“If God had wanted Texans to ski, He would have given them mountains”

“If God had wanted Texans to ski, He would have given them mountains” is an anti-Texas bumper sticker that appeared in New Mexico and in Colorado in the 1970s. Actually, it was Texas money that helped to make many of the ski slopes (Vail, Colorado in particular)  the money-makers they later became. The phrase is sometimes altered into a more profane form.
 
 
Google Books
Head in the Clouds, Feet on the Ground:
Serials Vision and Common Sense
by Jeffrey Bullington
New York: The Haworth Press, Inc.
1999
Pg. 80:
Colorado has gone through the whole series of bumper stickers: “If God meant Texans to ski, he’d have made bullshit white.” Really wonderful things like that.
 
Google Books
Children and Fools: A Twisted Tale of the Vienna Woods
by Terry Mirll
Oakland, Oregon: Elderberry Press
2002
Pg. 26:
“I think it’s because people from New Mexico think Texans treat every place they visit like they own it.” I laughed. I knew she was joking, but I also knew that she wasn’t far off fro mthe truth. I guess we Texans do tend to look at the rest of the world as a suburb of the Lone Star State. Just for example, a greeting card company in New Mexico, apparently aggravated by the factthat every ski season New Mexico is deluged with Texans looking for any slope—steep or otherwise—to ski on, one printed a pile of bumper-stickers which read: “If God had intended for Texans to ski, he would have given them mountains.” A novelty shop in Texas responded with an issue of bumper stickers reading “Sure, God meant for Texans to ski. He gave them New Mexico.” ‘Nuff said.
   
28 February 1975, Daily Tribune (Wisconsin Rapids, WI), pg. 8:
New Mexico fights back with pointed bumper stickers, such as:
If God had wanted Texans to ski, He would have given them a mountain!
 
23 November 1976, Greeley (CO) Daily Tribune, pg. 7:
Mitchell told the Greeley Kiwanis Club last week, “Some people wish the skiers didn’t spend all of that time and money to come to Colorado—there are bumper stickers reading ‘If God had wanted Texans to ski, He would’ve given them mountains.’”
 
22 February 1980, Washington Post, Weekend section, pg. 36:
Often they ski in cowboy hats and smile indulgently when you repeat the bumper sticker saying that “If God wanted Texans to ski, He would have given them mountains.”
 
Vail, one Texan tells me, is known as the Dallas Alps, since it was developed largely by Dallas money in the early ‘60s.
 
“If God had wanted us to ski, he would have given us money—and he did,” he adds, and he’s right.
 
22 March 1984, Washington Post, pg. MD10:
Gelman, who relished the spoken—and extemporaneous—word, teased several Texans in the audience about the Lone Star State. Gelman, raised in Colorado, joked that if God had wanted Texans to ski (as they do in Colorado), He would have colored certain barnyards offal white.