Sixteen Seattleites Climb Rainier, With Carrier Pigeons and a Night on the Crater

Everett Smith and C. C. Maring, two of the party of sixteen Seattle people who started to climb Mount Rainier, returned home last evening. These two gentlemen did not succeed in reaching the summit, but the rest of the party, when last seen, were climbing upward and passed from view at Crater Peak, the summit of the mountain. Mr. Smith and Mr. Maring are very much sunburned as a result of their week's outing, but they report having a splendid time, and left the rest of the party well and enthusiastic.

In speaking of his trip last evening, Mr. Smith said:

"Last Saturday evening Leo Daft, Ira Bronson, Roger Greene, Jr., and myself left Seattle to join the rest of the party, who were at the Camp of the Clouds. We went from here to Tacoma, and Sunday morning left by steam motor cars for Lake Park. From the latter place we went to Longmire's Springs by stage, a distance of fifty miles. We reached the Springs Sunday evening at 4 o'clock and started on foot for Camp of the Clouds, a distance of seven miles, reaching there at 7 o'clock the same evening. The rest of the party, composed of Maj. E. S. Ingraham, H. E. Holmes, George E. Wright, W. H. Wright, F. W. Hawkins, W. P. Strickland, N. A. Carle, L. M. Leetey, Miss Helen Holmes, Miss Hanna Hall and Miss Bernice Parke, was already there.

"On Monday we all rested in order to be refreshed for the ascent on Tuesday. Tuesday morning at 5:30 o'clock we started out with our blankets and a supply of light provisions. About 10 o'clock we halted at Camp Mair at an altitude of 10,590 feet, and at 3 o'clock that afternoon we sent off one carrier pigeon. The message was wired to his tail. When set free the bird did not leave directly, but perched on a rock pluming himself and fluttering his wings. He had been kept for three days in a small box and evidently was bruised somewhat from knocking about. It was fully an hour before he concluded to start, and then he spread his wings and soared away. It is said that a pigeon ought to be able to cover the distance in forty-five minutes. I see that the bird must have arrived the same evening, for the following morning he was found in the loft and the message was taken off his tail. This was the message which was published in Friday's Post-Intelligencer.

"At 4 o'clock we went on to what is called the Camp of the Stars, an altitude of 12,000 feet. It took us nearly two hours to climb the additional 2,000 feet. The path is very steep, and the rocks and snow make climbing difficult. We slept at the Camp of the Stars that night. This point is away above the timber line, and we had a decidedly cool night of it. Next morning—Wednesday—at 6 o'clock we put calks in our shoes and started upward for Gibraltar, from which place the final ascent was to be made. The passing of Gibraltar, which is 400 feet above Camp of the Stars, is attended with much danger. There is much ice, and the falling rocks, which frequently come from above, make this point the most dangerous of all for the mountain-climber. Maring and myself followed the party as far as Gibraltar, but declined to go any farther. I was cold and my experience the night before at the Camp of the Stars unfitted me for further climbing. We waited and saw the rest of the party pass upward with the aid of ropes toward the summit. Myself and Maring, concluding the experiment was attended with too much risk, returned to the Camp of the Clouds, from which point, with the aid of glasses, we watched the others make the ascent. The first of the party reached the crater at 1 o'clock in the afternoon and the last of them disappeared in the crater at 4 o'clock. We waited until 5 o'clock about the camp and then, satisfied that the party would spend the night on the summit, returned to Longmire's Springs. We stayed there that night and the next day, Thursday, started for home, reaching here at 4 o'clock this afternoon.

"After the first pigeon was liberated, Maj. Ingraham still had two left, a male and its mate. We could not ascertain whether they were released or not, although it was the intention to liberate them from the summit. There was some doubt, however, whether it were possible for a pigeon to sustain itself in the air at so great a height. The air at such an altitude, nearly 15,000 feet, is very light, and birds don't rise that high. Pigeons especially usually soar low."

Mr. Smith says that the party in all probability spent a very pleasant night on the mountain. If they camped on Crater Peak, and they must have, the steam constantly issuing from the crater would keep them warm. On the summit there are three distinct peaks—Crater Peak, Success Peak, and Liberty Cap. Success Peak is a crater, but it is extinct. Liberty Cap is not a crater but a distinct peak. Both Crater and Success peaks have been surmounted, but no one has ever been on top of Liberty Cap. It was the intention of the mountain climbers to make their headquarters in Paradise Valley, but there they found ten feet of snow and so they bivouacked at Camp of the Clouds. The snow in Paradise Valley is melting rapidly and in three weeks the snow will be gone and the valley will be covered with grass and flowers.

Tacoma, July 20.—[Special.]—Signaling by Greek fire here and answered by wood fires on Mount Rainier by the mountain climbers was successfully carried on tonight.