Category Archives: History

Kev Reynolds

Book Review: The Mountain Hut Book by Kev Reynolds

By Laurel Bradley & Sam Demas

With the Mountain Hut Book, the prolific and trusted guidebook author Kev Reynolds offers an enjoyable and highly informative tour of the hut experience, and recommends some favorite huts and hut to hut traverses.   The book is an invitation to new audiences – outdoor enthusiasts whom the author is convinced will become hut-to-hut hikers once he uncovers mysteries shrouding this venerable pastime.  Hut novices will come away from this delightful prose traverse of alpine huts full of ideas about where they want to go, what to expect, and how to plan a hut trip.

[For a firsthand feel for the book read an excerpt (at the end of this review) from the first chapter.]

What is a hut, anyway?  Reynolds skillfully charts the evolution of alpine huts from primitive mountain shelters to comfortable hostelries “claiming eco-friendly credentials”.  Two definitions frame the subject: Walt Unsworth, Encyclopaedia of Mountaineering, 1992 offers the original definition of huts as shelters for mountaineers: “a mountain hut is a purpose-built refuge situated at some strategically high place in the mountains so that one or more peaks are readily accessible from it.  It may vary in size from a simple bivouac shelter to something resembling a small hotel in size and facilities.”  Contrast this specialized notion of the hut with Reynolds’ modern mountain hut: “A bit like a youth hostel, offering simple, reasonably priced accommodation and meals in a magical setting for visitors taking part in mountain activities.”

The mountain huts Reynolds extolls are far from the rudimentary garden shed or simple wooden cabin that the word “hut” conjures for many.  This book radiates the author’s enthusiasm, and his many positive experiences.  He revels in the architecture: “I love the diversity, the sheer variety of hut buildings.” Photographs, mostly by the author, confirm this observation—readers see small stone huts, large stucco lodges, and a few highly sculptural modernist structures. 

The Mountain Hut Book
Kev Reynolds, courtesy literaryfestivals.co.uk

At the heart of the hut experience is, of course, the gorgeous mountain setting.  As a serious outdoorsman and guide, Reynolds provides perspective on how huts support trekkers, climbers, walkers, and wildlife watchers in indulging their passion for high altitude pursuits day after day.  The experience of taking shelter, and overnighting at the hut is central to this avocation.  Reynolds warmly conveys his appreciation of hut warden hospitality — with delightful sketches of some venerable hut guardians — and conjures the convivial atmosphere of mountain huts.  “Arrival at a hut invariably comes with a sense of relief, for it’s a guarantee of shelter, somewhere to relax, freshen up, slake your thirst and settle the nagging hunger that comes from a long day’s effort.”  Chapter two initiates the reader into the joys of hut life. With friendly conversational prose,  Reynolds provides personal accounts, memories, impressions and information on everything from sleeping and eating, to bathrooms to sociability. 

Mountain Hut Book
Hut conviviality, courtesy Kev Reynolds

While The Mountain Hut Book is not as detailed as many of Reynolds other 50 guidebooks, it provides expert practical direction to those fired up to learn more.  The chapter “Top Ten Huts” highlights a tiny but well chose sampling of these structures, in Switzerland, France, Italy, and Austria.  Not surprisingly, the European Alps are closest to Reynolds’ heart; he started his career as a mountaineer and guide, and has written extensively on hiking, mostly in the high heart of Europe.  “Hut to Hut,” the next chapter, presents a selection of ten classic multi-day routes in order of difficulty.  Illustrated with photographs of massive peaks which dwarf huts below, pristine lakes, verdant meadows, the descriptions are guaranteed to get the reader dreaming about their next walks.  This chapter includes clear maps, brief but useful route descriptions, and practical information including hiking times, level of difficulty and scenic features. Recommended guidebooks, many available from Cicerone Press, include even more detail about these classic walks. 

Plan Sec Hut, Photo by Jonathan Williams, Courtesy Cicerone Press
Triglav Hut, Slovenia, Courtesy Kev Reynolds

Finally, Reynolds sketches in the larger context mountain accommodations. Looking beyond the European alps, he offers brief information about bothies, lodges and huts in other parts of the world.  Reynolds omits information about huts in Greece, Slovenia, Scandinavia, Australia and elsewhere.  His focus is on high mountain huts; the book is not intended as a comprehensive view of huts. Using the European alps as the model, it admirably evokes and explains the mystique of the high alpine hut experience.  The Mountain Hut Book fills a gap in the literature and is highly recommended for purchase as a gift – for ones-self, friends and family – and for purchase by libraries serving communities with interest in the outdoors.

By Laurel Bradley and Sam Demas, January 2019

Excerpt from Chapter 1 of the book, courtesy Cicerone Press:

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Shelter from the Storm: dream team, genesis and impact

Shelter from the Storm: dream team, genesis and impact

Sam Demas, September 5, 2018

(Note: this is part of the larger work New Zealand Huts: Notes towards a Country Study)

{Photo above by John Rhodes, courtesy Shaun Barnett}

Shelter from the Storm: the story of New Zealand’s backcountry huts deeply influenced my understanding of huts and how they are — in addition to shelter — both evolving cultural reflections of the terrain and the society in which they exist, and also manifestations of human relationship to nature.  I was so excited when I first read the book that I wrote an extended review in hopes of increasing sales/readership in the USA.  While traveling in New Zealand I learned how profoundly the book has shifted Kiwi perceptions of huts as a treasured elements of culture and history.  As an offshoot of talking with the authors and the publisher I pieced together a little bit about the genesis of the book and its publishing history.  Talking with trampers all over New Zealand I heard repeatedly about how the book has shifted perceptions and the national conversations about huts.  I am now even more impressed by the book and am moved to share my deepened enthusiasm.

The full impact of this book has likely only begun to play out.  It is a classic.  While I am clearly not the best person to write about its publishing history, what follows is the germ of a story I really want to tell to my hut friends in the USA.  So, I am moved to jot here some threads about the publishing history of this book, musings about its impact in New Zealand, and some personal notions about the future of huts.

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New Zealand baches

The Kiwi Bach – New Zealand vernacular architecture

The Kiwi Bach

Photos and text by Janet Abbott, art historian and bach historian, Christchurch, NZ

“Build them yourself on land you don’t own, out of things you’ve pinched from somewhere.”  

(Paul Thomson, The Bach 1985)

Huts, cabins and shacks are most commonly called baches in New Zealand. Pronounced ‘batch’ as in bachelor, these tiny holiday houses, often by the sea, are held close to the hearts of many Kiwis. There is nothing so fine as to travel over a winding, dusty road with the kids in the back, a stop to pick up fish and chips, and then arrive at your bach. The door opens to that particular aroma that belongs to the ancient furniture and musty magazines, and together with the sounds of sea, the birds, the wind in the trees, this transports you back to the carefree living of endless golden summers past. You can feel the sun on your skin, the sting of the sunburn and the ever-present sand in the sheets of your bed.  The excitement of catching a fish, climbing the cliffs, boating into sea caves and tobogganing down grassy slopes plays at the edge of memory. This is the kiwi bach.

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New Zealand Huts

New Zealand Huts Country Study: introduction

NZ Huts Notes for a Country Study: Introduction

By Sam Demas, hut2hut.info

(Note: this is part of the larger work New Zealand Huts: Notes towards a Country Study)

What and why? (purpose, scope, and audiences)   

The immediate purpose of this series of web posts, which are knit together by an annotated Table of Contents, is to provide a substantive overview of the world’s largest hut system.  This is an invitation to learn more about the remarkable culture and system of huts and tracks in New Zealand. Continue reading

New Zealand Huts History

Historical perspectives on NZ Department of Conservation huts and tracks

by Sam Demas

(Note: this is part of the larger work New Zealand Huts: Notes towards a Country Study)

New Zealand huts history: one cannot grasp the meaning, extent, challenges and opportunities of huts in NZ without a bit of historical perspective.  Huts and tracks everywhere reflect the culture and terrain of the nations in which they evolved; this is vibrantly evident in New Zealand.  The piece provides historical perspectives on the DoC hut system only, and does not treat the broader scope of other (i.e. non-DoC) huts and tracks in New Zealand, e.g. privately owned huts.

 

What follows is a small historical sketch providing context for the other posts on NZ huts.  At the end of this post is a list of books for readers who want more than a cursory introduction to the historical context of huts in NZ.

The focus here is on the contemporary history of how the NZ Department of Conservation (DoC) — established in 1987 — came to inherit the world’s largest and best organized hut system, and how it forged the disparate parts into a coherent, government-operated system of about 962 huts.  A few key events in DoC history between 1987 – 2010 highlight how this transformation took place.  During this period about 100 new huts were built, most to replace existing structures in poor condition. Continue reading

New Zealand Huts – How Many and What Kinds?

(Note: this is part of the larger work New Zealand Huts: Notes towards a Country Study

A Tally and Taxonomy 

This is an attempt by an outsider to convey to other outsiders a quick visual, numeric and organizational overview of the wild and wonderful range of New Zealand huts.  Most, but not all, are available for recreational tramping.

The count, or “Tally”, attempts to enumerate “huts” (broadly construed) in categories corresponding to how they are discussed by hut folks in NZ.  The description, or “Taxonomy”,  briefly defines these same categories and illustrates them with some examples that give a sense of the variety of hut designs. Continue reading

Summit Huts: Historical Notes

Notes on the history of the Summit Huts Association

Picture of Janet White Tyler on skis.

Staying in the Summit Huts and talking with folks involved in founding and running them, one is struck by the sheer number of friendships, connections and remembrances that permeate the huts and weave them into a strong hut community.  This moved me to dig a little deeper into the history of Summit Huts Association – essentially an outsider scratching the surface for a few days — and here are some notes on the history of this remarkable community-based hut system.  This is a placeholder for a more in-depth account in future.  Need to add photos of founders and staff.  See Summit Huts Photo Gallery for relevant documents. 

Not surprisingly, SHA was inspired by its neighbor and partner, the Tenth Mountain Division Huts Association (10MD) and by a memorial hut.  In 1985 Dr. John Warner and his friends Tim Casey, John Cooley, Bob French, Jon Gunson, and Rick Hum were on a hut ski trip at the Friends Hut near Aspen.  Friends Hut was built as a memorial to a group of friends killed in a private plane crash.  Browsing through the photo album documenting the conceptualization and construction of the Friends Hut, John Warner said, “Hey, we can do this!”.  And they did!

They began meeting informally, and at the urging of Dr. Ben Eiseman, a founder of the 10MD, they incorporated in 1987 and began making plans and fundraising.  The original plan was to establish 8-12 huts in Summit County.  A survey of potential sites identified about 40, which was narrowed down to 12 possible locations.   Over time the regulatory environment got more restrictive and the larger plan was replaced with the aspiration to build 5-7 huts.  Today, after 8 years in the planning the fifth, Weber Gulch Hut, is nearing construction.  Most folks involved seem to believe this will be the last of the Summit Huts to be built.

SHA established a strong, working Board, Leigh Girvin Yule was hired as Executive Director in 1994, working with Scott Toepfer, Hutmaster and avalanche expert.  A Friends of the Summit Huts group was started and it appears that great community volunteer and philanthropic energy was generated quite quickly.  As part of this, a community visioning process around the huts was undertaken in the late 1980’s.

Janet’s Cabin was built in 1989/90 and Francie’s in 1993/94.  Local architect and SHA Board Member John Gunson designed both of these first two cabins.

Janet’s Cabin, a three-story log building, was built as a memorial to Janet White Tyler, 1926-1983.  Janet was an enthusiastic, life-long skier and a great lover of life.  She was by all accounts a woman of real grace and charm, who knew how to make people feel comfortable in her presence.  She was known for her friendly conversation and for the hospitality she extended in her Vail home.  Family and friends raised about $200,000 towards the construction of the cabin, The Town of Breckenridge contributed some funds, and a huge amount of volunteer labor went into the construction project, which in the end was estimated to cost $385,000.

The logs for Janet’s cabin were flown in by helicopter, and there was a helicopter accident after the last batch was dropped off.  Pete Wingle, a former 10MD and SHA Board member, was instrumental in working with the U.S. Forest Service in planning the Cabins and assisted SHA in many ways.  Before retirement, Wingle served as Director of Recreation for the region that includes Colorado, and was an expert on ski area development.  He pioneered in helicopter construction of ski lifts as a more environmentally sound method.

Francie’s Cabin, very similar in design to Janet’s, was opened in 1994.  It was built as a memorial to Frances Lockwood Bailey, 1953 – 1989, who died in a commercial plane accident (in which two of her sons were injured). Francie was known as a kind, gentle, caring and artistic woman who took pleasure in the small things in life.  She was a graphic artist and started a business designing children’s wear called “Baby Boomer Designs”.  Francie was an enthusiastic skier and loved the Breckenridge area.  Her friends and family were inspired by the idea of building a cabin in her memory.

Herb’s Sauna at Francie’s Cabin is dedicated to one of Francie’s brothers, Herb Lockwood, who died in a construction accident shortly after finishing college at Hamilton College, where he wrote his senior thesis (a copy of which is at the hut) on the geology of the drainage systems of Crystal and Mohawk Lakes near Breckenridge.

Ken’s Cabin and Section House are a great example of public/private partnership in preserving historic buildings.  The USFS uses the buildings and site as an historic site interpretive center in summer, and provides a special use permit to SHA to use these historic buildings as ski huts in winter.

Ken’s Cabin (1864) is one of a cluster of four historic buildings at Boreas Pass.  Owned by US Forest Service, Ken’s Cabin (built as Wagon Cabin) and Section House (1882) were built as living quarters for railroad workers and their families.  They were part of a very small settlement housing employees of the South Park Highline, one of two rail lines operated by the Denver and South Park and Pacific Railroad built to connect Denver to the mining districts on the other side of the Continental Divide.  once had a post office and a population of 25.

Section House (sleeps 12) is a delightful period structure that evokes the history of this lonely railroad outpost with a restoration that took place in mid-90’s, a great old wood kitchen stove, metal bunk beds.  It was opened as a SHA ski hut in 1998.

The adjacent Ken’s Cabin was renovated and opened as a ski hut in 1999 (?).  This three-person cabin, restored by SHA and USFS, is dedicated to the memory of Ken Graff, MD (beloved friend and pediatrician), who died at age 33 in an avalanche near Francie’s Cabin on January 15, 1995.  On the first weekend that Francie’s cabin was open he skied up to reconnoiter for a group trip the following Thursday.  Skiing about a half mile from the Cabin he was killed by an avalanche.  There is a moving journal entry by the people who discovered his ski tracks that were suddenly covered by a fresh avalanche, with no tracks coming out the other side of the avalanche field.  The search and rescue effort included flying in the rescue dog “Hasty”, and his owner Patty Burnett, from Copper Mountain.  Hasty located the body within five minutes of arriving on the scene.  Ken was not a registered guest at Francie’s but had stopped there for lunch before skiing towards his death.  He chatted with the two couples who later discovered the avalanche and wrote the account.  

The SHA received a special use permit from the USFS in June 2015 for construction of its fifth hut, Weber Gulch Hut. The site was one of those identified in the 1980’s site selection process. During the environmental assessment process, several public concerns surfaced: impact on wildlife — specifically habitat for Canada lynx, pine martens and elk ­— and off-site parking for the hut’s users. Construction is estimated to cost between $1 million and $2 million.  

 

Sperry Chalet

Sperry Chalet – historic hut in Glacier National park

Sperry Chalet: historic hut in Glacier National Park

[Featured image (1914) above by Fred Kiser, Courtesy Ray Djuff Collection]

By Sam Demas, October 2017

Sperry Chalet, a much-loved historic hut in Glacier National Park, came to national attention on August 31, 2017 when the main lodge, or “dormitory” was badly burned.  Sadly, I never visited Sperry.  This is not a first-hand account; like many others, I still hope to get there some day.  Efforts are underway to rebuild and re-open this early exemplar of high mountain hospitality. May they succeed!

This post is an appreciation of Sperry Chalet as one of the oldest and most beloved high mountain huts in the nation.  It sketches the hut’s history and architecture, and briefly treats its prolific namesake Lyman Beecher Sperry.  This post is based entirely on secondary sources, mainly the work of Ray Djuff, but others as well.  Apologies in advance if any errors crept into my account.

For fuller information about the present and future — i.e. the Sperry fire, present conditions and efforts to re-build — please see the article by Ray Djuff, which he kindly granted Hut2Hut.info permission to print and the October 19 Glacier National media release reporting on the stabilization efforts to help the structure (which lost its roof and floor) weather the winter.

For fuller historical information about Sperry Chalet see chapter 10 (p. 128-137) of Glacier’s Historic Hotels and Chalets: View With a Room by Ray Djuff and Chris Morrison (Farcountry Press, 2001).  For a touching, first hand post conveying the depth of affection Sperry has engendered among park visitors and staff, see Courtney Stone’s Remembering a Grand Lady: the Loss of Sperry Chalet, 1913-2017.  And the website of the National Park Lodge Architecture Society.

Origins of the second oldest hut system in the U.S.

Between 1913-1915 the Great Northern Railway (GNR) built a system of nine Backcountry Chalets (see my separate post on this early hut system) and four hotels to provide park visitors with horseback (and hiking) access to the interior of the park.  This makes it the second oldest hut system in the USA, and until sometime in the 1930’s or 40’s it seems to have been the nation’s largest hut system.

Until the 2017 fire, Sperry and Granite Park Chalets were the last remaining backcountry chalets in this once-grand hut system. The Glacier huts (and hotels) were sited in places of great natural beauty, each one a day’s horseback ride apart from another lodging option.  Designed in the style of Swiss Chalets, these hut complexes were part of the railroad’s efforts to market Glacier as “America’s Switzerland”, as part of a promotional campaign aimed a wealthy Americans to “see America first”.  See the introduction to Glacier’s Historic Hotels and Chalets: View With a Room for an excellent overview of this ambitious initiative advanced by Minnesota railroad barons James Jerome Hill (the Empire Builder) and his son Louis Warren Hill, Sr.

Sperry Chalet: quick historical sketch

Built on the precipice of a magnificent cirque, Sperry Chalet offers some of the finest views in Glacier and provides access to to nearby Sperry Glacier.  The Great Northern Railroad was anxious to build on this strategic site to gain a monopoly on access to one of the most popular destinations in the park.

Legally designated a National Park in 1910, the Great Northern Railway (GNR) was quick to establish a near monopoly on lodging in Glacier.  Sperry was just one of a dozen or more construction projects initiated soon after formal designation as a national park.  At Sperry a tent camp was constructed in 1911 and hosted 461 visitors in 1912, its first season.  Construction on the stone kitchen and dining hall began in 1912 and the facility opened in 1913.  The “dormitory” — accommodating 75 guests — was constructed in 1913 and opened in 1914, and supplemented by a tent camp (which operated until WWI) accommodating another 75 guests.

The hut is accessed by 6.7 mile trail from Lake McDonald (with a 3,300′ elevation gain) and a gentler, scenic 13.7  miles through Gunsight Pass.  The blazing of the trail to the site of Sperry Chalet is an interesting story related below.  Accessible only by horse or by foot, Sperry Chalet is renowned for its views, remoteness, and its mountain hospitality during its 60 day operating season.  Even without electricity, the level of amenities made for genteel comfort in a backcountry setting.  In the early days lighting was provided by kerosene lamps, running cold water was available in the dormitory rooms and hot water was delivered on request.  The buildings were heated by wood stoves. Plentiful servings of good food was provided, family style, three times a day in the dining room.

Sperry Chalet

Sperry dining room and kitchen in 1920’s, Courtesy Ray Djuff Collection

The hut was supplied by pack horses from Lake McDonald.  Human waste from outhouses and gray water were tossed over the cliff until the environmental effects became intolerable (see below) by 1992.  Lounging on the balconies to watch the sunset was a favorite activity.

Sperry, along with the other Glacier lodgings, suffered financially during the Great Depression. After the initial completion of the Going to the Sun Highway in 1933 park visitors increasingly visited by auto and overnights at the backcountry Chalets dropped off. 

Sperry closed (1943-46) during WWII.  By the end of WW II all but 2 of the chalets were accessible by car, the demand for saddle trips fell off dramatically and the railroad deemed the Chalets out-moded or unsupportable.  The GNR sold Sperry to the National Park Service for $1.  The Park Service let the hut as a concession to Martha Russell.  In 1954 the concession went to the Luding family, who operated it for many years.

What kept Sperry and the few remaining backcountry chalets going during the 1950’s and into the 1960’s was use by enthusiastic and fit cliques of park and concessionaire employees.  Ray Djuff says this was a second golden age of the chalets, which became prized hiking destinations for those in the know.  The back to nature movement of the 1960’s and backpacking boom of the 1970’s precipitated yet another golden age, which continues today.  People love these huts.  Getting reservations has long been very competitive, and will certainly be harder still in future.  As in Yosemite, the interest in backcountry huts on national park lands is intense.  Sperry continued to operate through August 2017 in much the same way as it did in the early days, as rustic shelter for backcountry travelers who appreciate comfort and conviviality at the end of a day of hiking in fabulous mountains.

[Coda: It is interesting to speculate what the Glacier hut system would look like today if the other backcountry Chalets at Glacier had been able to survive the incursion of the automobile into the center of the park.  If, like Sperry and Granite Park, they had been able to hold on until the environmental movement and backpacking boom a generation later, Glacier still might have one of the largest and oldest hut systems in the USA.  In any case, Glacier still has Sperry (assuming it will be rebuilt) and Granite Peak as reminders of a different era in National Park Service backcountry lodging options.]

Sperry Chalet, note rock work mimicking log joints, Courtesy Wiki Media

Architecture

Both of the main buildings comprising the Sperry Chalet complex were built of local stone and lumber from the area.  The kitchen/dining building was built by Italian stone masons in1912. Both structures were designed by architect Kirkland Cutter of Cutter and Malgrem in Spokane.  The one story 22’x80′ Kitchen and dining hall was a fairly unassuming stone structure.  The 32’x90′ two story lodge or dormitory, was built in the style of a Swiss chalet.  The balconies were a favorite feature of guests.  A nice detail in the stonework is the use of stone to look like the corner joints of a log cabin.  Following is the architectural data included in the description on the website of the National Park Lodge Architecture Society:

Sperry Chalet • Glacier NP, 1913
Classification IV
Location:
 Sperry Trail, Lake McDonald, Montana
Theme: Swiss Chalet; National Park Rustic “Parkitecture” with multiple rectangular structures
Original Architect: Cutter and Malmgren; some sources list Samuel Bartlett. Glacier Park Hotel Company
Construction: Glacier Park Hotel Company (later renamed Glacier Park Company), subsidiary of Great Northern Railway. Most aspects of design and construction were controlled by Louis Hill, president of GN Railway.
Structure: Two storey stone dorm building with asphalt roof, multiple porches and dormers. Interior walls cedar tongue-and-groove, floorboards are painted wood, interior and exterior railings are peeled log. One storey kitchen-dining room building, stone structure with wood shingle roof.
Known Timeline:
Construction begins, 1912
Kitchen/dining room building completed, 1913
Open for guests, 1914
Closed due to war, 1918
112 total season guest count due to depression, 1932
Dormitory altered, 1940
Closed due to war, 1942-1944
Concession transferred to Luding family, 1954
Dormitory altered, 1955
Dining Room altered, including roof replacement, 1961
Deck and balconies replaced, 1978-1979
Restoration of entire complex, 1996
New restroom building added, ca. 2008
Presently offers 17 guest rooms

Environmental impact: the “million dollar toilet”

For years kitchen waste was pitched over a cliffside and became, as in many national parks, a public viewing ground for the nightly feasts of “garbage grizzlies”.  In response to problems with beats attacking people in a number of national parks, culminating in several lawsuits after bears killed humans.  NPS implemented strategies (e.g installing bear boxes, visitor policies, and closing of dumps in the park) to break the connection in the minds of bears between people and food.  At Sperry a new strategy — packing out the kitchen waste beginning in 1954 — was implemented long before the aforementioned NPS policy changes.

Disposal of sewage was a harder problem to fix. While flush toilets were added in 1964, sewage disposal continued as before: dumped over the mountainside.  By 1992 the unenlightened practice of disposing of sewage finally caught up with the National Park Service.  The pollution effects of this practice were no longer possible to ignore; Montana state water quality tests were one indicator that precipitated discussions of Sperry’s future.  Sperry was closed after the Sierra Club Environmental Defense Fund threatened to sue NPS for this defilement of a beautiful high mountain area.  The cost of fixing the sewage problem was deemed prohibitive by NPS, which had many other pressing priorities.  NPS decided to close Sperry Chalet and Granite Park Chalet, which had similar conditions.

This decision prompted a public outcry in the form of a “Save the Chalets” lobbying and fundraising effort.  Public pressure resulted in action from the Montana legislators, getting Congress to direct the NPS to keep the chalets open and allocating $3.3 million to implement solution.  The funds were used to effect renovations at both huts, but most of the funds went to fixing the sewage problem (the most costly component was helicopter fees associated with complex backcountry construction).  Sperry and Granite Park were closed from 1992 – 1999 during  construction and renovation.

The elaborate project attracted much press coverage about the “million dollar toilet”.

Alas, the expensive toilets were removed in 2005 due to non-performance — they could not achieve a sufficiently high temperature conditions to actually compost the waste.  They were replaced with latrines using sealed drums, which were used to haul sewage from the huts by helicopter to a sewage treatment plant.

Today we know from experience that siting of high mountain huts is a significant challenge.  Site selection for Sperry Chalet was done quickly by the railroad, and without sophisticated consideration of the long term effects of human use, in particular waste disposal.  Sites like those of Granite Park and Sperry Chalets would no longer make it through the screen of an Environmental Impact Statement process.  However, high mountain huts “grandfathered in” are extremely popular and can prompt extraordinary measures to keep them open in compliance with environmental stewardship principles and practices.

Lyman Beecher Sperry: professor, naturalist, sanitary scientist, trailblazer

Sperry Promotional Brochure, Courtesy Carleton College Archives

Lyman B. Sperry, the namesake of Sperry Glacier (after which Sperry Trail and Sperry Chalet were named)  was a talented with many interests.  He was trained as a physician, taught at a number of midwestern colleges (Oberlin, Ripon and Carleton), promoted the establishment of Glacier National Park, and was a tireless lecturer on nature-based travel and on topics concerned with public health and human sexuality.

Several aspects of Sperry’s connection with Glacier Park are related in “Lyman Sperry and the Last of the Firsts”, a chapter in Randi Minetor’s book Historic Glacier National Park: the Stories Behind One of  America’s Great Treasures (Rowman and Littlefield, 2016 ). Apparently Sperry visited the Glacier area with two purposes in mind: to purchase land in the Avalanche Lake area as an investment, and to explore the wonders of the magnificent landscape.  In the end it seems his appreciation of the beauty of the region — or something like that — trumped his pursuit of land acquisition.

At some point (it is not clear if this happened before or after the discovery of Sperry Glacier, but I assume it was before) Sperry was approached by an agent of the GNR and asked to explore the region.  Sperry already had a reputation as a lecturer and promoter of travel and, according to Djuff and Morrison,

“Sperry was enticed to explore the Glacier Park region by a Great Northern Passenger agent who asked him to “make such observations as you shall find practicable regarding our scenic attractions.”  It was the first hint of the railway’s interest in developing tourism in Glacier — more than a full decade before the area became a national park. 

In June 1895 Sperry visited the Avalanche Lake area in the region that would become Glacier National Park.  Homesteader Charles Howe told him about a U-shaped valley he had discovered, and about a sighting from the top of Brown Mountain of a large glacier.   The thought of finding a new natural feature in a region that had been pretty well explored was exciting.  They went as far as the edge of the huge basin in June and realized they needed more  time and gear to do a proper exploration.  Sperry returned in August 1895 (with his nephew Albert L. Sperry and Prof. L.W. Chaney, a geologist from Carleton College) and mounted an expedition into the basin and measured the elevations of the surrounding peaks, made some geological observations, and analyzed the water of Avalanche Lake, determining its composition indicated the source was glacial meltwater.  There was clearly a glacier in the mountains high above them, and they looked for a way to find it.  They reached the edge of the massive glacier and determined they would have to return to complete their exploration and documentation.  Sperry wrote up his findings in the January 1896 issue of  Appalachia, and returned in summer 1896 to climb onto the glacier and fully document it.

Like the GNR, Sperry soon became a fervent promoter of the idea of protecting Glacier as a National Park.

The next step was to provide visitor access to this remarkable discovery.  Sperry went straight to J.J. Hill to propose he fund trail construction from Lake Mcdonald to Sperry Glacier. It seems Hill was intrigued but concerned because the land was not yet protected as a National park and he ran a risk of losing his financial investment.  Sperry suggested the job could be done inexpensively by letting him (Sperry) hire a fifteen students at the University of Minnesota to build the trail in a summer.  Hill agreed to let the students do the work (apparently without pay) and provide them transportation to and from the park on the Great Northern.

[A final note on Lyman B. Sperry the lecturer and promoter: he traveled the nation and abroad for over 30 years lecturing on “Sanitary Science”, an early tributary of what later became  the disciplines of public health and human ecology.  His lectures at colleges and through YMCA programs, focused particularly on societal and individual  problems of sex and narcotics.  Sperry was part of a movement to counter the effects of roving quacks who dispensed advice and medications that confused young people and also filled them with fears and misunderstandings about these little-understood matters.  Among his lecture topics were “Male and Female”, “Human Longevity”, ‘Brain and Nerve”, “Narcotics and Narcoticism”, “Superstitions, Delusions, and Fads”, “Friendly Enemies”, and “Gumption and Grit”.  By all accounts he was a powerful lecturer.  With all this practice, its no wonder he was convincing in his promotion of national park status for Glacier, a topic for which he also developed strong conviction.]

Author’s note: I am deeply grateful to Ray Djuff for his research, on which I have drawn heavily, for our phone conversation, and for his providing the images used in this post.  Ray  is passionate in his research and generous in sharing his knowledge and resources.

Glacier National Park Backcountry Chalets: historical notes

Glacier National Park Backcountry Chalets: historical notes

by Sam Demas, based on conversation with and the work of Ray Djuff

Glacier National Park backcountry chalets

“View with a Room” book cover

These are notes on the story of a once-grand backcountry hut system in Glacier National Park.  Based on phone conversation with Ray Djuff, reading his remarkable book, and looking at additional sources, I have pieced together the bare bones of the story of the second hut system built in the USA (AMC huts first, and High Sierra Camps third).

The fire that burned the Sperry Chalet dormitory accelerated my interest in learning more about the Glacier backcountry lodging system.  Articles about the fire cited Ray Djuff and one referred to his excellent book (written with Chris Morrison) Glacier’s Historic Hotels and Chalets: View with a Room (Farcountry Press, 2001), which traces the history of the the extensive system of lodges and chalets built and managed by the Great Northern Railway (GNR) to promote railroad visitation to Glacier National Park (the creation of which the GNR vigorously promoted).  You can read much of the very informative first chapter of this book on Amazon.com.

While the chapter on Sperry Chalet was of immediate interest, I enjoyed reading the entire book and highly recommend it (see a book review by Jerry Fetz).  Ms. Morrison and Mr. Djuff write in historical detail about this amazing  example of how the railroads lobbied for national parks, secured transportation and lodging monopolies at them, and, in the case of Glacier and the Great Northern Railway, along the way, developed huts and trails, primarily to promote horseback access to remote parts of the parks.

For more on the relationship between America’s national parks and their development as tourism destinations by the railways, see Alfred Runte’s book Trains of Discovery: Railroads and the Legacy of our National parks” by Alfred Runte (Roberts Reinhart Book, 5th ed., 2011).

In addition to Djuff and Morrison’s book cited above, for more detail on the chalets than what is offered below, see Courtney Stone’s moving blog post The Loss of Sperry Chalet, and the National Parks Lodge Architecture Society website.

***

While Louis Warren Hill, son of James J. Hill — the “Empire Builder” — swore he didn’t want the GNR to be in the hospitality business, he vigorously oversaw the development of a system of 3 large hotels/lodges (Lake McDonald Lodge preceded the GNR hotels), 9 chalet groups, and a number of tent villages.  The grand lodges and hotels are still operating, but the tent villages, most of which were very short lived, are long gone.

The 9 chalet groups (comprising sleeping quarters, dining/cooking area, staff quarters, and sometimes associated cabins) of primary interest here were all originally built (most in the period 1910 – 1913) to provide rustic but comfortable lodging for park visitors traveling into the backcountry by horseback, carriage, or boat.  The railway was promoting the park as the Switzerland of America and Hill was enamored of chalet architecture (his summer home “North Oaks” outside St Paul, MN was a grand chalet).

While comparatively few people hiked to the chalets in the early days, “tramping” was at least a small part of the hut/chalet culture from the beginning and the GNR promoted it as an inexpensive option.  The GNR courted hiking and mountaineering groups, as Djuff and  Morrison report:

Hill [Louis W. Hill] ensured that members of the Chicago Geographical Society, the Seattle Mountaineers, and the Sierra Club of California all received sponsored (often all-expense paid) trips to Glacier.  Then their travelogues were printed by the railway and distributed.

The use of the chalets changed quickly during the 1930’s and 1940’s. With the rise of the automobile people increasingly visited the park by car rather than by train, and apparently many were reluctant to leave their cars behind to take slower moving backcountry trip.  The 52 mile Going-to-the-Sun Road (constructed 1921 – 1933) traveled east to west and going over the Continental Divide,  opened the center of the to automobiles.  Of course the Great Depression also took its toll on visitation.  Where visitors before the 1930’s would typically spend 2-3 weeks in the park, car culture shortened visits to 3-4 days.  The auto helped propel a mentality still common today: “Check. Been there, done that. Off to the next park”.

Glacier National Park Lodgings 1917

Glacier National Park Lodgings, 1917 map by Great Northern Railroad. Courtesy Ray Djuff Collection.

The first golden age of the backcountry chalets for non-motorized travel was from 1913 up to the Great Depression.  Some had short lives: Gunsight Chalets, one of the most popular in the early years, was obliterated by a land slide in 1916.  But what killed them off was the automobile and the development of roads.  By the end of WW II all but 2 of the chalets were accessible by car.  The demand for saddle trips fell off dramatically and the park began to emphasize car camping.  After WW II the Chalets were deemed out-moded or unsupportable by the GNR:

  • three hut complexes were torn down because they were no longer in demand and were in poor condition from disuse: Cut Bank, St Mary’s, and Going-to-the-Sun;
  • the chalet group at Swiftcurrent Lake was turned into an “auto camp”, with cabins for people driving in the park;
  • the Great Northern Railroad sold three chalets: Belton, Sperry and Granite Park; and
  • GNR retained Two Medicine chalets, but they were not much used after WWII and were torn down in 1956 (except for the dining hall and log store, which remain today as historic landmarks).

According to Ray Djuff, who worked for a time at the Prince of Wales Hotel in Glacier, what kept the few remaining backcountry chalets going during the 1950’s and into the 1960’s was use by enthusiastic and fit cliques of park and concessionaire employees.  Djuff says this was a second golden age of the chalets, which became prized hiking destinations for those in the know.  The back to nature movement of the 1960’s and backpacking boom of the 1970’s precipitated yet another golden age, which continues today.  People love these huts.  Getting reservations has long been very competitive, and will certainly be harder still in future.  As in Yosemite, the interest in using the few backcountry huts located on national park lands is very strong.

Each of the chalet groups is discussed in greater detail, and illustrated with period photos and promotional brochures and notices,  in Glacier’s Historic Hotels and Chalets: View With a Room.

Glacier Park Lodging

The Mountaineers of Seattle ready to take a hike, GNR Promotional Brochure, Courtesy Ray Djuff Collection

With the burning of the Sperry Chalet Dormitory on August 31, 2017 (the kitchen and dining building are undamaged), the only remaining backcountry chalet is Granite Park. Because Sperry Chalet is such a rare and beloved backcountry lodging, there is deep sentiment that it should be re-built and re-opened.See my separate post on Sperry Chalet and a piece by Ray Djuff on the fire that further diminished the once-grand hut system in Glacier National Park.

Sperry Chalet Dormitory, Sept. 10, 2017. Note the original iron beds, which held up well in the fire and after many seasons of use! Courtesy Ray Djuff and Glacier National Park Conservancy.

 

 

Among the supporters of this effort are the Glacier National Park Conservancy, Secretary of the Interior Ray Zinke (a Montanan) and the two U.S. Senators from Montana.  See Ray Djuff’s article about the fire and the future.

Author’s note: Sadly, I never visited Sperry Chalet.  At this time I don’t have time to do in-depth research so this is a brief sketch of a big topic.  Fortunately there are a number of good sources to which I refer the reader for more detail.  This post is a placeholder.  It is comprised of notes from sources I plan to revisit and expand upon, including noodling around in a preliminary way in the rich literature on lodging experiments in the U.S. National Parks and the relationship between the railroads and the National Parks.

The National Parks Lodge Architecture Society provides some excellent architectural and historical information along with links about the chalets, including:

Glacier NP Lodges

Glacier Park Lodge Resources

Recommended Reading

 

 

 

 

 

Ray Zillmer: Ice Age Trail Founder

 

By Drew Hanson, http://pedestrianview.blogspot.com/

Ray Zillmer left for posterity Wisconsin’s greatest trail, the organization that promotes and protects it, the Badger State’s first and still only backcountry huts and a backpack full of conservation and exploration accomplishments.

Born in Milwaukee, WI in 1887, Zillmer attended Harvard Law School and received his PhD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. From 1914-1960, he practiced law in Milwaukee.

Ray Zillmer in Canadian Rockies

During the 1930s–1940s, Zillmer became an accomplished and respected explorer and mountaineer. In 1934 Zillmer was part of a team of five mountaineers who completed the first ascent of Anchorite Peak, British Columbia, Canada. He would go on to summit many other peaks and describe previously uncharted lands.

In the summer of 1938, he and a companion retraced the steps of Alexander MacKenzie’s 1793 expedition between the Fraser and Bella Coola rivers, through part of what is today Tweedsmuir South Provincial Park. He described the adventure in detail in his first of four articles published in the Canadian Alpine Journal.

The American Alpine Journal also published several of his exploration and mountaineering articles, including:

“The Exploration of the Source of the Thompson River in British Columbia”, 1940;

“Exploration of the Northern Monashee Range”, 1942;

“The Location of Mt. Milton and the Restoration of the Names ‘Mt. Milton’ and ‘Mt.Cheadle'”, 1943;

“The Exploration of the Cariboo Range from the East”, 1944;

“The Exploration of the Sources of the McLennan River”, 1946.

In recognition of his accomplishments, Mount Zillmer, Zillmer Creek and Zillmer Glacier in British Columbia’s Cariboo Range were all named in his honor.

Back in his home state of Wisconsin, in addition to being an accomplished attorney at law, Zillmer had a keen interest in natural history. He was well aware of Wisconsin’s rich array of landforms created during the Pleistocene. Indeed, North American geologists refer to the last phase of the recent ice age as the Wisconsin Glaciation. During this by-gone epoch, vast oceans of ice that covered northern latitudes would make today’s disappearing alpine glaciers seem like mere creeks of ice.

One of the unique areas of Wisconsin is the Kettle Moraine, a belt of ridges and depressions created by the combined action of two lobes of a Pleistocene ice sheet. It is the place where geologists first determined that Pleistocene ice sheets had lobes and that interlobate regions had their own set of landforms. Through the Izaak Walton League, Ray Zillmer was a leading advocate for the acquisition of land for the Kettle Moraine State Forest, which today covers 55,000 acres within a hundred-mile corridor.

For many years Zillmer led weekend hikes to explore the Kettle Moraine during fall, winter and spring. The hikes were memorable for the miles covered as well as the lunch which consisted of various cans of soup brought by fellow hikers, all combined into a single pot.

In the 1950s he worked closely with the Wisconsin Conservation Department (precursor to the DNR) to design backcountry huts for hikers in the Kettle Moraine State Forest. He then donated thousands of dollars to their construction. These nine shelters remain the only set of backcountry huts in Wisconsin.

Ice Age Trail map

Ice Age Trail map

In 1958 he established the Ice Age National Park Citizens Committee and the Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation, later renamed the Ice Age Trail Alliance. His articles proposing an Ice Age National Park in Wisconsin were published in 1958 by the Milwaukee Public Museum and in 1959 by Wisconsin Alumnus magazine. The proposed park and a long-distance hiking trail through it would follow the Kettle Moraine of eastern Wisconsin and continue west along the terminal moraine to the state’s western boundary. Bills were introduced in Congress to create an Ice Age National Park in Wisconsin.

Zillmer’s insistence that long, narrow corridors of public land serve greater numbers of outdoor recreationists than the big national parks of his day and his proposal for a long-distance hiking trail in Wisconsin made an impression on Wisconsin Governor Gaylord Nelson. Armed with this appreciation and later as a U.S. Senator, Nelson introduced legislation to designate the Appalachian Trail the first National Scenic Trail and introduced the National Trails System Act of 1968. Congress finally designated the thousand-mile Ice Age Trail a National Scenic Trail in 1980.

In 1933 the Wisconsin Izaak Walton League named Zillmer “Man of the Year” for his work on the Kettle Moraine State Forest. In 1959 he was presented a plaque by the National Campers and Hikers Association for his efforts to preserve natural areas for public use. A trail system in the Northern Kettle Moraine State Forest is named the Zillmer Trails and a park in St. Croix Falls is named Ray Zillmer Park, both in his honor. He was inducted into the Wisconsin Conservation Hall of Fame in 1993. Today the highest award of achievement given by the Ice Age Trail Alliance is the Ray Zillmer Award.

Following his death in December, 1960 the Milwaukee Journal opined, “…the people of Milwaukee and of Wisconsin and the conservation movement nationally are deeply indebted to Mr. Zillmer. His vision, his boundless energy and his dogged determination in behalf of worthy causes to which he was devoted became legend . . . No community and no state ever has enough of men like Raymond T. Zillmer. And the loss of even one, inevitable as it may be, is cause for deep regret.”

 

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Sources:

“Our Greatest Trail”, Erik Ness, Wisconsin Trails magazine, April 2002, Vol. 43, No. 2

“Climb Anchorite Peak”, The Montreal Gazette, July 23, 1934.

Along Wisconsin’s Ice Age Trail, University of Wisconsin Press, 2008, page 8.

“Scorning A Glacial Gift”, The Milwaukee Journal, August 21, 1988.

“Origins of Wisconsin’s Ice Age Trail”, Sarah Mittlefeldht, Wisconsin Magazine of History: Volume 90, number 3, spring 2007, page 7.

These American Lands, Dyan Zaslowsky and T.H. Watkins, Island Press, 1994, pages 258-259.

Ice Age Trail Alliance, http://www.iceagetrail.org/iata/history/

“The Wisconsin Glacial Moraines”, Milwaukee Chapter of the Izaak Walton League, 1942.

“The Wisconsin Glacier National Forest Park”, Lore, Milwaukee Public Museum, vol 8, edition 2, 1958.

“Wisconsin’s Proposed Ice Age National Park”, Wisconsin Alumnus, March, 1959

American Alpine Club, http://publications.americanalpineclub.org/articles/12196134700/print

 

Drew Hanson blogs at pedestrianview.blogspot.com