As BrieAnne Wilson ’10, M ’12 trudged upward, wind and cold gnawed at her face. It was only November, but the weather had surprised her and her friends with snow and temperatures that dipped below freezing.

Now they were caught in a snowstorm on the side of a mountain in the Adirondacks. Unlike Wilson, who brought winter gear, half the group forgot hats and gloves. Some even neglected to bring winter coats.

BrieAnne Wilson ’10, M ’12 climbed the first of 46 Adirondack High Peaks in 2009 when she scaled Big Slide. Her quest to join the Forty-Sixer Club ended successfully atop Gothics Oct. 29, 2011.

They pushed on through the snow. When Wilson finally hoisted herself up to the summit of Big Slide Mountain, which stands 4,240 feet above sea level, she was greeted by a panorama of New York state’s highest and most rugged mountains.

“The view was absolutely fantastic,” Wilson said. “The fulfillment of getting to the top … I felt very rewarded once I got to the top.”

Since that climb with the college’s Outdoor Club in 2009, Wilson has conquered all 46 of the Adirondacks High Peaks, those that rise more than 4,000 feet.

She was officially inducted as the 7,328th member in the Adirondack Forty-Sixers Club May 27 in Lake Placid.

Wilson dedicated her final mountain, Gothics, to her deceased grandfather, who along with her father got her interested in the outdoors when she was young. On the summit, she placed a memorial and drank a toast to her grandfather with wine she carried up.

Now Wilson has a new goal to climb all 46 High Peaks again, but during winter. That would put her into an even more exclusive club of only 564 who have accomplished that feat.

“You get such a rush from it that you’re like ‘I need to do this again,’” she said.

— Ken Sturtz ’12

Ed. Note: This story originally appeared in the May 23 edition of the Oswego Palladium-Times. This modified version is republished with permission.

A team of Oswego faculty, staff and students successfully climbed Mount Kilimanjaro this January as part of a course. Pictured first row, from left, are Gary Morris '88, master guide Protus and Mehran Nojan. Pictured second row, from left, are Ryan Lemon '00, Leila Karkia, Ariel Powers '12, Hannah Richard '13, Allison Tuttle '12, Ashley Krakau '12, Meg Aguila, Katie Loiacono Maxwell' 97, M '02, Stefania Cornnell '12; Jamie Baldanza and Alyssa Amyotte. Pictured back row, from left, are Anthony Catalano '12; Peter Richard, Brian West '12, Fabio Ritmo '12, Matt Kirkman '12, Chris Bankard '12, Robert Madonia '12, Steve Baker '12, Mac Dillman '12 and Nick Hackenfort '12.

The physical education course co-instructed by experienced climber and Director of Career Services Gary Morris ’88 covered mountain-climbing techniques and preparation in terms of fitness, health, nutrition, essential gear and travel to Tanzania to scale the highest peak in Africa.

At 19,340 feet high, Kilimanjaro is also the world’s highest stand-alone peak. The team’s ascent and descent took eight days and required assistance from a team of porters.

“One of our strengths is hands-on learning, and students learned about working as a team, how to prepare their minds and bodies for the trek and about the importance of setting and reaching goals,” said Lorrie Clemo, interim provost and vice president of academic affairs. “The next time they face a challenge during their college years or careers, they can look at everything they did to scale Mount Kilimanjaro and be confident they can succeed at anything.”

Team members also took time to visit a school in a Maasai village to distribute school supplies as well as to go on a safari.

Wallace “Wally” Reardon ’10 recently received a national award for a tower climber safety project he began in college and continued this summer with Upstate Medical University’s Occupational Health Clinical Center.

Wallace “Wally” Reardon ’10, who worked for years climbing communications towers, has been honored for his work in climber safety.

Climbing communications towers is grueling, dangerous work in all kinds of wind and weather, said Reardon, who climbed towers hundreds of feet high for 13 years. 

“Some of the equipment we hauled up the towers was big, bulky lighting units that often weighed 50 to 60 pounds,” Reardon said. “We would climb up the tower, (with that) hanging beneath us hooked to our belts.”

After witnessing a colleague’s catastrophic injury, Reardon set out gathering stories and data from climbers and managers, working with grieving families and, as a SUNY Oswego senior in 2009-10, completing a tower climbers safety project under Lisa Glidden, assistant professor of political science.

Now he has received a national award for that project, which has become the Workers at Heights Health and Safety Initiative. Reardon accepted the 2010 Tony Mazzocchi Award for grassroots health and safety activism in November at the annual conference of the American Public Health Association in Denver.

He and Patricia Rector, director of
outreach and education for Upstate’s OHCC, also co-presented a paper on the worker-focused approach Reardon has applied to climber safety.

Rector said her organization has applied to the federal Occupational Health and Safety Administration for long-term funding to employ their talented intern, with the vision of taking his program national.

Reardon appeared this July in Washington, D.C., as an invited safety and victim advocate at a national conference of the United Support and Memorial for Workplace Fatalities, an activist group for families of workers who have died in industrial accidents.

— Jeff Rea ’71

The advice of his late father really resonated with Richard Clarke ’82 as he approached age 50 in April. A few months and 19,350 feet later, Clarke reached great heights atop one of the world’s tallest mountains.

“Of all the things I’ve done, this was a killer,” said Clarke of scaling Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak. “It was just so satisfying to get to the top.

Guide Babuu, Richard Clarke ’82, friend Kent Hanson and assistant guide Sira stand atop Kilimanjaro, roughly 19,350 feet above sea level.

“It was just breathtaking — you’re on top of the clouds,” he said.

The altitude and air made the four-day trek particularly difficult, even for the avid cyclist, runner and general adventurer.

To build his endurance in the months leading up to his climb, Clarke played
tennis — for four to five hours a day, most days of the week. The strategy proved effective in training for his 15-hour days walking up Kilimanjaro and developing a mean backhand.

Clarke nurtured his adventurous spirit at Oswego, where he loved cycling all over Upstate New York. Bicycle trips to Syracuse, Watertown and Canada are fond memories, he said.

Late Professor Emeritus Dr. Girgis Ghobrial had a huge influence on Clarke, who initially came to Oswego for meteorology and graduated with a degree in geography. On his trip that included a safari and a stop in Eygpt, Clarke recalled many of the stories Ghobrial, a native of the country, would tell about his homeland.

— Shane M. Liebler