John Eliot Allen

So he did a lot of the logistic things?  

Yeah. Well, that was what he was hired for, I guess.

I know something about the rim caravan being an all day kind of …

Oh yes, and the boat trip was an all day.

 But that wasn’t established route for them.

No, it wasn’t, but they wanted it.

They explained that to your successor, but were very hurt that it was shut down.

He [Robert Benton] didn’t have to shut it down.

It was already shut down by your order.

Four of us went up to Sun Notch so that they could be assured that I had, in fact, covered it. They didn’t like armchair decision making, you know. We went back and then up north along the east boundary to Diamond Lake, and to the rim from the North Entrance and back. We maintained snowmobile access as it was (21).

So you didn’t snowmobile from Munson Valley to Diamond Lake on the Rim Drive?

From Munson Valley up the road? Oh, no. That was in their [the snowmobile supporters’] plans. The route that I accompanied them on was what I just explained. Roger Rudolph was with me and we had dinner over at Diamond Lake with the group. In fact, I have a slide from somewhere on the east side of me and my snowmobile and the leader of the snowmobile club down on his hands and knees. I can’t remember his name, but the background was Mt. Scott, and it was all in fun.

So Rutter had made that decision before you were down there?

Yes. The only deviation from established access was for rescue and we would call on them. We had an incident concerning a snowmobile that went over the rim on the north side, so we posted a sign that said do not go beyond this point.