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Reports from Committees... Report from the Camps
As winter fast approaches, our fall caretaking season nears its end. Leslie Ham, who worked this summer’s trail crew, has enjoyed her time up there during a wonderful fall and the many nights shared with the fall trail crew who have been working high up on Lowe's Path. Our two winter caretakers are accumulating warm gear and preparing for the long cold winter up at the camps. Sally Manikian and Mike Street will start winter caretaking duties and be working one-week on/one week off starting October 26 and lasting until April. Sally was the previous spring caretaker, and Mike returns to Randolph once again, a veteran of three summers on our trail crew. If you haven't winter trekked
up to Gray Knob in a while, perhaps this is the year? And if
you go, be prepared for whatever weather and other challenges
the mountain gods might toss your way. RMC Retail Report The beginning of the fourth quarter, after the busy summer season, is a good time to report on the RMC merchandise program. This program is critical to the club for many reasons. Not only is It an important source of revenue used to support the club's mission, but the program also helps hikers stay informed and safe with guidebooks and maps. RMC shirts and hats also provide great visibility for our club when our members wear their RMC gear out on the trails. Further, RMC items make great holiday gifts!
Mike Micucci, a Board member and owner of Moriah Sports, volunteered to put together and implement the plan to move the RMC merchandise from the Tuckers to his store in the center of Gorham. Mike generously provided the RMC a dedicated room within Moriah Sports to display and store RMC items. In addition, Moriah Sport’s inventory control system offered more precise tracking and maintenance of RMC inventory. Each quarter, Mike cut a check to the club for items sold and Jeff Smith, the RMC’s highly capable webmaster, provided a detailed list of all items sold. This system appears to have succeeded in all respects. First, the general hiking public has had access to RMC items for sale. In many instances, people who formerly hand no knowledge of the RMC have left Moriah Sports with an RMC hat or a t-shirt, and Mike always included an RMC membership envelope and newsletter in the Moriah bag for later reference. Additionally, Mike processed all of the web sales, packing and shipping orders as they were forwarded to him by Jeff Smith. Further, all of the RMC printed materials are now in one location and Mike Dickerman, our agent in charge of wholesale distribution has found this to be immensely convenient. Many thanks to Mike and Jeff for their support of the RMC merchandise program! Through their efforts, the Club has experienced increased visibility and revenue and now has better control of costs and inventory. We applaud and appreciate their valuable contribution. Now, however the club is contemplating further changes as Mike approaches a change in career. Mike is retiring from Moriah Sports in order to spend more time with his family. Mike is in discussion with several potential buyers of the business and part of the package is for the eventual buyer to maintain the outlet of RMC product in the Moriah space. In the event this plan falls through, Mike is willing to continue packing and shipping mail ordered items and Mike and Blake Strayhorn are working on an alternate plan for retail sales. Stay tuned for the details as they develop. In other news, sales of the
Stearns Lodge limited edition long sleeve cotton shirts are moving
along a little more slowly now that the excitement of the grand
opening has past. Accordingly, the price of the shirts
has been reduced to $18.50 as we hope to move the remaining shirts
out and recover our costs. The Stearns Lodge T-shirt features
a lovely Tim Sappington sketch of the RMC trail crew returning
to the lodge after a day on the mountain. As winter approaches,
remember the all-new RMC fleece hat with its embroidered logo.
At $15 this is a great value and a great way to show your support
of the club. An updated edition of the Spur Cabin register
is now available as well and makes for interesting reading as
the nights grow longer. A full catalog of our products
and instructions on how to place an order are available on the
web at www.randolphmountainclub.org. Trails Report
For this trails report, I thought I’d take excerpts from a few of these reports, to share, from the crew’s point of view, how the summer went on RMC’s paths. Our trail work this past summer consisted of the usual chopping and chain sawing of blow-downs by RMC’s 8-member crew in early June. That was followed by drainage cleaning and brushing on any trails that had brush beginning to encroach on them. The major projects for the season were reconstruction and erosion control work on the Amphibrach, Diagonal, Wood Path, EZ Way, and at the end of the Four Soldiers Trail at Pond of Safety. All projects were ably led by Chris Fithian, returning for his second season as RMC’s Field Supervisor. Projects on the White Mountain National Forest were half-funded by the Forest Service; the other projects received 80% of their funding from the federal Recreation Trails Program grants, a popular source of funding for trail clubs. About this season’s trail work, crewmember and Randolph summer resident Jamie Phinney wrote, “I don’t know when I will swing an ax again, dig a large hole in the ground, or hump a 300 lb. rock to a trail. These skills, when taken out of context, seem entirely random and useless in the larger scheme of things. However, over the course of the summer they have come to attain a higher value. Each skill represents hours of focus, pain, frustration, and, in the end, satisfaction. I really like this type of work because it makes me more responsible for my own success and helps me realize my own personal gains. It allows me to gain more ownership over my own projects and motivates me to do better. I cannot simply rely on others to figure out my problems for me.”
This fall, RMC fielded a crew funded by a grant from the Waterman Fund (www.watermanfund.org) and the US Forest Service. The crew performed trail work on the alpine sections of Lowe’s Path above treeline. For a full description of the work, see Leslie Ham’s article elsewhere in this newsletter. The crew also received funding to work on Pasture Path, courtesy of a number of memorial gifts in memory of longtime RMC member Eleanor Phinney. Their work included clearing out the beautiful Eyrie view near Lookout Ledge and installing a rustic bench made from native materials. Later in the season, the crew worked alongside volunteers and cleaned drainages on RMC’s paths. In addition, this fall, RMC rebuilt the Bee Line’s Baldwin Bridge over Moose Brook on the way to Durand Lake. The work was accomplished by John and Jim Tremblay who did an excellent job. Thanks to RMC’s fiscal prudence, we now have a reliable reserve fund for use on capital projects such as this one when the need arises. A word of thanks to board members Mike Micucci and Matt Schomburg who organized this year’s work trips. The best attended, with a dozen participants, was Al Sochard’s brushing adventure to the upper reaches of Howker Ridge. We hope you can join us on a trip next year, meet RMC friends, enjoy our trails, and lend a hand! Here are a few concluding thoughts from crewmember Maya Velasco: “I find life in Randolph so relaxing. There is nothing better than living in a community where life revolves around the mountains. I feel so lucky that I spend my summers being paid to hike and work in the dirt. What makes me feel even better is the sense of accomplishment and appreciation I feel from the community. One of the best days this summer was when the group hike came by the staircase that Rachel and I were building on the Amphibrach. It was fun explaining what we were doing, but it was even better answering their questions and receiving their thanks. Randolph shows so much support for the RMC. Since the whole community supports the RMC so much it is easy to feel comfortable and welcome -- however it also makes it hard to leave.” Many of us couldn’t agree
more, and have decided to make these mountains our home. Whether
you’re here year-‘round, or only in the area for a
long weekend, we hope you have a chance to enjoy our trails,
no matter what the season. Treasurer's Report As the new Treasurer of the Randolph Mountain Club I would like to take this opportunity to thank our previous treasurer, Bill Partlett, for his time during the transition in August. Also thank you to former Treasurer Michele Cormier for always making herself available to answer questions or to discuss protocols. The two of them remind me that the Randolph Mountain Club has been and always will be an organization with dedicated volunteers. In my short time as Treasurer it is clear to me that the Board of Directors are responsible fiduciaries. They make every effort to control spending and their decisions are always in the best interest of the RMC and its mission. To date I can report that Membership Dues and Sales income are up from 2006. However the number of visitors to camps is down so Camps income is also down. Overall expenses for 2007 are down 8%. Two issues that need to be mentioned when comparing overall year-to-date figures are the completion of Stearns Lodge and a gift from the Eleanor Barschall estate. Excess funds from the building of Stearns Lodge and the gift are being held in Reserve Funding for future use. This money makes our cash on hand position a bit healthier than the same time last year. A complete 2007 Profit and Loss report will be included with the President’s Annual Letter in February. In the meantime I welcome members’ questions and ideas.
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The RMC Camps
enjoyed a wonderful summer led by our two terrific caretakers
-- both from Bates College in Maine and enjoying their summer
break living high on the flanks of Mt. Adams. Gretchen Grebe
and Chris Carlson came by to visit the camps in early spring
and were smitten. Hiring the pair made sense as the time they
had served together on the Bates Outing Club had already created
a friendship that continued and grew on the mountain. The caretakers
very much enjoyed staying at the new Stearns Lodge on their days
off and appreciated the great new facilities. Many of you probably
enjoyed Gretchen's journal entries and musings on life at 4200
feet as found on the RMC website -- if you missed them, they
are still available there.
This
is also a good time to assess the retail experiment the Club
undertook this past year. By all accounts, moving the RMC merchandise
into Moriah Sports has been a good move. As you may recall,
for many years the Tuckers generously provided space and access
to RMC products in the airlock of their home. This proved
to be convenient and accessible to some, but less so for many.
In addition, the Tuckers decided that they would like to put
the space to another use. Thus was born the concept of
moving RMC items to a central retail location with more visibility
and access. 
At
the close of the summer, we ask each trail crew member to take
an hour to reflect on the season and write down their thoughts.
The results range from poems, to pragmatic suggestions for the
following summer, to essays. Some have appeared in these pages.
All join the RMC archives maintained by Al Hudson.
This
past summer was our first in the new Stearns Lodge. The move
occurred without any great surprises and the new lodge was greeted
appreciatively by the crew. Tyler Self wrote that, “I think
that the new Stearns Lodge functioned well in its inaugural season.
New crew and caretakers seemed quite happy with it, and I think
the returning members appreciated the plentiful kitchen and bathroom
space. The porches and foyer area were quite useful, and everyone
had their cubbies and cabinets full through the summer. The washer
and dryer were also quite appreciated. The lodge overall fulfilled
its role successfully.”