MAMMOTH LAKES, Calif. - From New York to Los Angeles, the obituaries for Andrea Mead Lawrence, who died recently at the age of 76, told of her skiing accomplishments while still a teenager and then a young mother. That was fitting and proper, for her skiing accomplishments were extraordinary, unrivaled for a half century.
But just as Sir Edmund Hillary was far more interesting for what he did after climbing Mt. Everest, so did the eulogies tell of a woman's life that truly began after she collected her Olympic gold medals, then put them into a box.
The medals were a means to an end - an end she never fully attained, and perhaps could not. What she wanted most was a shared respect for the mountains and an agreed upon sense of the role of people within those mountains.
She was born into the world of ski resorts. Her parents had founded Pico Peak, a resort in Vermont that in 1940 gained the nation's first T-bar lift. In 1948, at the age of 15, she became the youngest female skier ever on the U.S. Olympic Team. In 1952, at the age of 19, she was on the cover of Time Magazine. Racing that year in Oslo, Norway, she became the first American alpine skier to win two Olympic gold medals.
But it was on the other side of the continent, but still in the mountains, where she made arguably her biggest splash. After living on a ranch near Winter Park and then in Aspen, she moved to Mammoth Lakes in 1968 and was persuaded to lead opposition to construction of an eight-storey condominium.
That opposition yielded a landmark ruling by the California Supreme Court, which said local projects required an environmental review. That effort made her probably the most significant and effective citizen activist in California, one water lawyer, Antonio Rossman, told the Los Angeles Times .
Eulogies mention clarity, purpose, and compassion. "She was, oh, hard as nails and a heart of gold," said Aspen's Dave Durrance, whose famous family of ski racers and photographers lived next to Lawrence. "If you were talking to her, it didn't matter if you were old or young: you had her complete focus," he told The Aspen Times.
She told various interviewers that it's not the medals you've won, but what you do with them. Her passion, after ski racing, was entirely about mountains. In California's Mono County, she was county supervisor - a position equivalent to county commissioner in other states - from 1983 to 1999.
"She was the irresistible force and the immovable object rolled into one," Mammoth Mountain chief executive Rusty Gregory told The Sheet. "I respected her for that. With all the equivocation you hear in the world, she was a breath of fresh air."
One of her friends late in life was Leslie Ann Klusmire, a former municipal planning director in Glenwood Springs, Colo., and then the director of planning in California's Inyo County. She recalls long, engaged discussions with Lawrence about land stewardship that continued nearly until her death.
"Andrea was passionate about land stewardship," says Klusmire, "particularly mountains. She felt a very, very strong connection to mountains."
Lawrence, says Klusmire, believed the primacy of private property rights had been taken too far. She didn't necessarily believe in more laws, but rather in shared responsibility for land stewardship.
She believed in mountain resorts, but she even more strongly believed in limiting their scale. The built environment should not, she said, be allowed to overpower the natural environment.
Mountainfilm takes on food supplies
TELLURIDE, Colo. - MountainFilm, the four-day film-based exploration of ideas and action held every Memorial Day weekend in Telluride, this year is turning its attention to food.
Don't get the wrong idea. The festival, which started out in 1978 with the showing of several films about climbing mountains, is not trying to bump the Aspen's Food and Wine Festival or any of the other festivals devoted to the exquisite aspects of chocolate éclairs and fine wines.
Rather, the festival is devoting itself to the big idea of food.
"With one billion people on this planet overweight and another 800 million starving, today's food system is clearly broken," said David Holbrooke, the festival director.
The Moving Mountains Symposium on Friday, May 22, will examine how the planet can feed the 2.8 billion additional people projected for 2050.
Bill McKibben, the keynote speaker, is best known for his writings about the need to address climate-changing air pollution. However, at the festival he will talk about what he sees as the systemic and serious weaknesses in current methods of large-scale agriculture. He will also describe a new paradigm for food, one that he says is based on sustainability and equity.
Among the other presenters will be the acclaimed chef Ming Tsai, the emcee. Yale-educated as a mechanical engineer, Tsai has achieved fame from his acclaimed East-West restaurant in the Boston area. He also has had a national television show for six years.
National Geographic Magazine, which recently had a story titled "The End of Cheap Food," will also participate, with executive editor Dennis Dimmick talking about the increasing pressures on the Earth's systems from crop choices and changing climate.
Another speaker will be Gene Baur, the founder of Farm Sanctuary, an activist group that is working to end cruelty to farm animals. Pamela Ronald, chair of the Plant Geronomics Program at the University of California, will argue that a successful future of food will need sensible approaches to both organic farming and genetically modified foods.
The main portion of the festival is devoted to films, many of them specifically devoted to mountains and mountaineering, punctuated by appearances of film-makers and other notable individuals.
But always there has been much more, a trend accentuated in recent years. This year's lineup of special guests includes:
• Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times columnist who almost single-handedly has brought international attention to the genocide of Darfur.
• Ken Burns, who will premiere his new movie, "The National Parks - America's Best Idea."
• Richard Holbrooke, President Obama's special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan (and father of Holbrooke, the festival director).
• James Balog, a contributing editor to National Geographic adventure, whose ongoing work about the recession of glaciers in Greenland and Alaska was the subject of an hour-long documentary show on PBS television in late March.
• Jim Whittaker, the first American to summit Everest.
• Tim DeChristopher, an economics major at the University of Utah, who threw an auction of oil and gas drilling rights into chaos in December by out-bidding all others on the 22,500 acres of land surrounding Arches and Canyonlands national parks.
Skier almost gets the shaft
PARK CITY, Utah - Deer Valley is built on land that was once used for silver mining. That historical antecedent created an unsettling moment for Bruce Rogers, who felt the ground give way under his heels as he paused while skiing in a seldom-visited off-piste area.
"It was thoroughly confusing," the 50-year-old Rogers told the Park Record . "A bit bewildering for a momentary second."
When the Lady Morgan Express lift was built, nobody noticed the mine shaft nearby. Erin Grady, a spokeswoman for Deer Valley, described the mine shaft as being in an "obscure area" and not on a designated ski trail.
Rogers, an expert skier from Hailey, Idaho, located down-valley from Sun Valley, dropped to shoulder-level in the snow, and could see a dark hole below. With aid of another skier, he was able to extricate himself and, later on, retrieved his skis, too.
Resort officials say that mining shafts and adits have been discovered occasionally at Deer Valley, although nobody has ever fallen into one. As well, a sinkhole opening appeared last summer after a subterranean excavation collapsed.
Four-day week considered
HAILEY, Idaho - Blaine County, which includes Sun Valley and Ketchum, is considering a four-day workweek for employees. The stated goal is to reduce commuting, and hence reduce consumption of fossil fuels, the primary cause of greenhouse gas emissions. Meanwhile, Steamboat Springs has tinkered with a similar four-day workweek for city employees, but with the goal of saving money.
Spanish-language radio debuts
FRISCO, Colo. - A Spanish-language radio station has begun broadcasting in Summit County. The station, KQSE-FM, which calls itself the La Nueva Mix, had existing broadcasts covering the Eagle and Roaring Fork valleys of Colorado (the Aspen-Vail-Glenwood Springs area). The Summit Daily News notes that the immigrant population of Summit County increased by more than 700 per cent from 1990 to 2000, and presumably most of those immigrants come from Spanish-language nations.
Steamboat Springs adopts 1% idea
STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Colo. - Taking a page from Jackson Hole, a program has been launched in Steamboat Springs called the One Percent for Steamboat. The goal is to generate money for sustainability projects identified by participating businesses.
The program, sponsored by the Steamboat Springs Chamber Resort Association, asks participants to add a donation of 1 per cent onto their purchases. The money is to be disbursed to local sustainability projects.
This year, for example, reusable tote bags were given to Halloween trick-and-treating children, to replace the disposable plastic bags, explains the Steamboat Pilot & Today .
A similar program was pioneered in Jackson, Wyo., with the underlying premise being that the local environment is the most valuable asset for any community, but especially Jackson and the broader Teton County with its backdrop of Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks.
Residential permits drop 600%
TRUCKEE, Calif. - Talk about a downhill slide. Three years ago Truckee issued 326 permits for residential construction. The numbers fell to 200 and, last year, just 56.
That's nearly a 600 percent decline. And this year it's likely to get worse.
"We do not see much in the pipeline," Duane Hall, a town planner, told the Sierra Sun . But the town is investing money in public projects, and is also working to bolster the affordable housing component.
John Falk, lobbyist for the Tahoe Sierra Board of realtors, says that while Truckee and the nearby Lake Tahoe resort area was slow to feel the effects of the global recession, it will likely be recover more laggardly.
Psychologist studies suicide causes
ASPEN, Colo. - By almost any definition, Aspen and the broader Pitkin County is paradise. So why are people killing themselves so often?
The suicide rate in the county is three times the national average, and double the rate of Colorado, according to the University of Colorado-Denver Depression Center. In a recent interview, Colorado Public Radio wanted to know why?
Dr. Michael Allen, director of research at the Depression Center, explained that rural areas in the Rocky Mountain West tend to have a higher rate of suicide. It's partly because of the greater distances between people, how hard it is to get to the doctor, and how often you see your neighbors," he said. "We think the fabric may be a little bit looser."
Too, people in rural areas of the Rocky Mountains tend to be more efficient in killing themselves. Guns are prevalent, and guns are a vastly more effective way of committing suicide than drug overdoses or knives.
But what about Aspen? "A lot of people who move there are adventuresome people. They like taking risks," answered Allen.
But they often find greater risks than they expect. "They move there with high aspirations, and it turns out to be a real challenge," said Allen, citing the economic seasonality plus the economic challenge that forces many to have several jobs.
"When the lifts close, half the town leaves. That has economic consequences, relationship consequences."
As well, there is a different attitude about substance abuse.
The Depression Center got involved after being solicited by agencies that might normally be thought of as first-responders to suicide. In fact, firefighters and others have had high suicide rates, Allen told the radio station.
What did T.S. Eliot know about mountains?
VAIL PASS, Colo. - The old saying about March was flipped upside down this year. It arrived meekly in Colorado but roared lion-like on its way into April, hiding brown spots under a fresh carpet of virginal snow.
The flurry of new storms blessed virtually all the mountain ranges. Steamboat, in the Park Range, was expecting to quickly surpass the 400 inches of snowfall for the season.
In the Gore Range, the scene at Vail Pass was so enchanting to a traveler that he stopped on Monday at a rest area and then began walking up a road toward Shrine Pass, two miles away and 500 feet higher. All around, the mountains were like golden slippers and silk skirts.
Although it was into the evening hours, sunshine continued to flood the landscape. Others were also out and about. The road, packed down and groomed for snowmobilers, felt nearly as busy as I-70. Some snowmobilers were merely sightseeing, while others towed yo-yo skiers to slopes laden with north-facing powder. One towed a sled with a large cooler, presumably containing beer for one of the 10 th Mountain Division huts located above Shrine Pass.
The air stank momentarily after they passed, the exhausts violating the sanctity of the mountain air.
A woman on a snowmobile stopped and inquired whether the walker had seen her son on a snowmobile. He had not. As the walker continued up the road, she stopped again four more times, each time more apprehensive.
Finally, a string of snowmobiles passed, the woman in the rear, and as she did she raised her thumb. The boy had been found.
Beyond them, the waning sunlight on the Tenmile Range was golden, the blue sky on the horizon watering down to a thin green. T.S. Eliot said that April was the cruelest month, but what did he know about mountains?
Basalt stabilizing its kilns
BASALT, Colo. - To the modern eye, the old beehive-shaped charcoal kilns that are often found around old mining towns surely present a curious spectacle. What purpose did they serve?
Seven of these kilns are found near the centre of Basalt, 18 miles from Aspen. They were built in 1882, just as Aspen was taking off as a major silver mining and smelting town. Wood was burned in the kilns under carefully controlled conditions, so that the moisture was removed from the wood, leaving mostly carbon, or a fuel more closely approximating coal. Charcoal also burns more cleanly and hotter than wood. As such, it was needed for the operation of smelters.
Such charcoal was needed in Aspen before the railroad arrived in 1886, and was able to deliver supplies of coal. In the interim, charcoal was hauled by horse-drawn wagon from Basalt.
In recent years, Basalt's brick charcoal kilns have been falling apart, due both to vandalism and to natural weathering. However, the town government is hoping to leverage an investment of $85,000 in hopes of securing $341,000 for restoration, reports The Aspen Times.
"We all love the kilns and don't want to see them fall down," said Jacque Whitsitt, a member of the Basalt Town Council.
Obama may visit Park City
PARK CITY, Utah - Park City is wondering whether it will be hosting President Barack Obama in June. The city's Deer Valley Resort will be site of the Western Governors' Association annual meeting. The governments last year met in Jackson, Wyo., and before that in Breckenridge, Colo. Typically, 8 to 12 governors attend the conference to talk about items of mutual interest, including energy and water policy. This year will be no exception.
Park City is no stranger to either presidents or, for that matter, presidential aspirants. Twice during the 1990s it hosted Bill Clinton on skiing vacations. Clinton also spent time in Vail, Aspen, and Jackson. Last year, it hosted Obama on a fund-raising trip, but also President George W. Bush. It is the part-time home of former presidential aspirant Mitt Romney.
Security for these visits is costly. The Summit County Sheriff's Department spent $50,000 last year when Bush was in town to raise money for Republican candidates. David Edmunds, the sheriff, tells The Park Record he believes the cost for protecting Obama could be even higher. "We're living in an increasingly hostile world," he noted.
