Forest Fire and Blizzards Fail to Deter Outing Club

Braving mountain blizzards and fighting a local forest fire was all in the day's fun for Harvard Outing Clubbers as they took advantage of the Columbus Day holiday for a long weekend in the wilds, hiking and canoeing in the loveliest season of the year.

"We were never cold or uncomfortable," said Jim Rothschild ocC, speaking of the group which climbed through ley rain and snow on Mount Adams, where the weather took a toll of one camper's life this weekend. While the mercury dropped close to zero on the mountain top the Outing Club boys found sung haven in the Crag Camp, below freeline.

Snow on Summit

Starting from this base at 4200 feet, Howle Oedel '43 led the climbers on the holiday morning through thick clouds and a gale of wind to the second highest peak in the Presidential Range. On the summit there was already six to eight inches of snow. Only in the afternoon as the hikers started down, did the sun break through and the clouds lift to give a view of the range and a bit of saving warmth to the tired trippers.

Meanwhile, closer to home, some undergraduate canoeists on the upper Charles River happened on an incipient forest fire blazing in the finder-dry underbrush. Aided by a couple of local urchins, they worked fast and succeeded in beating out the flames before they spread beyond a few hundred square feet of grassy woods.

The Outing Club also announced its docket for another week, with a general invitation to all undergraduates to attend a barn dance sponsored by a group of Dartmouth O. C. Alumni Friday night.

The whole membership of the club is expected at the Fall Feed, to be held late Sunday afternoon at the Blue Hills Reservation South of Boston. The bicycle boys will take a long four through the country and join at supper the other men who have hiked or ridden horse back during the day.