Presentation on December 12, 1911

His Hunting Experiences in East Africa. 

President Theodore Roosevelt discussed his big game hunting safari in East Africa. He provided vivid descriptions of this relatively unexplored area of Africa along with tales of his encounters with the wildlife living there. 

Presentation on May 28, 1909

On his Journey from Buenos Ayres to Lima,  across Argentine, Bolivia, and Peru.

Dr. Bingham was an American academic and explorer. He talked about his rediscovery of the existence of the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu, with the guidance of local indigenous farmers.

Presentation on November 15, 2002

Shackleton Returns! The Antarctic, Ireland, the Shackletons and One  Hundred Years of the Harvard Travellers Club. 

Three generations of Shackletons have spoken at the HTC beginning with Sir Ernest Shackleton (left), famous for the 1914–17 Endurance voyage, where his leadership ensured all crew survived after their ship was crushed by ice in Antarctica.

Presented on January 12, 2016

90 degrees latitude and longitude…Incredible!

At the Club's 850th meeting, Wendy Booker told her inspirational story. Diagnosed with relapsing-remitting MS in 1998, Wendy decided that she was not going to take her diagnosis sitting down. She ran the Boston marathon and then 12 more after that. She climbed 6 of the Seven Summits of the world – attempting Everest twice in the process, mushed to the North Pole with a team of sled dogs and skied to the South Pole – setting records and breaking through barriers all the way.

Wendy is now a National Ambassador for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society sharing her message across the country to the MS community. 

Presentation on March 23, 1954

Seven Years in Tibet.

In 1939, a young climber named Heinrich Harrer, who had achieved fame for being a member of the first team to scale the north face of the Eiger in the Swiss Alps, traveled to India on a climbing expedition. Then World War II broke out, and Harrer and all other German nationals in India were rounded up and imprisoned by the British. In 1944, Harrer  escaped and headed up into the mountains of Tibet. Two years later, after an exhausting journey on foot over 65 mountain passes and across the Tibetan plateau in the dead of winter, he arrived in the forbidden city of Lhasa. Harrer stayed for five years, eventually becoming a friend and tutor to the teenage Dalai Lama.

His autobiographical story, the subject of this presentation, was captured in 1997 in a movie, Seven Years In Tibet.

Presentation on January 13, 1906

An  Account of his Antarctic Expedition, 1901-04. 

Otto Nordenskjöld, a Swedish geographer and geologist, led an Antarctic Expedition in 1901 where his ship was trapped and crushed by ice. Otto narrated one of the greatest survival stories ever – one that even rivals Shackleton’s Endurance 13 years later.

Presentation on March 8, 2011

Alone on the Wall

Six years before climbing Yosemite’s 3,000-foot El Capitan without ropes or other protection (“free solo” climbing), Alex Honnold presented “Alone on the Wall,” a visually stunning short movie of his early free solo climbs, including Half Dome. This viewing, and a lengthy follow-up Q&A, provided an intimate look at his motivations, mindset, and other elements that would allow him to complete a free solo climb of El Capitan, that has been called one of the greatest athletic achievements of all time. Subsequent to his HTC presentation, Honnold authored (with HTC member David Roberts) the memoir Alone on the Wall (2015) and was the subject of the 2018 biographical documentary Free Solo, which won an Academy Award and a BAFTA.

Presentation on November 13, 2012

Birds of Paradise

Rainforest biologist, Tim Laman, Ph.D., spent over 12 months of field work in New Guinea, spaced over 7 years, completing a comprehensive photographic study of the most spectacularly ornamented birds in the world, the Birds of Paradise. This was a very challenging and frustrating task in the dense rainforest that these birds call home. His work became the feature story in the July 2007 issue of National Geographic magazine. 

Presentation on February 3, 1915

Loss of the Karluk, and the Rescue of the Men from a Point 60 miles North of Herald Island to Wrangell Island—and the Walk to Siberia.

HTC member and Club Medalist, Capt. Robert A. Bartlett, participated in several famous Arctic adventures including as Commander of the Peary Expedition in April 1909 to discover the geographic North Pole. He also served as Captain of the doomed flagship Karluk during the Canadian Arctic Expedition (1913-1918). He left the 17 survivors on Wrangel Island and walked with one Inuk to get help and eventually traveled 1,120 km (695 miles) across the frozen sea on foot reaching the Russian port of Cape North. Three more died before the rescue of the remaining 14 survivors.

The HTC has a history rich in mountaineering. A number of members have belonged to both the HTC and the Harvard Mountaineering Club. Five, in particular, pushed forward the standards of American mountaineering in the 1930s: Robert Bates, Adams Carter, Charles Houston, Terris Moore and Brad Washburn. Many of their adventures and achievements were chronicled by fellow HTC member and mountaineer, David Roberts.  

This photo pictures Harvard Mountaineering Club members on the summit of Denali after a new route up the Wickersham Wall, in 1963. David Roberts is in the white coat. 

Presented on January 8, 2008

The Not-So-Accidental Adventurer

Barbara Washburn was the wife and climbing partner of mountaineer and scientist Bradford Washburn. They became the first to successfully summit 13,628-foot Mount Hayes. Along a particularly treacherous ridge, Barbara took the lead because the team felt she’d be light enough to haul up if the ground crumbled beneath her. None of the cornices gave way, and everyone followed safely behind. In 1947 she became the first woman to climb Denali (Mount McKinley). 

The pair took on ambitious mapping projects. Starting in 1970, they used aerial photography and laser measurement tools to fully map the Grand Canyon for National Geographic. The project took seven years and nearly 700 helicopter trips. A 380-square-mile map of the region was finally completed and published in National Geographic. For that achievement and others, the Washburns received the Alexander Graham Bell Medal from the National Geographic Society.  They also produced the most detailed and accurate map ever made of Mount Everest. 

March 11, 2003

Escape from Lucania

Robert Bates, HTC member and Club Medalist, was a member of the Harvard Mountaineering Club.

In 1937 Bates, along with his classmate Bradford Washburn, made the first ascent of Mount Lucania in Yukon, which was then the highest unclimbed mountain in North America.  When the plane that flew them to the remote mountain landed on the Walsh Glacier it sank into the unexpectedly soft snow. After they had spent five days digging it out the pilot departed, warning Bates and Washburn that he would not be able to return to collect them as planned and that they would have to walk back to civilization. The pair climbed 17,150 foot Mount Lucania and were then faced with a trek through the wilderness without maps. After walking a harrowing 156 miles in 32 days and losing 20 pounds each they arrived at Burwash Landing,

Presented on March 8, 2008

Brotherhood of the Rope

HTC member and Club Medalist, Charles Houston, was an American physician, mountaineer and high-altitude investigator. He made two important and celebrated attempts to climb the mountain K2, the second highest mountain in the world. The second attempt is legendary and was captured in his book, "Brotherhood of the Rope”, one of the most famous books in climbing history. It details the horrific conditions and avalanche his team experienced on K2 (Bob Bates was part of the ill-fated team) while trying to save the life of a critically ill team member.

Perhaps more importantly, Charles did pioneering research on the effects of high altitude - work that was used to give US pilots an advantage in combat. 

Presented on October 8, 2019

Bears Ears and Beyond

HTC member and Club Medalist, David Roberts, was an accomplished mountain climber with a literary gift to match, the author of 32 books and hundreds of magazine articles. He was often acknowledged as the "dean" of American climbing literature and published extensively on mountaineering. He was a member and former president of the Harvard Mountaineering Club where he led exploratory first ascents of many peaks in Alaska.

Presentation on March 10, 2009

Climbing and Exploring around the World

HTC member and Club Medalist, Mark Richey, is an alpinist with a history of significant first ascents around the world, and for which he won the Piolets d'Or, the highest award in mountaineering, in 2012 and in 2020. The first was for the first ascent of Saser Kangri II in 2011. The second was for the first ascent of the southeast face of Link Sar (2,300-metres), in 2019.

Presentation on February 21, 1936

Explorations in the Stratosphere.

HTC member and Club Medalist, Albert Stevens, was a balloonist and aerial photographer. In 1930, he took the first photograph of the Earth in a way that the horizon's curvature is visible. In 1932 he took the first photograph of the Moon's shadow projected onto the Earth during a solar eclipse. In 1935, he made a record ascent of 72,395 feet into the stratosphere, a balloon record unequaled until 1956. Stevens was twice awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross – one award for each of his two most famous balloon flights.

January 13, 1930

The HTC held a special dinner in honor of Colonel Sir Francis Younghusband, who spoke informally afterward.

Sir Francis Younghusband was the last of the great imperialists and a dashing Adventurer. His travels in the largely unmapped Far East and Central Asia yielded major contributions to geographical research. He was an important player in the 19th century Great Game between the British and Russian empires over influence in Central and South Asia. In 1903 he turned a small diplomatic mission into s full-scale military invasion of the last unexplored country on earth, Tibet. It was an unfair match since the British troops used guns while the Tibetan militia only had swords. Younghusband forced a treaty on the Dalai Lama that gained Britain long-sought trade concessions. This action brought him a knighthood but also feelings of guilt for his Tibetan butchery.

He returned to Britain in 1909 where he championed British interests in Central Asia. He was elected President of the Royal Geographical Society, and two years later became Chairman of the Mount Everest Committee which supported efforts to summit Mount Everest including George Mallory's famous, fatal attempt on Mount Everest in 1924. 

Presented on May 27, 2003

Earth as Art

The 750th HTC meeting was addressed by Franklin Story Musgrave, an American physician, pilot, and retired NASA astronaut, who spoke about his flight experiences. He flew on six Space Shuttle missions, the only astronaut to fly on all five orbiters. Selected in 1967, he logged over 1,281 hours in space, performed the first Shuttle spacewalk, and led the 1993 Hubble Space Telescope repair with three EVAs.