Tag Archives: rock climbing

Miguel’s Pizza

Climbing Status Symbol
“Miguel’s Pizza”

Decker Wentz
Hanover, NH
May 22, 2019

Informant Data:

Decker Wentz is a 20-year-old sophomore at Dartmouth College. He grew up just outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Decker has been rock climbing with his dad since he was four years old. He would climb about monthly with his dad, going to climbing gyms but mostly climbing at various outdoors locations. In his senior year of high school, he began to really take ownership of climbing as an activity that he loved doing, not just one that he did with his dad. When he came to school at Dartmouth, it became one of the most important things in his life, as he joined the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club (DMC) and the Climbing Team. His first DMC trip was an ice climbing trip his freshman winter, and since then he has become more and more involved in the club. Decker is now a leader in the DMC and currently holds the position of chair. He has also been quite an involved member in the social aspects of both clubs.

 

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context: This piece of folklore was collected in a conversation with Decker at Baker-Berry library. Decker first learned about Miguel’s Pizza in a conversation with other climbers where one pointed out another’s “Miguel’s Pizza” sticker, which started a conversation. It is not incredibly common for someone to start a conversation on the basis of seeing the Miguel’s logo, but it is widely recognized if a climber sees another climber with it. Miguel’s Pizza is a pizza place and campground located in the middle of Red River Gorge, a famous and very difficult climbing area located in Kentucky. If a climber goes to Red River Gorge, Miguel’s is the place to stay and to eat. Therefore, the easily-identifiable logo is a sign to other climbers that the person possessing it has climbed at Red River Gorge.

 

  • Cultural Context: Since Red River Gorge is an incredibly good destination for climbing on the east coast with difficult climbing, almost all serious American climbers on the east coast know about it, know about Miguel’s Pizza, and associate the two. Therefore, a climber who goes to Red River Gorge is considered a strong climber. However, as the scope of climbers becomes broader, Miguel’s and Red River Gorge becomes less and less well-known. Generally, American west coast climbers may still recognize the logo of Miguel’s Pizza and associate it with Red River Gorge. However, it is not very well-known in the international climbing community outside of the United States.

 

Text:

Miguel’s Pizza is a pizza place and campground located in the middle of the Red River Gorge climbing area in Kentucky. Miguel’s is known as the place to stay and to eat when climbers go to Red River Gorge, and has a very distinctive logo that says “Miguel’s Pizza” and has the image of a man’s smiling face with flowing blonde hair. After visiting Red River Gorge and Miguel’s, many climbers buy merchandise with the logo on it. Because of this, Miguel’s logo has become a status symbol within the climbing community because the logo indicates that the possessor has climbed at Red River Gorge, which means they must be a very good climber.

 

Sam Drew, Age 20
Hinman Box 0250, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Dartmouth College
Russian 013
Spring 2019

Wine Game

Customary DMC Folklore
“Wine Game”

Alex Derenchuk
Hanover, NH
May 22, 2019

 

Informant Data:

Alex Derenchuk is a senior at Dartmouth College. He grew up in and attended high school in Bloomington, Indiana, but now lives in Tennessee. Alex started rock climbing his freshman year at Dartmouth in 2015 and has been very involved in the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club (DMC) ever since. He is now a leader in the club and has climbed quite often over the years and learned many climbing skills as a result. He has also been quite an involved member in the social aspects of the club.

 

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context: This piece of folklore was collected in a conversation with Alex at Baker-Berry library. Alex was first exposed to wine game during his freshman year after joining the DMC. It is most frequently performed around the campfire at the end of the days of climbing trips during breaks, and also at social events in off-campus apartments in Hanover during the term. All the members of the DMC present will gather in a circle to play wine game, but only those who want to participate will do so. It is usually started by a singular upperclassman or leader in the club.

 

  • Cultural Context: As far as Alex knows, wine game is a custom exclusive to the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club in particular. It is not something that is practiced by climbers belonging to any other group. Wine game is important to the DMC because it fosters bonding among members of the club, both intra-class bonding as well as inter-class bonding. It promotes intra-class bonding because it is a competition between class years, and therefore makes members of the same class year feel as though they are working together. It promotes inter-class bonding because it is another way to bring together club members of differing class years in the same social space to be able to socialize with each other in a different sort of environment than usual.

 

Text:

Wine game begins when the group of members of the DMC come together to form a circle, initiated by an upperclassman or leader in the club. The leader has a one-gallon jug of Carlo Rossi wine, and takes the cap off and throws it away to symbolize that once the jug is open, it must be finished, and the cap will no longer be needed. The jug is then christened with a short dedication led by the initiator to “DMCers past and present,” as well as “the homies and the homeless,” “Earl and Valerie,” John Joline, and Chris Vale. All of these people are important figures in the history of the DMC, and this dedication adds a level of seriousness to the ritual, where all members presents quiet down and listen. When wine game is done around a campfire, a bit of wine is poured out into the fire with each name mentioned. After this christening, the one who performed the christening takes the first swig of wine from the bottle and then passes it on. The aim of the game is to finish the last of the wine from the jug, but the game is done by class year—if you win, you win for your class. Therefore, it is really a competition between class years, not on the individual level. Everybody is only allowed a singular swig, and then must pass the jug on to the next person in the circle. This way, the game is fair, and everyone gets a chance to win it for their class. When drinking, members must hold the jug by their pinky finger and rest it on their bent arm, a method known as “Texas sidearm.”

 

Sam Drew, Age 20
Hinman Box 0250, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Dartmouth College
Russian 13
Spring 2019

The Legend of Devil’s Tower

Climbing Polymodal Folklore
The Legend of Devil’s Tower

Decker Wentz
Hanover, New Hampshire
May 23, 2019

 

Informant Data:

Decker Wentz is a 20-year-old sophomore at Dartmouth College. He grew up just outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Decker has been rock climbing with his dad since he was four years old. He would climb about monthly with his dad, going to climbing gyms but mostly climbing at various outdoors locations. In his senior year of high school, he began to really take ownership of climbing as an activity that he loved doing, not just one that he did with his dad. When he came to school at Dartmouth, it became one of the most important things in his life, as he joined the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club (DMC) and the Climbing Team. His first DMC trip was an ice climbing trip his freshman winter, and since then he has become more and more involved in the club. Decker is now a leader in the DMC and currently holds the position of chair. He has also been quite an involved member in the social aspects of both clubs.

 

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context: Every year, the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club runs trips during the break between two terms to climb away from campus. Polymodal climbing folklore, such as climbing legends and stories, are often shared during the trip either during dinners, campfires, or when the group is just hanging out. Polymodal folklore serves as a way to solidify and pass down group identity from generation to generation. Specifically, having knowledge of the legends within one’s group helps the members of the folk group have a better understanding of their origins, values, and identity. In addition, the telling of legends within a group is often a fun way for the current folk group to bond, and is an entertaining experience.

 

  • Cultural Context: The Devils Tower is a monolithic rock formation in northeastern Wyoming that sits 5,112 feet above sea level. It rises 1,267 above the Belle Fourche River. It is a famous rock-climbing location that is difficult to summit. Since it was first summited in 1893, 5,000 people summit it each year. A total of 5 people have died while attempting the climb. 

    Rescue missions are usually left to professional rescuers, and rarely involve individuals outside of the profession, especially in serious cases. Thus, the fact that the rescue teams asked the founder of the DMC to aid in the mission because they were not able to accomplish the rescue is rare and speaks to the difficulty of the mission. That Jack Durrance was able to successfully rescue the man is an incredibly impressive feat.

 

Text:

[I have recorded The Legend as closely as I could to the way Decker told it to me. The following descriptions were collected from the notes I took during the interview, and are paraphrases of what he shared during the interview.]

Legend has it that a man accidentally parachuted onto the top of the Devil’s Tower and got stuck there. They tried everything they could to rescue him, eventually calling in firemen, helicopters, and even the military, but nothing was working. At that time, the only person who had ever successfully summited the Devil’s Tower was Jack Durrance, who was the founder of the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club. They begged him to help the rescue mission, so he summited Devils Tower again, and safely repelled the man down.

 

Angela Liu, aged 21
2 North Park St., Hanover, NH
Dartmouth College
Russian 13
Spring 2019

“Whipper”

Climbing Vernacular
“Whipper”

Kayla Lieuw
Hanover, New Hampshire
May 22, 2019

 

Informant Data:

Kayla Lieuw is a 22 year-old senior at Dartmouth College from Potomac, Maryland. She is a middle class Asian American woman. Her father was part of the military. Kayla started climbing when she was only eight years old. Her mother was looking for something for her brother and her to do while her father was deployed, and they came across rock climbing. Since then, climbing has become a big part of her life. Before college, she has regularly competed in regional and national competitions. When she came to Dartmouth, she joined the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club (DMC), and has been climbing for all four years of her time here. She also competes regularly at regional and national competitions with the rest of the competitive climbers at DMC.

 

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context: The vernacular term “whipper” is used during conversations between climbers to describe the events that have happened during the climb. The term can refer to climbing events both indoors and outdoors. Kayla shared that she often uses it in conversation to recount climbs to other climbers. An example of the way “whipper” can be used is: “Do you remember when she took a huge whipper during our last session? It was epic.”The purpose of vernacular folklore in climbing is to bolster a sense of community between climbers. Having unique vernacular terms defines an in-group identity for the people who know, understand, and use the term. In the case of climbing, it also serves to distinguish people as members of the counter-culture established by climbers. Vernacular also helps capture ideas that would otherwise be communicated in multiple words in just one word. In addition to verbal efficiency, it also emphasizes the importance of the idea in climbing culture since the folk group has dedicated an entire new term to capture its essence.

 

  • Cultural Context: There are two types of outdoor belayed climbs: top roping and lead climbing. Top roping refers to when there is an anchor at the top of the of the climb, and a rope is run through the anchor, forming a sort of pulley system that keeps the climber safe in case he or she loses grip and falls while climbing. Lead climbing, on the other hand, refers to when the rope is clipped to bolts along the climb. For lead climbing, there are bolts regularly drilled into the climbing wall that are essentially metal loops. Each time the climber reaches a bolt, he or she clips the rope onto the bolt to secure his or herself so that in case of a fall, the bolt catches climber. It is like another pulley system, but with smaller intervals. Thus, the distance of the fall is equal to the distant the climber has covered after securing the rope to the last bolt. If the climber climbs two feet above the last bolt and falls, the climber will fall four feet before being stopped by the bolt.

 

Text:

[I have recorded “whipper” as closely as I could to the way Kayla told it to me. The following descriptions were collected from the notes I took during the interview, and are paraphrases of what she shared during the interview.]

The term “whipper” in climbing refers to when a climber falls while lead climbing. As mentioned above, the fall is a function of how far above the bolt the climber is when he or she falls. The term usually refers to a big fall, but can also refer to smaller falls. A climber can get rope burn when he or she goes through a whipper, especially if it is a big one. Climbers describe the whipper as usually being pretty fun, though if the fall is big, hitting the climbing wall can be painful.

 

Angela Liu, aged 21
2 North Park St., Hanover, NH
Dartmouth College
Russian 13
Spring 2019

“Pumped”

Climbing Vernacular
“Pumped”

Olivia Hunter
Hanover, New Hampshire
May 20, 2019

Informant Data:

Olivia Hunter is a 22 year-old senior at Dartmouth College from Vancouver, Canada. She is upper-middle class and an atheist, white woman. Her demographic background is primarily western European, but she is also part eastern European and Jewish. She has 4 parents—two biological parents and two step parents, and 5 half siblings. Both her father and her step father works in business, and both her mother and step mother don’t work, although her mother is a travel blogger and is sometimes paid to travel. In elementary school and in high school Olivia used to be a competitive athlete as a gymnast and being on a competitive volleyball team. However, after starting college, she realized that she was burnt out from the competitive sports she played in high school, and wanted to try something different and do a sport just for fun instead of for competition. At college, she has many friends who are climbers, and her boyfriend is also a climber. Eventually, one of her friends convinced her to go to the climbing gym at the River Apartments at Dartmouth College, and taught her the basics of climbing. She has been climbing ever since. She decided to keep climbing because it was a fun sport with a great community, and a great way to get exercise. She is not a competitive climber.

 

Contextual Data:

  • Social Context: The vernacular term “pumped” is used during conversations between climbers to describe the state of the climber. It is often used when climbers are trying to finish a climb or trying to end a climbing session. The term can refer to a climber’s condition when climbing both indoors and outdoors. Olivia shared that she used it last weekend to end a climbing session when she was too tired and could no longer do more climbs. An example of the way “pumped” can be used is: “I think I can do one more climb, but I’ll need to call it after that. I’m really pumped.”The purpose of vernacular folklore in climbing is to bolster a sense of community between climbers. Having unique vernacular terms defines an in-group identity for the people who know, understand, and use the term. In the case of climbing, it also serves to distinguish people as members of the counter-culture established by climbers. Vernacular also helps capture ideas that would otherwise be communicated in multiple words in just one word. In addition to verbal efficiency, it also emphasizes the importance of the idea in climbing culture since the folk group has dedicated an entire new term to capture its essence.

 

  • Cultural Context: Climbing is a unique sport because it relies a lot on the climber’s grip strength. Since the fingers are composed solely of joints and ligaments, grip strength comes primarily the climber’s forearm. Because the forearm is usually not a part of the body that is often exercised day-to-day, grip strength is acquired solely through experience in climbing. It can’t be built up from everyday activities, and so is a pretty good indicator of how much muscle a person has acquired through climbing alone.

 

Text:

[I have recorded “pumped” as closely as I could to the way Olivia told I to me. The following descriptions were collected from the notes I took during the interview, and are paraphrases of what she shared during the interview.]

The term “pumped” in climbing refers to when the climber’s forearm is so sore that he or she can no longer move it anymore. It is caused by a lactic acid buildup in the forearm muscles, which are the dominant muscles that are being exercised during a climb. When someone is “pumped”, the muscles on their forearms have been broken down so much over the duration of the climb that he or she can no longer hold on to anything, and therefore can no longer climb for the day.

How easily a climber gets “pumped” is a function of how good or experienced of a climber he or she is. Being “pumped” signals the extent of a climber’s endurance when it comes to climbing. The more experienced the climber, the longer and harder he or she will have to climb to feel “pumped”. The less experienced the climber, the sooner he or she will feel “pumped” when climbing.

 

Angela Liu, aged 21
2 North Park St., Hanover, NH
Dartmouth College
Russian 13
Spring 2019

 

“Beta”

Climbing Vernacular
“Beta”

Matthew Rube
Hanover, New Hampshire
May 19, 2019

Informant Data:

Matthew Rube is a 21-year-old student in his final year at Dartmouth College. He was born in New York City, New York, United States on August 19, 1997. Matt has two younger siblings: a brother and a sister. His mother and father are both lawyers. His family origins are Western European Jewish and Eastern European Jewish (Ukrainian). Matt is white, upper-middle class, and Jewish. Matt has been climbing since he was 11 years old. When Matt started training to be a climber, his parents would drive him long distances and then wait as he practiced. This lead to them picking up climbing too to mediate long hours waiting for him in the gym. His siblings both climb: his sister is a high-level competitive climber and his brother climbs recreationally. Matt has been an elite-level competitive climber since elementary school and to this day. He founded the climbing team at Dartmouth College and was the captain for all four years. He competes indoors and climbs outdoors.

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural Context: Climbing is a very social and collaborative sport. For most types of climbing, there needs to be a minimum of two people: one to belay and one to climb. Usually, two or more people will go to a gym or to an outdoor climbing area together and then trade off on who belays and who climbs on a given route. As such, multiple people tend to be taking turns trying to climb one climb until everyone is satisfied and would like to try a different climb. This setup often results in many discussions about the climbs as people are attempting them or between the attempts. Climbs on the wall will shout down asking for advice and observers or belayers will shout up with different options. Between climbs, groups of climbers will stand around and discuss the climb, pointing out the hard parts and discussing possible strategies or things that had worked for them previously.

 

  • Social Context: The item of folklore collected is a vernacular term used in conversation between two climbers. This term is a very common term and is usually one of the first pieces of vernacular a new climber learns when they begin participating in the sport. Because the nature of this piece of vernacular is to share climbing wisdom, usually it is performed by a more experienced climber to a less experienced climber. However, this is not always the power dynamic at play. Sometimes this vernacular can be used between two climbers of equal level. In this case this is speculative wisdom (i.e. “this might work” or “I think we could try this”) as opposed to definitive advice.

    The purpose of the vernacular is to create a sense of community amongst climbers. There is so much vernacular within the climbing community that it can be difficult to understand conversations about climbing as a non-climber. This likely stems from the significant pride that climbers have as members of a counter-culture. The vernacular serves to create a sense of inclusion and exclusivity. Furthermore, the vernacular works to capture an idea that usually needs to be conveyed with more words; therefore, in addition to being a tool of group-cohesion, it is also a tool of efficiency.

 

Text:    

[I have recorded “beta” not exactly as Matt told it but as close as possible with the notes that I took. This is meant to be an accurate representation of his words, but is ultimately in my own phrasing]

The term “beta” is used by climbers in place of the word advice or strategy. Beta can refer to multiple things: how to do a particular climbing move, how to hold a particular climbing hold, how to get passed a particularly hard section of their current climb. Beta is a noun (i.e. “what’s the beta?” or “I have the beta”).

There is no one beta for a climb. The beta can vary based on the characteristics of the climber. For example, the beta for a short person is going to be different than the beta for a tall person due to differences in reach. The beta can also vary based on the characteristics of a climb. For example, there can be multiple moves that would work to get the climber passed a particularly tough spot on the wall; there are, therefore, multiple betas.

 

Olivia Hunter, Aged 21
22 N Park St., Apartment 201, Hanover NH
Dartmouth College
Russian 13
Spring 2019

“Sandbag”

Climbing Vernacular
“Sandbag”

Matthew Rube
Hanover, New Hampshire
May 19, 2019

Informant Data:

  • Matthew Rube is a 21-year-old student in his final year at Dartmouth College. He was born in New York City, New York, United States on August 19, 1997. Matt has two younger siblings: a brother and a sister. His mother and father are both lawyers. His family origins are Western European Jewish and Eastern European Jewish (Ukrainian). Matt is white, upper-middle class, and Jewish. Matt has been climbing since he was 11 years old. When Matt started training to be a climber, his parents would drive him long distances and then wait as he practiced. This lead to them picking up climbing too to mediate long hours waiting for him in the gym. His siblings both climb: his sister is a high-level competitive climber and his brother climbs recreationally. Matt has been an elite-level competitive climber since elementary school and to this day. He founded the climbing team at Dartmouth College and was the captain for all four years. He competes indoors and climbs outdoors.

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural Context: There are two main types of climbing: bouldering and sport climbing. Sport climbing involves wearing a harness and a rope. The climber is belayed by someone else. The ropes are necessary because sport climbing encompasses going up heights that would be dangerous to do without safety gear. Bouldering, on the other hand, involves climbing shorter heights without ropes. In either case, climbs are graded by difficulty so that climbers can attempt climbs within their skill level. There is no rubric for how climbs are graded; grading climbs is a non-formalized process. Typically, the level of a climb can be determined by experience. The more climbs a person has done, the more likely they are to know what level a climb would be categorized as, and therefore usually the more experienced climbers dictate what grade every climb gets. This is true of both indoor and outdoor climbing.Unfortunately, what can end up happening is that as a climber becomes too experienced, they lose sight of what an easy climb actually is. An easy climb to a highly experienced climber could be an incredibly difficult climb for a beginner. With time, therefore, an experienced climber may begin to grade climbs improperly because their perspective becomes skewed.

 

  • Social Context: The item of folklore collected is a vernacular term used in conversation between two climbers. This term is not a very common term used in climbing and is more often used by climbers who climb outdoors rather than climbers who climb in a gym. The use of this particular piece of vernacular usually signals to the listener that the climber is more experienced; usually beginners are not yet exposed to this term. This is generally a term used in casual conversation when describing a location; that location can be a gym or an outdoor area where lots of people climb.The purpose of the vernacular is to create a sense of community amongst climbers. There is so much vernacular within the climbing community that it can be difficult to understand conversations about climbing as a non-climber. This likely stems from the significant pride that climbers have as members of a counter-culture. The vernacular serves to create a sense of inclusion and exclusivity. Furthermore, the vernacular works to capture an idea that usually needs to be conveyed with more words; therefore, in addition to being a tool of group-cohesion, it is also a tool of efficiency.

Text:

  • [I have recorded “sandbag” not exactly as Matt told it but as close as possible with the notes that I took. This is meant to be an accurate representation of his words, but is ultimately in my own phrasing]
  • The term “sandbag” or “sandbagged” is used by climbers to describe the grading of a climb. A sandbagged climb is a climb that is graded easier than the climb itself warrants. As described above, this usually occurs when a climber becomes too experienced for a certain grade of climb and assigns the climb a grade that is easier than someone at the correct level would actually experience.This term is thought to originate from the idea of climbing while wearing extra weight. If a climber wears a sandbag while climbing, the climb becomes harder than one would reasonably expect when taking on that climb. Therefore, for a climb to be “sandbagged” it’s more difficult than the grading would make you expect, and so climbing it makes you feel like you’re wearing sandbags.

 

Olivia Hunter, Aged 21
22 N Park St., Apartment 201, Hanover NH
Dartmouth College
Russian 13
Spring 2019

 

Mnemonic for Figure Eight Knot

Title: Mnemonic for Figure Eight Knot

Informant Info: Tessa DeJong is a 19 year-old freshman undergraduate student at Dartmouth College. She has been climbing for 2 years and was born and raised in Las Vegas, NV. Her brother taught her how to rock climb. Tessa’s biggest climbing phobia is the rope breaking. She loves to climb for the adrenaline rush.

Date Collected: 5/14/16

Place Collected: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH

Type of Lore: Verbal, Mnemonic

Language: English

Country of Origin: United States

Social/Cultural Context: The figure eight knot is commonly used in a variety rock climbing activities. It is possible most commonly used in top belaying. Knots are important in rock climbing because they allow climbers to secure themselves to the mountain. They are involved in safety procedures.

Associated File:

Figure Eight Knot

Lore: The mnemonic used for remembering a figure eight knot is as follows “This is Charlie, give him a scarf, and punch him in the face”.

Informant’s Comments: The result of this mnemonic is a figure eight knot. The mnemonic is a silly way to remember how to tie the specific knot.

Collector’s Comments: The mnemonic for a Figure Eight Knot is an example of the playfulness that many rock climbers bring to the sport. In addition, it is a way for new climbers to remember how to tie a figure eight knot. This knot is extremely important for safety reasons, so it is imperative that climbers remember how to tie it correctly. The mnemonic both helps climbers remember how to tie  the knot and incorporates the DMC’s playfulness into every day climbing.

Tags/Keywords: knot, figure eight, mnemonic, rock climbing, DMC

Spring Break Blessing

Title: Spring Break Blessing

Informant Info: William Braasch Jr. Billy is a 27 year old graduate student at Dartmouth who is originally from Lyme, NH, now lives in Norwich, VT, and has been climbing for 6 years. His favorite part about climbing is being outdoors and with his friends. Billy first learned about the Spring Break Blessing from older members of the DMC.

Date Collected: 5/25/16

Place Collected: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH

Type of Lore: Customary, Ritual

Language: English

Country of Origin: United States

Social/Cultural Context: When the DMC used to drive to Red Rock National Park for its annual Spring Break Trip, John Joline, who is known as the father of the DMC, would give a speech about Earl and Valarie, the climbing gods. Originally there was only one climbing god, Earl, but many DMC women went out on a spiritual adventure and realized how important Valarie is to the DMC. After this discovery, Valerie was Christened a second climbing god.

Associated File:

Picture1

Lore: The ritual itself involved John Joline blessing the cars and smashing a bottle of wine over the cars. It is important to note that some variations of this blessing beer was used instead of wine. Only after this blessing could DMCers begin the 30 hour drive to Las Vegas.

Informant’s Comments: This ritual ended a year ago when John Joline passed away. Basically, it was a way to kick off each spring break trip. Joline performed this ritual to remind climbers about mindfulness and encourage them to take a moment to reflect before embarking on their trip.

Collector’s Comments: The Spring Break Blessing  is an example of a ritual marking the beginning of something — this time the beginning of the spring break trip. This theme is consistent throughout the majority of rock climbing folklore collected. The Spring Break Blessing seems to be a way to encourage mindfulness before embarking on the trip. It also appears to be a good luck ritual ensuring that climbers will be safe and have fun over spring break.

Tags/Keywords: spring break, blessing, Earl, Valerie, rock climbing, DMC, trip, ritual, initiation

Hike and Climb Trip Tradition

Ritual                                                                                                       Timothy Brennan

DOC Hike and Climb Tradition                                                                  Hanover

5/10/2016

 

 

Informant Data:

Timothy M. Brennan was born in Princeton, N.J. on June 15, 1995 and grew up in Cranbury N.J. He attended Princeton High School and is currently a student at Dartmouth College in the Class of 2017 majoring in government. Outside of class, Tim is a co-captain of the Dartmouth track and field team and the president of Chi Gamma Epsilon. He is also active in the Christian community and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes.

 

Contextual Data:

Tim went on First-Year Trips and was a member of G225- Hike and Climb. Tim never rock climbed before but loved his first experience rock climbing in New England and continues to enjoy it at Dartmouth. He recalls numerous sources of folktale from his trip that are passed down orally including raiding and a poem ritual. This video was taken in his room in Chi Gamma Epsilon and conducted in English.

 

Type of Lore- Customary, Ritual

 

Language- English

 

Country of Origin- USA

 

Social/Cultural context: This video was taken in his room in Chi Gamma Epsilon in a relaxed setting and was conducted in English.

 

Transcript and Informant’s Commentary:

After the first night in the wilderness, the hike and climbers descend from the mountain top at the Dartmouth ski-way to the climbing location near the Dartmouth ski-way lodge. Along the way, the “klimbing croo” stops the group as alien robots and learns about the trippees, leaders and their time thus far. The way the klimbing croo does this changes every year but the function stays the same.

 

Additionally, after the first day of climbing when the sun is setting, the klimbing croo, trip leaders and trippees meet on top of the final cliff they climb overlooking the Holt Cliffs. At the top, they form a circle as the students discuss their hopes, fears, plans, and anxieties for their next four years at Dartmouth. The trip leaders and klimbing croo also give advice to the trippees. Then, they stand in a circle holding hands with the right arm crossed over the left and recite a poem. Each line first spoken by one of the croolings and then repeated by everyone:

 

I am strong and beautiful.

The world is wide, my future full.

I know I find myself akin

To moose and trees and rocks and men

No matter where I find myself

If on a rock or on a couch

Or strolling across the campus green

I will not forget…

To know that I, like one small rock

Am a part of the great Mt. Moosilauke

And that the woods are there for me

As when college first began

At the end of the poem everybody spins outwards, and because of the way the hands are cross the circle is unbroken with each person facing outwards.

Everyone symbolically and physically moves from facing inwards to outwards, preparing to move on from trips into Dartmouth, to grow from who they are, into who they will become.

Collector’s Comments: This ritual seems to be near the end of the rites of passage for first-year students at trips. The poem and talk emphasize that they are about to leave the comforts of their friends and the woods and incorporate into the new world of Dartmouth.225, Hike and Climb,

Tags/Keywords: 225, Hike and Climb, poem, rock climbing