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UA Launches Drive to Assist Family
of Dr. John McCall
A territory-wide fund drive for the
family of the late Dr. John McCall was initiated this morning by the
faculty student body and Alumni Association of the University of Alaska.
An organizational meeting was held early this afternoon, with
representatives of the three university groups and the town of Fairbanks
present.
Thirty-one-year-old John McCall, an
instructor in geology at the University of Alaska and the territory's
only glaciologist died Friday night of polio. He left a wife, Mary Ann,
and four children, aged four months, two, three and eight years.
Represents Students
Representing the student body in the
fund campaign is Dean Hughes. The faculty is being represented by Dean
Earl A. Beistline of the school of mines, and the alumni throughout
Alaska by Bruce Thomas, president of the association. The fund drive in
town is aided by the Daily News-Miner, with Jack Ryan, editor, as
director.
One activity of the drive will be
the showing, at a date yet to be announced, of the color slides taken by
Dr. McCall during the dramatic rescue last May of George Argus, injured
mountain climber stranded on the 11,000-foot level of Mt. McKinley.
Color slides taken by Les Viereck, now in the possession of Fairbanksan
Morton Wood, of the climb which resulted in the rescue will also be
shown. It is tentatively planned that one showing of the films will be
held in town and one at the university.
Came Here Year Ago
Dr. McCall became an instructor at
the university a year ago following his return from a three-year study
stint in Europe. He received his PhD, in glaciology from England's
Cambridge university in June of 1953, becoming the first person to
obtain such a certificate from that institution. It is estimated that
there are only 11 glaciologists in the world, five of whom are in the
United States.
During McCall's field work for his
PhD, he spent a year observing the properties and flowability of a
glacier in the Jotunheim area, west of Lillehamar, Norway. He was the
first man to dig a tunnel 400 feet deep for this purpose. McCall and his
co-workers spent 12 hours a day for 40 days tunneling down the 400 feet.
Got B.S. Degree
The glaciologist came to Alaska in
1948 and completed his studies for a bachelor of science in engineering
which he had begun at the Pennsylvania State University. In that year
he, in the company of other Alaskans, climbed to the top of Mt.
McKinley , a mountain he was to return to six years later at the head
of mercy rescue mission.
McCall was born in Port Arthur,
Tex., in 1912 [sic] and was married in Fairbanks in 1949.
The educator's wife and four
children live on College road in the university area. ,
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