Solari Mary Elizabeth

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Biografie:
Mary Elizabeth Solari 1914-1986
Babs Solari was a mathematician who began teaching at Barnard College and climbing with the Appalachian Mountain Club. During the War she did cryptographic work for the US Navy and she met Frank Solari when he was posted to New York. Their long and successful partnership began auspiciously with a honeymoon in the Wind River Range. Thereafter, they visited many ranges and Babs remained active in the hills until a long illness intervened.
Their Zermatt visit in 1950 introduced Babs to the Alps and the Rucksack Club - that male bastion which she impressed as much as her friends expected. Meets with the LAC and ABMSAC took her to Turkey and regularly to the Alps, whilst winter meets with the Cairngorm Club enlarged an already considerable circle of friends.
In high country she was limited by acclimatization difficulties, but with Frank and the McArthurs she proved a resourceful traveller in an unknown area. They filled a blank in the map of Lahoul in 1955 when they were accorded the unusual support of a Liaison Officer complete with wife - who proved to be a competent expedition member. A return with the McArthurs in 1958 was abbreviated unhappily when Hamish died on a climb from the Thirot Nulla. Treks in Kashmir were interspersed with visits to the Canadian and American Rockies, Assiniboine, the Wind Rivers, both Mts Olympus (Washington and Greece), New Zealand, or just the two of them in the Alps, as when they did the High Level Route.
As an outgoing and active Club member, Babs provided one of the benefits of LAC/AC amalgamation and reorganized the refreshments at meetings. On the hills she will be remembered best as a good companion with imperturbable good humour. Her observations on wide-ranging subjects and lively anecdotes were matched happily by Frank's unquenchable flow, but tempered by somewhat Scottish dryness. Maybe this derived from her ancestor Robert Stuart, who made the first West to East crossing of America through 1811-12, discovering what became the Oregon Trail.
Chelsea Polytechnic benefited from a Statistics course started by Babs in which teaching ability and dedication to students' progress were greatly appreciated. She retired as Senior Lecturer in 1974 but continued to publish, as well as giving Open University tutorials and screening examination papers.
We extend our sympathy to Frank Solari in recollection of a notably happy and effective husband-and-wife partnership in the mountain scene.
Kenneth Pearson
Quelle: Alpine Journal Volume 92, 1987, Seite 298-299



Geboren am:
1914
Gestorben am:
1986