Former Dartmouth Outing Club Director Andy Harvard Dies at 69

Hanover — Andy Harvard, a world-class mountaineer who was diagnosed with younger-onset Alzheimer's disease when he was 59, died Wednesday at Dartmouth-Hitchcock's Jack Byrne Center for Palliative and Hospice Care in Lebanon. He was 69.

A feature documentary, The Final Climb, that “parallels the tragedies and triumphs of Andy Harvard's adventurous life with the vast medical, legal and financial implications of Alzheimer's disease,” is due to be released this year. His wife, Kathy, is the independent film's executive producer.

Harvard, a 1971 Dartmouth College graduate, had given up his career as a corporate lawyer in 2004 to work for his alma mater. In 2008, Harvard was abruptly fired as director of the Dartmouth Outing Club. Nine months later, he was diagnosed with the uncommon form of dementia that strikes people younger than 65.

The Harvards fought for more than five years to get the college to recognize that his disease was at the root of the reasons for his dismissal, but never was able to reach a settlement with Dartmouth. 

Posted at 1:30 p.m. on Thursday. See more in the Sunday Valley News column by Jim Kenyon, who has been writing about Andy Harvard’s case since 2015.

 

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