, Utah.

Alta Ski Area is one of the oldest ski areas in the United States. In 1935, the U.S. Forest Service had notable skier Alf Engen scout out the upper part of Little Cottonwood Canyon, where the near-abandoned mining community of Alta was located, to determine its potential for a new skiing area. Having found favorable conditions, Alta was started in 1939 with one chairlift.

Since its beginning, the area has grown to include several hundred more acres of skiable land, as well as several chairlifts providing greater access to the slopes. Today, Alta Ski Area is known for its abundant snowfall and for being one of only three ski areas in the country to completely prohibit snowboarding.