MOUNTAIN CLIMBING ACCORDING TO SCHLITZ

KNOCK WITH A hammer!" shouts the crowd in unison. "Answer with a wrench!"

An etiquette training session for carpenters? No, it's a bunch of Outing Clubbers viewing "Schlitz on Mt. Washington," Dartmouth's own cult film. It's no "Rocky Horror Picture Show," yet viewers of "Schlitz" behave in much the same manner as patrons of the risque midnight cult classic, shouting advice and exclamations at the characters on screen and joining in with the film's narrator on such lines as "You'll freeze! You'll die!"

Made in 1936, the comedy film features skier Chris Young as the bumbling Dr. Wolfgang Von Schlitz of Übergurgl on Obergurgl, who sets out for a leisurely stroll up Mt. Washington and suffers the perils of inclement weather, insufficient clothing (his chauffeur, who waits at the bottom smoking his employer's cigars, has accidentally packed a swallowtail dress-coat instead of a windbreaker), dangerous ski conditions, and the malicious Mad Monk of Mt. Washington ("Hisssssssssss!!!!"). Inspiration was provided by the true story of one Dr. Ball, who spent two days lost on the mountain in 1852. The narrator is the great radio journalist Lowell Thomas, father of Lowell Jr. '44.

Von Schlitz