File talk:Lute Jerstad on Sahale Summit 8-66.jpg

I was climbing with friends in the North Cascades, August, 1966. After reaching the summit of Sahale Peak near Cascade Pass, we decided to spend a bit of time, eat lunch, and look around. Suddenly we heard talking, laughing, and when we looked around we saw a group of a dozen or so people coming up the back side of the peak. In the lead was Dick McGowan, Lute Jerstad and Ira Spring. We moved down our ropes a bit from the summit so everyone could come up and stand on the top. In the process I had a nice conversation with Ira, Lute and Dick, and came to know Lute well enough to invite him for a talk at our mountaineering club at Oregon State University in Corvallis.

Lute was at U. of Oregon in Eugene finishing his PhD. in Eastern Theater, and I was finishing mine in Mathematics. I asked him if he'd show slides and he said he'd love to but would have to charge our club 100$, an amount agreed on by the Everest expedition members. When I asked if he had any personal slides he'd like to show, his eyes lit up and he asked if he could show slides of his research in Nepalese theater -- then mentioned they had plenty of mountains in the background.

I jumped at the chance, of course, and we had a great show, great conversation, and we treated Lute to dinner afterwards. I kept in touch with him for a bit after that before we went our separate ways.

Had I been smarter in 1966, I would have taken many more photos of all the people. In particular, there aren't many pictures of Lute on the Internet, so I'm delighted to supply this one.

Jack Zelver Jack-z (talk) 21:21, 27 December 2010 (UTC)