On Top of the World
Moosilauke Summit Camp on "Dartmouth's Mountain" Again Operated by Crew of Undergraduates
THE EIGHTY-TWO YEAR OLD Summit House on the top of Mt. Moosilauke is the oldest in the east, built in iB6O. The original Summit House on Moosilauke was called the Prospect House. Not much more than a one story hut, but of rock walls four feet thick and six feet high, it still stands and forms the kitchen, dining room and east wing annex of the present House. Its walls were built to withstand the winter storms and strong winds of the summit. They will probably stand as long as people have the desire and the energy for mountain climbing.
For 22 years Moosilauke Mountain has been "Dartmouth's Mountain." In 1920 Charles P. Wood worth '07 gave the mountain and the famous Summit House to the Dartmouth Outing Club. Each summer since 1920, undergraduates from Hanover have run the Moosilauke Summit Camp. The standard of work which each year's crew has tried to maintain, the good condition the House has been kept in, and the desirable location of Moosilauke for mountain hikers, have given to the Moosilauke Summit Camp a large share of importance in the general development of the White Mountain region over the past 20 years.
Although the Summit Camp was intended mainly for the use of Dartmouth students and alumni, it has taken on a much larger scope. The D.O.C. policy has consistently been to maintain this mountain hostelry for the convenience and comfort of all who like mountain climbing. Last summer, from all over the east, 3,200 people climbed the Mountain. The two years before that averaged 3,000 each summer.
Open only from June 15th to September 15th, the chief problem of the crew is to make the House expand during the heavy period of mid-July to mid-August, and to try and fill it during the remainder of the season. Moosilauke's main source of business comes from overnight trips of boys' and girls' camps in New Hampshire and Vermont. Their schedule forces most of them to climb at the same general time. The crew, lonesome and inactive during late June and July, suddenly find them- selves cooking supper for a hundred hungry guests, serving meals and doing dishes in several shifts, getting up at five in the morning to cook enough pancakes for the 7:30 breakfast.
Although a large portion of Moosilauke's business comes from boys' and girls' camps, this in no way limits the nature of Moosilauke. It rather testifies to the wide appeal which the Summit Camp holds. The most striking example of the loyalty that some hold for Moosilauke is the example of Ernest Ainsworth from Amesbury, Mass. Since 1921, Mr. Ainsworth has climbed Moosilauke several times every summer. Usually leaving his home after work on Saturday, he, and a party of tired, doubtful friends will reach the Summit about 10:30 P.M. Not content to climb it once, at 5:00 next morning Mr. Ainsworth gets up, takes an orange from the pantry, runs down the Glencliff Trail to his car, drives that around to the other side of the Mountain, and climbs up the Beaver Brook Trail to be up at the Summit again in time for breakfast. Just as loyal and enthusiastic has been Judge McLane '07, Trustee of the College. The Judge made two trips to the Summit last summer. Russell Keep '20 and his wife, and Russ Jr. '50, climbed several times last summer. President Hopkins and Dean Bill have been enthusiastic Moosilauke climbers.
Moosilauke Summit Camp faces an uncertain season this year. For the fourth time in its long life it will begin the summer with the Nation at war. Reflecting back on the survival value which any organization develops after eighty-two years of operation, after having endured a Civil War, one World War and a hurricane, and considering the desirable location of Moosilauke Mountain with a railroad station but four miles from the Summit House, the outlook for this summer is at least hopeful.
The thing most outstanding about Moosilauke is the view from the summit. Because of its detached location in the southwestern part of the White Mountains, because of its open summit giving the hiker a view of the broad Connecticut Valley below, the Green Mountain ranges and several peaks of the Adirondacks in the west, and the Presidential Range in the east, it is considered by many to have the finest panorama in New England. Thomas W. Higgins wrote in the Atlantic Monthly, November, 1880:
"Few of the White Mountains have a summit so fine as that of Moosilauke. After youascend above the luxuriant vegetation....after you come -to the interrupted groves andever-dwindling trees, you step out at lengthupon a bare and narrow ridge. With one boldcurve it sweeps away in air, and leads the eyeto a little summit one halfmile beyond. There can benothing finer than this curving crest, raised nearly fivethousand feet above sea level..... Looking down, you seeon one side all the fertile valley of the Connecticut, andthe broad farms of Vermont,and on the other side therelies spread out all Maine andNew Hampshire."
Not alone for its view is Moosilauke famous. There are also the Moosilauke pancakes and the famous ghost story of Dr. Benton. The Summit Crew carefully preserving the old traditions of the Mountain, retells to the summer guests, amidst carefully timed sounds and crashes, the weird and inexplainable happenings of Dr. Benton when he climbed the summit of Moosilauke many years ago. They still serve for breakfast the plate-size pancakes that 22 years of careful experimentation by Dartmouth crews have brought to near-perfection. And they still guarantee free meals and lodging to anyone who can break the record of eighteen pancakes in one sitting after having had the customary servings of fruit and oatmeal. There are also those other qualities of mountain hospitality and informality, and the exhilaration of being on top of the world away from the noise and heat of the cities, that have made Moosilauke its many friends over the years.
THE SUMMIT CAMP Moosilauke in 1860 is shown atthe right where the originalcamp walls built of solid stonewere 4 feet thick and 6 feethigh. At the left in 1881 theSummit House had grown andabove is a view of enlargements to the Summit Campwhich last summer received 3;200 visitors, as described in theaccompanying article.
As THE HIKER SEES THE WORLD FROM MOOSILAUKEAn infra-red film view of the mountains to the northeast of the summit. In the fore-ground is the winter cabin, never locked, a shelter in bad weather.
