1975- SKI Magazine 1st Place Environmental Award. Butternut was designated as an "ENVIRONMENTAL SHOWCASE" for the industry. Winning the coveted environmental award for Excellence in Overall Development and Design for keeping the entire area in harmony with the environment. The award was given to Channing Murdock by Ed Hughes of SKI Magazine. Butternut is cited as displaying excellence in its examples of sensitive environmental planning of its ski area. Butternut found itself in great company beating out Vail, Sun Valley, Copper Mountain and Snowbird who all received recognition for special phases of their designs. This honor was judged by a panel of well known architects, planners and forest managers.
The areas well-designed trails were carefully cut and are maintained with a clean, trim look. Through a vigorous re-grassing program erosion has been stopped. There has been major emphasis on replantin, using trees to tie in area buildings with the landscape and to break up the look of structural steel. Tasteful architecture of the base lodge and lift terminals blends wholesomely with the natural surroundings. The unloading ramp on the beginners chairlift is walled with stone, becoming part of the landscape. Butternut’s beauty is most apparent in the non-winter months, a period when ski areas typically unmask their scars. As one of SKI’s judges put it. “Snow has a tendency to cover up a hell of a lot of mistakes.”   

1975 - Chair #3 Overbrook Triple Chairlift Installed. Serving slopes with over a 750 foot vertical drop and stretching 3500 feet in length. The new triple chairlift can carry 1800 people per hour. The Thiokal Triple Chair (known as the Rolls Royce of lifts at the time) opened to the public in Dec. A Sikorsky helicopter lifted the 40 foot 5000lb towers into position where the Butternut crew quickly bolted the towers into poured concrete bases. The Thiokol chairlift cost $185,000 to purchase, total construction costs including earth clearing, engineering, electrical and hill prep exceeded $400,000.

1976 - Five new state-of-the-art Headco Snow Cannons were added to the snowmaking arsenal along with new grooming equipment.

1977 - Chair #5 Scooter Double Chairlift Installed
SKIwee program introduced by SKI Magazine and Ski Butternut was one of the first areas to adopt it. At Butternut pizzas are for going - not eating. The pizza shape was the image that instructors wanted young students to visualize. They asked them to form a pizza shape with their skis instead of asking for a basic wedge shape that is much less visual to youngsters.

1978 - Big February snow storm.
April - 1st year of the LMS (Lift Maintentance Seminar). Where industry GM's and their important lift service mechanics join together with the NSAA, The MA Tramway Authority and MA Ski Areas Association to "enhance safety through shared knowledge." Members will attend seminars on such significant issues as proper design and maintence of lifts, lift construction and repair techniques. Select session will cover many topics on things as minute as choosing the right: nuts & bolts, splicing and caring for wire ropes, concrete, bearings, lubrication and welding techniques. The LMS was the braintrust of both David Kenney (Code Enforcement Officer for the MA Recreational Tramway Board) and Channing Murdock (Butternut's owner and President of NSAA).

1979 - Award Winning Upper Lodge is finished offering spectacular views of the entire ski area.. The Lodge was designed by NY Architect Lo-Yi Chan of Prentice, Chan & Ohlhausen and features passive solar heating. Chan was a frequent skier at the mountain.