STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK

Want to duck in out of the heat?

Check out the Blaine County Historical Museum’s new exhibit “In Pursuit of the Mountains: A Local History of Mountaineering.”

The exhibit explores the what and the why of local mountain expeditions as it taccles such topics as first ascents and surveying, the U.S. Forest Service, the Sawtooth National Recreation Area and C.C.C. camps.

Among the stories is that of Robert and Miriam Underhill, world renowned mountain climbers from the 1930s.

Miriam O’Brien Underhill, born in 1898, was an early environmentalist and feminist known for the concept of “manless climbing,” in which she organized all-female ascents of climbs in the Alps and elsewhere. Among her first ascents is one on Torre Grande in the Dolomites on a route known as the Via Miriam in her honor.

She married Robert L.M. Underhill, a Harvard professor, and together they climbed in the Sawtooth Range of Idaho, in addition to the Wind River Range and the Beartooth Range

The museum plans to feature the exhibit through the 2022 season.