November Enewsletter responses
The following are responses to the Question of the Month in the November 2005 edition of What's New @NU:
Anyone who has spent a winter in New England has a snow story to tell, of getting lost on a mountain, stuck in a snow bank, or falling on the ice and breaking ...something. Send us your most entertaining snow story from your years at Norwich, and we may print it in the December edition of What's New.
I attended Vermont College during the winter of 70-71, and we had so much snow that we were actually able to jump from the second story windows of Glover-Hadley Hall without injury. The things you do when you're 18!
~ Pam Dundon
One very vivid memory of the four winters I spent at Norwich University revolved around an ice storm. Everything was covered in ice - roads, cars, trees, buildings, etc. After realizing that classes were NOT going to be canceled, a classmate of mine and I ventured out to attend our PE class at the Armory. We very slowly made our way in that direction and then that hill going down to the Armory reached our sight. After stopping and contemplating the best way to conquer the hill, we decided to stay close to the side of the road and stay low. We started sliding down the hill, picking up speed very quickly as we moved along. We stayed low and when we reached our destination, we were able to grab onto a car alongside the curb to help slow us down. We were two of very few people that attended class that morning, but I will always remember how exciting it was to make our "plan of action" for getting there. Funny thing is, I don't recall how we made it back up the hill after class!
~Lorrie (McFee) Johnsen '76
You asked about a snow story for your Question of the Month in the Nov online News ... snow sounds nice right now, being stuck "over here" for awhile!
I had never strapped on a pair of skis before I attended Norwich. But during my freshman year, I learned to ski on our great ski slope across the street (you current students have no idea what you're missing!), and by my sophomore year, was hitting the slopes pretty much every afternoon when snow conditions permitted. I was 19, indestructible, and stayed on the slope most days until darkness forced me off. One afternoon, on the "last run," I attacked "Downhill," the bumpiest and most challenging run on the hill. Skis in those days had the safety strap attached to the ankle, which kept the ski from running away, but unfortunately kept it too close in this case. My right boot popped out of the binding as I hit a mogul, and the ski bounced off the bump back up to my face – and knocked me out while leaving a pretty nasty gash above my left eye. I came to on my back, looking at the trees silhouetted against the darkening sky, surrounded by a not too pretty pool of blood, which looked all the more dramatic on the snow. Not knowing how badly I was hurt, I looked toward the lift, which I could just see through the trees, and saw a ski patroller going up for his final sweep of the slopes. I called to him, and he and a couple of other patrollers skied down to me, stopped the bleeding, loaded me on a sled, and brought me to the bottom of the hill. By then I felt fine, so I walked over to the Green Mountain Clinic, where Doc Hyde stitched me up, walked back to the dorm, got changed, and had dinner. No one made a fuss about having a concussion in those days, and I certainly didn’t tell the AFROTC department, since I had a flying slot. But the stitches looked pretty cool, and my accident got better with each telling. "Downhill" remained my favorite run until I graduated.
~Brian O’Connell ’76
