WELD — “Down-Mountain and Cross-Country: 140 Years of Skiing in Maine,” the Ski Museum of Maine’s new digital slide show will be presented at 7 p.m. Friday, Aug. 21, in the Weld Town Hall.

Maine’s skiing history goes back farther than any other New England state. A Mainer wrote America’s first book on skiing. A Maine company built the world’s tallest ski jump and the first chairlift in the East. Two Maine manufacturers were leading producers of skis in the mid-20th century. Two dozen Maine skiers have competed or coached at the Olympics. Maine has hosted five ski, snowboard and biathlon competitions at the World Championship and World Cup level. A Mainer won the first-ever Olympic gold medal in Snowboard Cross.

The show will be presented at the Webb Lake Association’s annual meeting. A brief business meeting will precede the presentation at 6 p.m. Refreshments will be served. The public is invited.

More than 125 photos ? some more than a century old ? have been assembled from the Farmington-based museum’s collections and more than 40 other sources, including Sugarloaf Mountain Ski Club, Saddleback Mountain and Titcomb Mountain.

One drawing will depict a proposal to develop a major ski area on Mt. Blue in the early 1950s. It was never built, but the image provides a glimpse into the state of the ski industry nearly 60 years ago.

The narrator will be Scott Andrews, a Portland-based ski journalist and museum director who assembled the photos and performed much of the research.

“Skiing has been part of the Maine way of life since the late 1800s, offering recreation and competition to both residents and visitors,” said Andrews. “Our museum’s objective is to feed the passion of Maine skiers and to illustrate the significance of our sport to our state’s lifestyle and economy.”

“Down-Mountain and Cross-Country: 140 Years of Skiing in Maine” is sponsored by the Maine Community Foundation, the Ski Maine Association and the Sugarloaf Mountain Ski Club.