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Road Map for Life

Alumni say the Outing Club taught them everything they need to know

Many UNH alumni who were members of the New Hampshire Outing Club will tell you they received two educations at UNH. One was an academic education, which was excellent, they will add. But with enthusiasm bordering on fanaticism, they will also say that everything they know about leadership, resourcefulness, self-reliance and teamwork, they learned from the Outing Club.

Deb Coles Lauman '90 distinctly remembers the first time she heard about the Appalachian Trail. She was a shy transfer student on her first trip with the club, and they were hiking along Franconia Ridge. Her trip leader said, "So, if you go that way, you can go all the way to Maine, and if you go that way, you can go all the way to Georgia.

"You're kidding," she said. "Has anyone ever hiked the whole thing?"

Ten years later, Lauman completed the entire 2,167.1 miles of the Appalachian Trail in 178 days, starting on Springer Mountain in Georgia and ending on the summit of Maine's Mount Katahdin. For Lauman, the journey led to the publication of her first novel, I. Joseph Kellerman.

"Writing and hiking for me are really companion activities," she explains. "I know where to start, I know where I'm going, but getting there is the fun part, and the challenge." While hiking, Lauman heard a story from another hiker that captured her imagination, and she began formulating a character. "I wrote at night in my tent, with my flashlight in my mouth," she says.

Although Lauman was working as a paralegal before she hiked the Appalachian Trail, she has since decided to write full-time. She credits the Outing Club with the direction her life has taken. "The Outing Club gave me a huge boost of confidence at a point in my life when I needed it most," she says. "Everything that I've learned about myself and everything I've become goes back to the Outing Club and the opportunity it gave me."

In his 40-year career as an artist and teacher, Erling Heistadt '63 can identify two questions that have been central to his professional life: what is the most effective model for the educational process, and how does one create an effective educational environment? Those questions, he says, were formed in his mind back in the days when he was a member of the Outing Club and lived for rock climbing.

Heistadt came to UNH at the age of 16. "I was younger than anyone else, and I hadn't developed any leadership skills," he explains. "The Outing Club is very, very good at helping people develop leadership skills, and it allowed me to step up." Heistadt started UNH as an engineering major, and because of his technical curiosity, he was drawn to rock climbing. He soon became a rock climbing instructor in the Outing Club.

Hal Manion '49, Don Lamson '48 and friend, left; Joan Boodey Lamson '49 gets a hand from Betty Shearer Warner '49, middle; Outing Club members unload gear at the base of Mt. Chocorua, right.

A teacher by nature, he wanted to share his enthusiasm for rock climbing, and he became fascinated with all aspects of the educational process. How do you create interest, he wondered? He rappelled off the belfry of Thompson Hall to advertise his climbing trips. What's the best way to instruct? He managed to get 38 instructors and 150 beginners on a rock wall over a weekend. How do you prevent injuries? He built and tested rescue equipment as part of his engineering major, eventually doing workshops for the Appalachian Mountain Club.

As a junior, Heistadt changed his major from engineering to art. After graduation, he took a job at Dartmouth College, where they asked him to create an art program. Currently resident artist and craftsman at Dartmouth, he has built a studio for jewelry making and pottery, a foundry and a glass blowing shop. He was also instrumental in bringing art to schools in a program he called Project Arise.

"Over the years, whatever project I've taken on, I've used what I think of as the Outing Club model," he says. "For me, it started with the question, 'How do we get a bunch of kids on a rock effectively?' Later on, it was 'How do we effectively expose 16,000 students to art?' Once you get the right question, then it's just a matter of getting your hands dirty."

When Dean Moosavi '98G arrived at UNH in the fall of 1991, he looked for an activity that would help alleviate the stress of being a graduate student and that would help him to enjoy his new environment. Although he had never hiked before, he showed up at the MUB on trip sign-up night.

"I was completely intimidated," he remembers. "There were about 500 people there and they all looked like they knew what they were doing. I had a sinking feeling that I was in way over my head."

Nevertheless, he signed up for a hiking and camping trip. "And I had a great time," he says. "The trip leaders were really good—they didn't seem to mind that I was a graduate student, or that I had no skills to speak of." Moosavi eventually became a trip leader, a senior leader and finally, in 1998, an alumni advisor.

Now at Minnesota State University in Mankato preparing undergraduates who want to become earth science teachers, Moosavi jokes that he "rose from being a private first class to a five-star general." But he adds, "That's what is unique about the Outing Club. The only limits that are placed on your growth are your own limits."

Anne Downey '95G is a freelance writer who lives in Eliot, Maine.

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