Up!
Ellen Kraly is Back
On a Mountain
For a Good Cause
Ellen Kraly is Back
On a Mountain
For a Good Cause
It's before 6 a.m. and Ellen
Kraly is walking.
Unlike most Hamilton walkers, the
path the Colgate geography professor
and director of the Upstate Institute is
vertical, not horizontal. A trail of
footprints in the heavy dew mark her
steep path up the former ski slope at
Colgate.
She leans into the hill. Each boot she
wears weighs three pounds. She carries
a pair of ski poles and has a backpack
filled with four gallon jugs of water
strapped on.
This is no morning stroll.
Then again, Kraly is not just any walker.
Kraly is walking.
Unlike most Hamilton walkers, the
path the Colgate geography professor
and director of the Upstate Institute is
vertical, not horizontal. A trail of
footprints in the heavy dew mark her
steep path up the former ski slope at
Colgate.
She leans into the hill. Each boot she
wears weighs three pounds. She carries
a pair of ski poles and has a backpack
filled with four gallon jugs of water
strapped on.
This is no morning stroll.
Then again, Kraly is not just any walker.
Kraly is in the final days of training before joining her son Jimmy for a climb up Washington State's Mt. Rainier. The mother/son
team is part of a group climbing the 14,411-foot volcano to help raise money for the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
in Seattle.
This will be the second such climb for Ellen and Jimmy. Several years ago, they climbed Mt. Baker and raised $10,000 for the
Hutchinson Center.
It's no coincidence that they are making the second ascent Aug. 13-15. Kraly has soft spots in her heart for the research center,
Seattle and mountain climbing in general.
Kraly's love for mountains and mountain climbing began as a child. While she grew up in table-flat Ohio, Kraly said she her
parents wanted their children to be exposed to and educated in the East. She went to college at Bucknell and her brother
wound up at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy
But it was while working at a girls camp in the Adirondacks that Ellen discovered and was smitten by mountaineering. She has
since climbed the 46 peaks of the Adirondacks and made an ascent of Mt. Kenya, Africa's second highest peak, on ice and snow,
the kind of climb she will be making in August.
But it's not just her love of mountains that is driving Ellen and Jimmy toward the top of the mountain known historically by
American Indians in the Pacific Northwest as Tahoma or Tacoma, "mother of waters". It's Ellen's history of having breast cancer
that provides the strongest motivation.
In 1994, Ellen was preparing to lead a study group to Australia with another Colgate professor, Randy Fuller. Part of the
preparation was a thorough health check. A chest x-ray showed a tiny spot. Because her impending trip, her doctors expedited
exams and not one, but two biopsies.
"Everything kept coming back clean," she said.
Then, on the day she went to Upstate Medical Center in Syracuse to have the stitches removed, her doctor told her the
pathology exam detected cancer. Australia would have to wait. Surgery didn't.
team is part of a group climbing the 14,411-foot volcano to help raise money for the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
in Seattle.
This will be the second such climb for Ellen and Jimmy. Several years ago, they climbed Mt. Baker and raised $10,000 for the
Hutchinson Center.
It's no coincidence that they are making the second ascent Aug. 13-15. Kraly has soft spots in her heart for the research center,
Seattle and mountain climbing in general.
Kraly's love for mountains and mountain climbing began as a child. While she grew up in table-flat Ohio, Kraly said she her
parents wanted their children to be exposed to and educated in the East. She went to college at Bucknell and her brother
wound up at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy
But it was while working at a girls camp in the Adirondacks that Ellen discovered and was smitten by mountaineering. She has
since climbed the 46 peaks of the Adirondacks and made an ascent of Mt. Kenya, Africa's second highest peak, on ice and snow,
the kind of climb she will be making in August.
But it's not just her love of mountains that is driving Ellen and Jimmy toward the top of the mountain known historically by
American Indians in the Pacific Northwest as Tahoma or Tacoma, "mother of waters". It's Ellen's history of having breast cancer
that provides the strongest motivation.
In 1994, Ellen was preparing to lead a study group to Australia with another Colgate professor, Randy Fuller. Part of the
preparation was a thorough health check. A chest x-ray showed a tiny spot. Because her impending trip, her doctors expedited
exams and not one, but two biopsies.
"Everything kept coming back clean," she said.
Then, on the day she went to Upstate Medical Center in Syracuse to have the stitches removed, her doctor told her the
pathology exam detected cancer. Australia would have to wait. Surgery didn't.
Instead of Ellen going to Australia, the entire Kraly
family made what amounted to a pilgrimage to
Seattle after Ellen's successful surgery.
A family with a deep love of music, they visited the
grave of guitar legend Jim Hendrix, a son of
Seattle. It was in a Seattle music store that her
younger son Geoff, then a pre-teen, bought his
first bass guitar. They even stayed at the Paradise
Lodge on Mt. Rainier.
It was a therapeutic trip that summer, she says.
It was a prophetic journey as well. Now, 14
summers later, Ellen and Jimmy are returning to
the Pacific Northwest to join others climbing Mt.
Rainier on behalf of scientists working to spare
other women from what Ellen faced.
While cancer does not dominate Ellen Kraly's daily
routine, she remains aware of it.
"You don't want to pretend it's not part of your
life," she says.
At times, it seems as though cancer is an
intellectual challenge to be solved. Ellen tells of
having spoken with her doctor about what verb
to use when talking about her cancer: its a "have"
versus "had" question.
Today, this energetic professor, loving wife and
proud mother -- and cancer survivor -- does not
seem overly concerned about parsing out the
language of the disease. For the next couple of
weeks, her focus is on the final preparations for
the trip to Seattle and the Cascade Range;
wondering if she has climbed the hill at Colgate
enough, lifted enough weights.
Once out west, she, Jimmy (who will celebrate his
29th birthday during the climb) and others in the
climbing party will train on the mountain. They will
learn to climb on a mountain covered in glaciers,
to self-arrest, to stop themselves if they begin to
slide on the ice and snow.
"It's come full circle," she says.
If all goes as planned, the team that Ellen and
Jimmy are part of will stand atop Mt. Rainier and
unfurl a string of Tibetan prayer flags. There will
be names on each. On one will be the name of
Scott Kraly's Aunt Irene, who died from cancer
not long ago.
Posted 2008.7.23
family made what amounted to a pilgrimage to
Seattle after Ellen's successful surgery.
A family with a deep love of music, they visited the
grave of guitar legend Jim Hendrix, a son of
Seattle. It was in a Seattle music store that her
younger son Geoff, then a pre-teen, bought his
first bass guitar. They even stayed at the Paradise
Lodge on Mt. Rainier.
It was a therapeutic trip that summer, she says.
It was a prophetic journey as well. Now, 14
summers later, Ellen and Jimmy are returning to
the Pacific Northwest to join others climbing Mt.
Rainier on behalf of scientists working to spare
other women from what Ellen faced.
While cancer does not dominate Ellen Kraly's daily
routine, she remains aware of it.
"You don't want to pretend it's not part of your
life," she says.
At times, it seems as though cancer is an
intellectual challenge to be solved. Ellen tells of
having spoken with her doctor about what verb
to use when talking about her cancer: its a "have"
versus "had" question.
Today, this energetic professor, loving wife and
proud mother -- and cancer survivor -- does not
seem overly concerned about parsing out the
language of the disease. For the next couple of
weeks, her focus is on the final preparations for
the trip to Seattle and the Cascade Range;
wondering if she has climbed the hill at Colgate
enough, lifted enough weights.
Once out west, she, Jimmy (who will celebrate his
29th birthday during the climb) and others in the
climbing party will train on the mountain. They will
learn to climb on a mountain covered in glaciers,
to self-arrest, to stop themselves if they begin to
slide on the ice and snow.
"It's come full circle," she says.
If all goes as planned, the team that Ellen and
Jimmy are part of will stand atop Mt. Rainier and
unfurl a string of Tibetan prayer flags. There will
be names on each. On one will be the name of
Scott Kraly's Aunt Irene, who died from cancer
not long ago.
Posted 2008.7.23