Tag Archives: spring break

Spring Break Signs

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Title: Spring Break Signs

Informant Info: Tessa DeJong is a 19 year-old freshman 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 climbing phobia is the rope breaking as she climbs. She loves the rush of adrenaline that she gets when climbing.

Date Collected: 5/13/16

Place Collected: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH

Type of Lore: Material

Language: English

Country of Origin: United States

Social/Cultural Context: The DMC hosts trips for its members over every spring break. Like many other DOC clubs, it is tradition to steal a sign at the end of the trip and have all members sign it. Usually, DMCers will take a trip to Joshua Tree or Red Rocks National Parks. The trip lasts for about a week. In the past, DMCers would drive to their destination. Today, DMCers usually fly as a group.

Associated File:

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Lore: Each year during the annual spring break trip taken by members of the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club, students steal signs from roads and national parks. These signs are then brought back to Dartmouth and signed by members of the trip.

Informant’s Comments: Stealing and signing signs is a way to commemorate your trip with you friends. The members sign with their nicknames which are usually earned during the trip. Every trip brings back their sign and hangs it in a special room in the climbing gym. The signs are a cool way to cement your trip’s legacy.

Collector’s Comments: The stealing of spring break signs is another example of a ritual marking the end of something, this time the end of a trip. It is also a way for the trip members to commemorate their time together. In addition, by means of this tradition, trip members create their own legacy — future DMCers will see signs from previous years and remember or imagine the people whose names are written on the signs. The act of stealing and personalizing each sign is a way for trips to celebrate their time together engage in a final, team-building exercise.

Tags/Keywords: spring break, material, sign, names, legacy

Spring Break Blessing

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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:

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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