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Reports from Committees... News from RMC Camps All went well this past winter and spring up at the RMC Camps. We had about the normal number of guests -- some new, and many returnees. The camps remain beloved to those who love to trek our Randolph trails and enjoy the shelter and comraderie of our camps. Winter caretakers Sally Manikian and Mike Street traded off weeks up at Gray Knob, and during their off weeks enjoyed living at the new Stearns Lodge. Electricity and a shower -- not to mention heat -- are a luxury after a week up high! In March our spring caretaker Julianne Hudson took over for Mike and has enjoyed a beautiful spring. Since Sally finished up in April, Curtis Moore, our summer 2008 Trails/Camps Supervisor, has taken the alternate weeks till June when our summer caretakers start. So, plan to visit this summer. A set of twin sisters from the Adirondacks, Alexandra and Elizabeth Disney, will be caretaking. Don't be surprised -- you will indeed be seeing double!
As the summer field season begins on RMC's paths, the club finds its management of trails continuing to evolve. Most notably, we are settling into a comfortable routine with Stearns Lodge. RMC's home in the valley is already showing its value, in ways both anticipated and not. Our work trips now often include a post-trip barbeque at the Lodge-a nice after-work addition that will allow time for socializing with volunteers and trail crew members. Meanwhile, on the hiring front, several applicants remarked on the impressive lodge they saw on the RMC web site-one small piece that enables RMC to hire the best applicants we can find. Already, Stearns stands as an enduring tribute to RMC members' caring for our paths.
This summer, please mark the mid-summer RMC trails potluck dinner on your calendar. The potluck, which in past years has reached thirty to forty RMC friends, is always a fun evening. This year, it will be Friday night, July 11 at 6 pm, at Stearns Lodge. Jot the date down, meet the crew and others, and join us if you can! If you're interested in following the progress of the trail crew this season, we're adding something new to the RMC web site this year: a photo web log, or blog, that will be updated weekly. Featuring photos of trail work, along with descriptions of the work and occasional essays, the blog will be managed by new crew member Benzo Harris, son of RMC 1952 trail crew member Chris Harris. For trails projects, this summer will find our eight-member trail crew out and about on a variety of endeavors. Leading the crew this year will be RMC Field Supervisor Curtis Moore. Fresh off a stint working as a carpenter's helper at the South Pole, Curtis has had variety of backcountry experiences, including three years on RMC's trail crew, seasons spent under the leadership of former RMC President Mike Pelchat as a Ranger on Mount Washington, and time spent leading crews for the Student Conservation Association. The trail crew season will begin the first week of June with three days of orientation. What's involved in a trail crew orientation? Topics include work standards, safety policies, wilderness first aid training, risk management, tool repair and maintenance, Leave No Trace guidelines, Forest Service rules and regulations-even a primer on forest fires from RMC's Bill Arnold. Five members will complete an additional three-day, Forest Service chainsaw class. This thorough program is now required for RMC trail crew members who operate a chainsaw on the White Mountain National Forest, and turns RMC crew members into knowledgeable, safe sawyers. On the work front, the crew will start the season by spending two weeks clearing blowdowns and cleaning drainages on our paths. Following that, one crew of four will begin work on repairs to the Ledge Trail. The popular trail has no waterbars, rock steps or step stones. A variety of such work will be accomplished along the length of the trail, including a relocation of the bottom 200 yards of the trail, to eliminate the current steep, eroded start. Eighty percent of the cost of this project is being paid for by the State of New Hampshire's Recreation Trails Program. RMC received a grant for the trail work last year. Meanwhile, another crew of four will be working on Israel Ridge Path, performing similar work along the lower stretches of the trail. A bit more in the backcountry, this crew will be camped in the woods from Monday through Friday, each week. Later in the summer, they'll move to a project on Lowe's Path, installing rock steps to reduce the current widening of the trail on a steep section of ledge just below the Log Cabin. The US Forest Service is paying fifty percent of the cost of this project. While the work of the crew is substantial, the absolutely reality is that RMC continues to rely heavily on volunteers-not just for organizing the trails program, but for on-the-ground work, too. We hope you can join us this summer! Our Work Trips organizer, Mike Micucci, has put together a variety of projects for the season. Please see the schedule elsewhere in this newsletter. If you have questions about participating, feel free to drop Mike a note anytime at mikemoriah@yahoo.com. While we're on the topic of volunteers, RMC members owe a special thanks to Randolph's Larry Jenkins, who continues to maintain and build our much-needed wooden pack frames. These frames, little changed in more than 50 years, are perfectly designed for carrying awkward, large loads like boxes, tools and supplies. This year, Larry built RMC two new pack frames at a heavily discounted price. The work is complex and there are few folks who have the skills to complete the job in style. Thanks Larry! This fall RMC will again have a part-time crew. This year the four-person crew will work during September and October, continuing on the Recreation Trails Program grant, and moving off of Ledge Trail and onto Pasture Path. The crew will improve the trail proper, adding drainages, step stones, and replacing a number of aging bog bridges between Four Soldiers Path and Grassy Lane. At the close of the season, the fall crew will assist volunteers in cleaning our drainages of leaves and debris, before winter's snows once again cover our forests. We look forward to seeing you all out on the trails this summer!
This past fall Alan Lowe loaned us a box of materials that had been saved by his grandfather Vyron. These contained newspaper clippings (including an obituary of Alan's great-grandfather, Charles E.), three photo albums and some loose photos as well as various odds and ends. We have added nearly 60 photos to our already extensive archive of Lowe photos. The archive was also given a photo album that had been presented to Don and Barbara Wilson in 1993. This winter we acquired an ancient (1910s or 20s) Randolph Path sign, the gift of John Sperry, which is to be hung on the wall of the Stearns Lodge this summer. Most of the past winter has been devoted to finishing the transcription of Eldena Leighton Hunt's diaries, a publication of the Randolph History Project which you can find this June in Randolph's new town library. We are always eager to see other materials that our members may have in their attics. Please let us know what you have! To contact us: email or USPS (Al Hudson/111 Amherst Road/Pelham, MA 01002).
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Another
change to our management of RMC's trails is the reinvigoration
of the Trails Committee, which now consists of volunteers Cristin
Bailey, Chris Fithian, Regina Ferreira, Tami Hartley, Doug Mayer,
Mike Micucci, Bill Parlett, and Dave Salisbury. Our goal is to
continue to spread out the web of work involved in managing the
trails network year-'round, so no one volunteer shoulders more
work than he or she wants.
In
the past year a number of new additions have been made to the
RMC's archive, mostly in the form of scans of photos. In July
2007, Judy and I visited the library of the Mt. Washington Observatory
in North Conway, and with Peter Crane's help pored through the
indices of Guy Shorey's photo collection. While many of the negatives
are on glass plates that present temporary obstacles to our scanning,
we were able to select and scan about 40 images from the photo
albums Shorey kept in his studio for customers to use in ordering
prints. The Shorey collection is a goldmine, and we hope to return
to work on it again. In July courtesy of Deb Stewart, we scanned
some 30 photos from Jack Stewart's albums, mostly from RMC events
of the 40s and 50s.