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Carolina Mountain Club                        Since 1923
eNews | Hike . Save Trails . Make Friends
 June 2015  
In This Issue
Clubs Complete 27-Foot 
Long Footbridge On MST 

By Mike Williams

More than a dozen volunteers from two Western North Carolina hiking clubs recently completed construction of a rustic, sturdy 27-foot long footbridge where the Mountains-to-Sea Trail crosses Neal's Creek near the Black Mountain Campground.

"We're thrilled that so many volunteers contributed their time and effort to a project that turned out so fantastic," said Jake Blood, president of the N.C. High Peaks Trail Association, which sponsored the job in cooperation with the Monday Trail Crew of the Carolina Mountain Club. "CMC Monday Crew Leader John Whitehouse helped lead the way on this and should be proud because the bridge is truly a work of art." To read more click here. 


MacDowell Answers Call To Hike For A Cause- Make A Wish
By Bev MacDowell 
Is it just me, or do other people on occasion feel that they receive 'signs' that are pointing them in a certain direction? This is how this long day's walk happened for me, a gal who likes her 5-7 miles with an occasional 10-15.

First there was the marketing brilliance of the billboards around town. There are three on Sweeten Creek alone. Well, the CMC has trained me to take on a Challenge. Nothing but good has come from participating in our club challenges. I've completed SB6K and LTC, hiking to fabulous destinations in order to earn my badges. I've become closer friends with CMC hikers and more fit in direct correlation to CMC challenges.

Secondly, I felt a heart 'tug' as I was aware that there was a 'Wish Kid' right in my kindergarten class at Carolina Day School. This young fellow is doing fine now, by the way. I mentioned to my student's mother that I was noodling with the idea of hiking. Well, she planned on doing the walk. "Come On!" she encouraged me.
To read more click here.
DNA Indicates Euthanized Bear Not The One That Attacked Camper In Park
GSMP release

Great Smoky Mountains National Park officials received DNA results from the bear attack occurring at backcountry campsite 84 where a 16-year old male from Ohio was seriously injured by a bear on June 6. Immediately following the report of the attack, rangers and wildlife biologists implemented an action plan that included clearing the Hazel Creek backcountry area of hikers and searching for bears using cameras, traps, and conducting foot patrols. Wildlife biologists and rangers also conducted a thorough investigation of the scene of the attack and collected forensic evidence, including bear hair and saliva from the victim's equipment, to be used for DNA analysis.


On the evening of June 7, wildlife biologists encountered and shot at a bear near campsite 84, but the bear ran off after the shots were fired and biologists were unable to confirm whether the bear had been struck. Efforts to track the bear were unsuccessful due to darkness and a severe thunderstorm with heavy rainfall that fell immediately following the shooting. On the morning of June 8, a bear was caught in a culvert trap set at campsite 84. Biologists euthanized the bear and collected a sample for DNA analysis.  To read more click here.


Federal Government Considering 2016 Conservation Funding
American Hiking Society Press Release
Senate appropriators passed the Interior bill through full committee on a party line vote yesterday after much back-and-forth over funding levels and riders. The bill will move to the floor of the Senate at an unspecified later date. 
 
The FY2016 Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill provides a total of $31.06 billion, including $30.01 billion in discretionary funding and $1.05 billion in emergency firefighting funds.
 
Land & Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) took a hit compared to last year's enacted funding level, the committee appropriators funding it at $292 million which is $14 million less than FY2015. Considering that the senate majority switched in the last election, however, it still reflects that there is much support for this program that is vital to completing so many trails. It also continues the trend, regardless of who is the majority party, of the Senate recommending much higher investment in LWCF than the House. To read more click here.
Stepping Back In CMC History- 1924
By Rocko Smucker
CMC Archivist
Box 15, Folder 17 Carolina Mountain Club Applications for Membership, 1924

This folder contained 15 applications for CMC membership.  They included a dentist, The Manor's assistant manager, a banker from Biltmore Forest, a person from Clearwater, FL, three physicians (one above from Massachusetts), a civil engineer, the president of a hotel, two lawyers, a landscape architect, the executive secretary of the Women's City Club, a farmer, and one no occupation.

CMC in 1924 was more of a social club.  The $10.00 dues for adults and the $6.00 dues for minors would equal $136.00 and $82.00 in 2015 dollars.  It was the beginning of the Roaring Twenties.  The Jackson Building in downtown Asheville was completed with an observation tower topped with a 400X telescope and an 18 million candle searchlight to attract tourists.   McCormick Field and the Battery Park Hotel opened in 1924

George H. W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, James Baldwin, Shirley Chisholm, and Marlon Brando were born in 1924.  It was the time of Jazz Age, Prohibition, the Lost Generation of Hemingway and Gertrude Stein, speakeasies, flappers, and Art Deco.  A Ford Model T cost $260, or $3,530 today.  Calvin Coolidge was President.
 

The picture to the left is the Smoky Mountains Hiking Club premier hike to Mt. Leconte on October 18-19, 1924.  This hike is when these individuals from Knoxville decided to create the SMHC.  Several gentlemen are wearing ties so I wonder about the extent of the hike.  I've notice in some early pictures, men hiked in ties. (picture courtesy of Smoky Mountains Hiking Club, Knoxville, TN)


L.L. Bean Helps Fund Maintenance Training
By Ann Hendrickson

A year ago, several CMC trail crew volunteers attended the Introduction to Stonework 2-day workshop, conducted by the Jolly Rovers of New York, at the Wilderness Skills Institute. The volunteers came back to their crews and raved about the invaluable skills that were learned and the applicability the skills are to working on trails in much of our terrain.


The groundwork was quickly laid to find the means to provide this type of training   for more of crew members. In order to minimize travel costs, the workshop date was picked to piggy-back when the Jolly Rovers were back in WNC. A grant was submitted and approved by L.L. Bean Inc., the CMC Council approved to fund the rest of the training expense, and crew members were invited to give up their weekend for an intense "rock work" training session. To read more click here. 

Trail Structure Training - Wilderness Skills Institute

By Ann Hendrickson

Four of CMC's trail crew members, Skip Sheldon, Tom Weaver, Bill Otto and Ann Hendrickson, were accepted to participate in the Wilderness Skills' Institutes Advanced Trail Structure Training Program. Once again, the Jolly Rover's out of New York were invited back to provide technical and hands on instruction in the craft of stonework. For the first time, an advanced skills weeklong course was offered for volunteers with a solid background in stonework. There was a long waiting list for the 12 educational slots for this course. We felt very fortunate to have been selected. (Even heaving sledge hammers in a down pour!) To read more click here.



     

The Big One that DIDN't get away.

CMC Pisgah Friday crew members Jerry Aldridge and Jim Spicer cleared this four foot diameter tree from obstructing the Mountains to the Sea trail recently.  Hikers had tried climbing over it, but found bushwhacking around it much more successful.

 

Peter Barr Bags Tallest Peaks In NC 

By Nathaniel Axtell
Times-News Correspondent
Some people collect stamps or coins; others, beer cans or commemorative plates. Peter Barr collects peaks.

The 31-year-old "peakbagger," who works as the trails and outreach coordinator for the Carolina Mountain Land Conservancy, has spent more than a decade climbing the highest mountains and hills he could find with friends and family. To read more click here.

Missing Hiker Found Dead In National Park

GMSNP Press Release

Great Smoky Mountains National Park rangers believe to have discovered the body of reported missing hiker, Jenny Bennett, 62, of Sylva, NC in the Lester Prong area of Greenbrier above campsite 31 on Monday, June 8. It was reported to park officials on Sunday, June 7 that Bennett was missing and possibly in the park.  Her vehicle was located at the Porters Flat Trailhead later that evening. An area wide search operation of trained man trackers was underway when she was found by rangers.

 

Bennett was an avid hiker in the Smoky Mountains and maintained a blog about her trips. She was a member of the Smoky Mountain Hiking Club and often liked to hike off trail in the park. 

 

Jack Fitzgerald Shares Passion 
For Life, Trails and Waterfalls

By Gina Malone

Times-News Correspondent

Jack Fitzgerald, 82, figures he averages about 500 miles a year of hiking. At that rate, he jokes, "I'm halfway through my hip replacement," which his doctors told him would last for 20 years or 20,000 miles, whichever came first.

With Fitzgerald, it's likely to be the miles.

He and his wife, Susan, moved to Hendersonville from Raleigh when they retired in 1993. The terrain was the draw. A boyhood in Nebraska where it was as "flat as a pancake," Fitzgerald said, led him to seek higher ground. Estes Park in Colorado was a few hours away and, as a young man, he hiked trails all over the Rocky Mountain National Park. To read more click here. 

Prizes By Diamond Brand Outdoors
Carolina Mountain Club Photo Contest

By Ann Hendrickson

Attention all shutterbugs! Get out your cameras, GoPros or cellphones with cameras. The CMC wants your best shots from the trail! Winning photographs of the new photo contest will be featured on the website and the photographers (and their photos) will be recognized at the Annual Meeting. Categories for the contest include:

 1) Landscape, 2) People on the Trail, and 3) Plants, and/or animals. Entries will be accepted until Sept 30, 2015. Please click here to see the rules.

cmclogo Send eNews articles to [email protected]
  
The newsletter will go out the last Friday of every month except for the months the editor is taking a vacation which will happen in July and September in 2015. The deadline to submit news is the Friday before it goes out.

The next issue will come out on Friday, August 28, so send your news by Friday evening at 9 P.M. before the newsletter comes out, that is, by Friday evening, August 21, to Kathy Kyle at [email protected]. Include your email address at the end of your story. Thank you.
 
Westgate parking - Park in the northernmost part of the lot - past EarthFare, in the last row of parking spaces.

To join Carolina Mountain Club go to:  www.carolinamountainclub.org. Click on "Join CMC" on the right side. Follow the instructions. Send all address and email changes to Gale O'Neal at [email protected]. Do not resubscribe yourself to the eNews. That will be done automatically.
If you are a non-member subscriber, you need to go back to the eNews and make the change yourself.

  

Kathy Kyle
Carolina Mountain Club | P.O. Box 68
Asheville, NC 28802