Life at Fort Snelling included extensive recreation as well as work, with athletic fields and facilities that helped earn it the nickname "the country club of the Army." Soldiers played on sports teams in baseball, hockey, football, and basketball, and the fort also hosted volleyball, curling, track and field events, and shooting competitions. Troops staged sham battles for the public and demonstrated trench mortars, howitzers, and other weapons. Skiing and snowshoeing were popular in winter and also trained troops to move through snowy terrain; the Third Infantry became known as the Alpine Chasseurs of the U.S. Army, and films of their winter sporting events were used as training videos nationwide. In their free time, soldiers often played cards in the barracks' day room, and each barracks also had pool tables, pianos, and writing desks. The Officers' Clubhouse was the center of social life at the fort, especially for the women who lived there, as officers' wives hosted dances, card games, and dinner parties and clubs met regularly. In the 1920s the Army built a pool at the fort, with soldiers digging the hole and moving in a building from another part of the fort for a bathhouse. Polo drew both players and spectators, with officers holding annual tournaments that sometimes included international teams. One of the fort's biggest attractions was Whiskey, "the smartest horse in the Army," trained by Captain William Hazelrigg to play dead, bow, and leap over flaming hurdles.
