Me and the ATO

Twenty Five years of Terror in the Krumholtz

I first heard tell of the ATO in 1975, when, as a camper at Pine Island Camp, I came to Crag for the first time on one of the many sorties the camp would send out from their base at Belgrades Lakes in Maine.    I do not remember if we actually did moon the cog that very first trip - but I know we talked very little of doing anything else (besides, perhaps, certain unspeakable things to the (then all female) crew of Madison Springs hut).

I returned many times in subsequent years, always to regale in new exploits of the ATO as told by RMC caretakers and in the high camps' log books. As a Pine Island counseler in 1979, I know I mooned the cog, along with a half-dozen of my campmates - I have a picture somewhere that I will eventually dig up and post here - stay tuned. It was July 16th - I remember because it was the one year anniversary of my summiting of Denali, and my last trip to the whites for almost a decade (I moved to the Pacific Northwest shortly thereafter).

When I moved back east, I hooked up with a great group of hiking geeks through my employ with Digital Equipment. We would verture into the high peaks and once again plot incessantly about destroying the Cog railway and taking all the AMC camps with it. The problem, of course, was that there was never enough dynamite to properly do the job. We'd never, ever forget to bring enough hard liquor, but somehow, some way, every time we'd get more than three quarters of the way to the camps, someone would slap their forehead and call out that he forgot the dynamite again. There's simply no other word. Oh well, maybe next time.