Warren, n.h.
Construction is ongoing for an approximately 11,500-square-foot wooden lodge at the base of Mount Moosilauke off of New Hampshire Route 118 in Warren, replacing the original that was built in 1938 and worn beyond reasonable renovations, according to DOC director Daniel Nelson.
The new structure will feature a larger central area on the main floor around a huge stone fireplace, a more well-equipped kitchen, three private rooms for overnight guests and a meeting room, according to literature provided by DOC.
Its lower level will include a combined library and social space, a multipurpose room and additional restrooms. The building will contain vastly improved insulation and meet existing codes for mobility impaired accessibility, something that would have been difficult to implement in the old structure.
“The original building had a life expectancy of 50 years. It lasted 78, but it was bursting at the seams,” Nelson said. “The doorways and the stairways weren’t up to code, and there was significant log rot. Aside from that, the capacity of the dining room was too small and it became clear we were going to need to accommodate better. (The original building’s) useful life had come to an end.”
News of the project elicited mixed feelings from Dartmouth’s alumni, many of whom identified with the old lodge for introducing them to the school and the region.
According to Nelson, 90 percent of incoming Dartmouth students participate in the optional first-year trips, sending them on any of a number of outdoor excursions such as backpacking, kayaking, mountain biking and even farming before convening at Moosilauke Ravine Lodge. There they share stories, make meals for one another and engage in various bonding activities before heading to Hanover for their first quarter of classes.
DOC President Alex Lochoff, a senior, remembers fondly his Moosilauke Ravine Lodge experience after a canoeing first-year trip prior to freshman year.
“We did all kinds of goofy stuff, just getting to know each other,” Lochoff said. “You have a big dinner, watch movies, sing songs, learn about the DOC and other organizations. There’s a lot of community and team building. … I think the old building was much beloved, but a lot of us are looking forward to the improvements of the new facility.”
To help preserve the aesthetics and ethos of the original building, nearly all of its interior decorations — artifacts such as old trail signs, classic cross country skis and snowshoes and taxidermy — will be re-established in the new building. Even some of the logs from the old building will be integrated into the interior of the new one.
“A lot of people, including myself, had so many good times at the old lodge,” said Nelson, a 1975 Dartmouth graduate. “But what makes the place special isn’t really the building, but the mountain, the community created and the relationships that define the spirit of the place.”
There are numerous efforts ongoing to preserve the memory of the original lodge.
Prior to its demolition this year, Dartmouth students Lily Xu and Alex Weinberg built an exhaustive library of photographs to help create a three-dimensional rendition of the lodge, inside and out, which they hope to have viewable online by the spring. The process of for the 3D model they’re pursuing is known as photogrammetry.
“We’ve been working with (technical advisor) Emily Whiting and a geography professor on mapping the landscape with the use of software,” Xu said. “A picture is really a two-dimensional representation of a 3D object, so we had to take many pictures at different angles to get their true geometry.”
Another project helping to immortalize the original Moosilauke Ravine Lodge comes thanks for the efforts of 2016 Dartmouth graduates Connor Gibson and Georgianna Anderson.
They built a website, www.sharingthemountain.com, that features written stories, photos, audio clips and video of lodge visitors sharing memories.
Twenty-three authors so far have produced material for the site, broken into categories such as “cooking,” “jokes/humor/fun,” and even “disasters.”
The latter features recounting of tales such as “The Great Lodge Poisoning of 2012,” an incident of undercooked chili by Molly McBride, and “Frozen Water Pipes,” a description by 1998 graduate Rosi Kerr about her and her peers’ curious approach to tackling that problem.
The site is punchy, most of the written stories confined to a few paragraphs and many of the audio clips three minutes or fewer.
“We spent about 45 minutes speaking with each of the contributors, but we wanted to break everything into categories so users can learn about specific instances and experiences,” Gibson said. “We also didn’t want (users) to need to have a long attention span, so we edited everything down into short clips.”
Gibson is one of many who has longstanding memories of the Moosilauke Ravine Lodge, having visited regularly since his parents, Dartmouth graduates Peter Gibson and Margie Wallace Gibson, began bringing him there when he was in grade school.
Another regular visitor is former Dartmouth cross country skier and 1984 grad Viva Hardigg, a 1984 graduate and one of more than 100 supporters who gathered for a “last supper” at the old lodge in September, days before its destruction.
Hardigg remembers fondly coming of age at the lodge, where she was part of various student crews who maintained the facility and served for a time as its manager.
“It was the ultimate training ground for cross country and Nordic skiing, and I just fell in love with the place,” Hardigg said. “I learned so much there: how to cook and how to braid hair, for example. We braided each other’s hair at the same time we were braiding bread. There was a swinging door and always someone playing music out on the porch.
“There were always so many inspirational people around, people like (former Dartmouth ski coach) Al Merrill and Everett Blake, who was just full of folksy wisdom and was the caller for square dances.”
Led by project manager James Pike, of Bradford, Vt., the new Moosilauke Ravine Lodge project is continuing through the winter months.
It figures to be finished in time for the August gatherings of 2017 first-year students.
The Moosilauke Ravine Lodge is generally open to the public, both for overnight stays and for many of its functions and events, including live music and dinners. Hardigg hopes the new lodge will inspire more from outside the Dartmouth community to visit.
“Some people realize that you don’t have to have a Dartmouth affiliation to take advantage of the Ravine Lodge,” said Hardigg, who sits on the facility’s Board of Trustees. “It’s open to the whole community.”
Jared Pendak can be reached at jpendak@vnews.com or 603-727-3225.