The herd shot “round the world”

My story begins on the third day of July in the year 1960. Early that morning, one could have seen Bill Wilson driving a heavily loaded, 18-wheel cattle truck as he began his ascent up the winding road that leads to the summit of the mountain. However, his destination was Summit Lake Flats (Fig. 1A), a broad stretch of tundra lying just below the peak but well above tree line at an elevation of 12,700 feet. He was carrying a load of 10 yearling Hereford steers, 12 Rambouillet/Suffolk spring lambs, and four tons of hay, straw, and pellet feed (Fig. 1B). Bill had been instructed to deliver his cargo to a portable corral that my colleague Jack Reeves and I had fabricated down in Denver. Estelle Grover, my wife, and Donald Will, a veterinarian and previous collaborator in 1958,[1] were coinvestigators on this project.