1. 



special to the Transcript 



Gorham, N. H., Ma'-nh 31. 



CHINOOK stood on top of a mountain 

 yesterday. Ho led the dog- sled team 

 of Arthur T. Walden of Wona- 

 lanoet, New Hampshire,^ from the Gl«n 

 House here up the eight miles of iced and 

 snowy trail to the Summit House on Mt. 

 ■Washington. It was the first time it had 

 ever been done .with a dog team. It was 

 said to be Impossible to do. 



Five years ago, AValden discussed the 

 trip with Ray Evans, who runs the Willis 

 House at Gorham and who has guided par- 

 ties in the mountains here most of his life. 

 Evans was the only man, o£ the many 

 AValden . UBked, who said that the a'lven- 

 turfl was possible. Evans was the guide 

 jeslerday. Without him and Joe Dod^e 

 and Harold Mohn it would not have been 

 successful. There were times when men's 

 lives were in danger. 



The danger was on the side slopes ol 

 the mountain above the Half Way House. 

 Walden said before the start that dogs 

 could 'not Iteep their feet on glare ice. 

 Over any other snowy footing they can 

 travel and haul a load. They can pull A 

 .'•led up a hill that looks like a leaning 

 wall. Tliey can cross country of any 

 roughness, but they must have footing that 

 gives tlieir feet a grip. When they .strike 

 ice , they begin to slip. Their toe nails are 

 unable to hold them. The probi' 

 reach the roountain on a day 

 tioiis were suitable. 



Ice Worst in Years 



As long ago as last Feb. 21 the plan 

 was projected. It was talked over with 

 Walden one night in the lobby of the 

 Chateau Frontenac at Quebec during the 

 Eastern International Dog Race. Walden 

 and Jake Coolidge of Path« and one other 

 made the plan. It was proposed then that 

 the trip be made immediately after the New 

 Hampshire Point-to-point l^ce of Feb. 25, 

 26 and 37. Tlie date was to depend on 

 conditions on Mount Washington. Walden 

 kept informed of those conditions, he heard 

 first that the Ice above the Halt Way House 

 was the worst in years. The first snow- 

 storm of the winter here was on Oct. 10. 



That first snow is still on the ground 

 in the mountains. But on the ridges where 

 the wind blows almost all the time with 

 terrible fores the ground had been swept 

 cleir. Only enough snow remained there to 

 ■ melt and freeze again as Ice. From that 

 ice- the new snow blew as fast as it fell. 

 That is why there is three hundred feet of 

 snow in Tuckerman's Ravine whence Joe 

 Dodge and his partner, after two nights 

 ■without sleep, rescued Max Bnglehardt last 

 October. The blowing snow from tlie 

 ridges has plied up that three hundred- 

 foot accumulation in the ravine. 



when condi- 



Driviing Tlijou^ii Mountain Beauty 



It was after the middle of March when 

 Walden was notified that there was snow 

 enough on tlie ridge.s. He had finished the 

 Kew Hampshire race and was driving 

 about "N'ew Hampshire and Vermont for 

 pleasure. At North Conway, N. H., last 

 Sunday morning, he took a passenger 

 aboard his sled who was to climb the moun-, 

 tain with him. They slid out of the rutted 

 roads of North Conway into the country 

 where was never a mark of wheel or run- 

 ner. With old Chinook in harness and 

 eight other dogs in the gang hitch, they 

 moved easily up the long lift through Pink- 

 ham Notch. For a few miles the passenger 

 took to sno^vshoes for warmth. Walden 

 rode the runners or ran and then strapped 

 his own snowshoes on. He ran with (hem. 

 as ea.^ily as he walked, webbed slioe lift- 

 ing carelessly over webbed shoe in the long 

 practiced ease of his years on the Alaskan 

 Tundra. 



The day was lovely. The mountains 

 wailed up on either side, their summits 

 bright, their slopes in umber shadow, liven 

 the dark .shadows were clear, perfect 

 was the light in the dry air. The woods 

 were like interminable' etchings in umijer 

 and .sienna, rising to black and purple. 

 Higher still, the snowline banked the edge 

 of the sky with glistening white. Over all 

 in the Wue, hung a cloud like an enormous 



snowshoe. And from time to time the 

 great white dome of Mt. AVashington 

 showed above the timber and higher than 

 the other peaks. Six thousand, two hun- 

 dred and eightq-seven feet above the sea 

 level is its official height. And through the 

 woods were only the puttering tliump of 

 steel runners as the snow settled beneath 

 their quick passage, and the occasional 

 call of the driver to his dogs and the eur£ 

 of the wind in the trees. 



Chinook the Wise and Steady 



Ov. 



.nd 



of : 



the 



:(1 the forest with its soft and 



potent roar, the white ghost of the moun- 

 tain with which men may take no chances 

 lightly, the sinister rush of the softly roar- 

 ing wind. And old Chinook,' pulling stead- 

 ily in the harness ; he was to need all his 

 steadiness, all his intelligence, all of the 

 great strength in his more than one hun- 

 dred pounds of body. For there came a 

 time when he stood at the head of the 

 team o£ young dogs who looked to him as 

 leader on the icy side of Chandler Ridge 

 where the slope sldewise was steeper than 

 the root of a house. Then Chinook's ten 

 years, eight of them in harness, helped 

 to ."lave the team and perhaps the lives of 



The afternoon of Sunday Walden reached 

 Uie Glen House, In the evening others 

 arrived. There were Phil Coolidge of 

 Pathe, Ludwig Geiskop of Pa the, Arnold 

 Belcher of Boston, Joe Dodge from the 

 Ra.vilie House who has been four years in 

 the Appalachian huts and who can \y\W\ 

 perfect ease be reached by letter addressed 

 "Joe. Dodge, White Mourxtaias," and .Kay 



I laid 



ilvans and Harold Mohn of Lynn, who 

 learned his skis in Norway and wliose sltiU 

 with skis is nothing short of wonderful. 



The moon was In the slightly clouded sky. 

 The wind spoke steadily like an invisible 

 ocean. It would not be possible to reach 

 the top in such a wind, said Evans, but It 

 might die down. The thing to do was make 

 the Half Way House by daybreak. With 

 dawn it miglit be still. The wind had been 

 blowing all day, and its sharp burden of 

 enow had been moving like clouds upon the 

 summit. The party left the Glen House 

 just before two o'clock on Monday morn- 

 ing on the first attempt which failed. Thex 

 left equipped with cameras and snowshoes 

 and provisions, with Ice creepers and ropes. 

 Walden was carrying perhaps two hundred 

 pounds on the sled, and Evans and Dodge 

 and Mohn had packs on their backs. They 

 travelled across the open to where the car- 

 riage road of Mt. Washington begins. 



Half Way House Before Dawn 



Tliey entered the forest. The ma 

 the streaked shadows of liranches 

 the hard deep snow of the road. Beneath 

 five feet of that snow lie the tools of work- 

 men who left them there when the first 

 storm broke last October. For the first 

 ■ miles there was no need of snowshoes. 

 The dog team slid ahead and upward faster 

 than any men could climb, and ahead in 

 the moonlit dusk the bright spark of Wal- 

 den's cigarette always showed where he 

 I waiting for the party to catch UP. 

 When they caught him. be stayed a minute 

 rive them rest, and then glided on Into 

 the shadows again. Tlie woods caught the 

 sound of talk and the laughter of men 

 having minor mishaps in a sport to which 

 tlielr muscles were unaccustomed. At the 

 right, the trees gave way for a long look 

 downward to the golden cliain of the light.s 

 of Gorham and to the valley flllecl with 

 moonlight like a basin filled with silver. 

 Far off the wind swept never ceasing 

 through its wild home in the mountains. 



It was not yet dawn when the party 

 reached the Half Way House, whose chains 

 hold it to the ground against the wind. In- 

 side (he house the thermometer registered 

 exactly zeV-o as the first sticks went into 

 the stovie to start the fire. To stand on the 

 porch at the back of the house was to hold 

 to the railing to keep from being blown 

 away. "We'll never make the top today," 

 said Evans. The dogs, out of harness, 

 came Into the house with the men and 

 promptly went to sleep. The job was to 

 keep from stepping on a dog. A pan wa* 

 filled with snow to melt into water for 

 coffee. Now and then a man would stick 

 his head out the door or go out until he 

 was blown back. Over the frozen sea of the 

 mountains, day began with a faint bright- 

 ening of the light. Rose color touched th<> 

 snow of the highest peaks. Clear green 

 made bands across the sky. The colors 

 deepened and tiiultiplied and the round sun 

 broke over the mountains, a dazzling coin 

 as fresh as the day. In a little while if 

 was time to try the last four miles of the 

 climb. 



