1977 Honorary Member Profile : Mike Sauser

Four times yearly, for 20 years, Kinnikinnick copy was delivered to Mike Sauser for printing and assembly into the Club bulletin. "Every time there was a really good climb I wanted to go on, I was doing the bulletin!" he recalls. This diligence was recognized with honorary membership in 1977. He continued to hold the printing contract through mid-1985, when he moved to the Coeur d'Alene area, and then to western Washington.

Today, Mike reveals other contributions. He talked now-president Chic Burge into joining the Mountaineers back when both were active in the Spokane Astronomical Society. And Mike provided-through Chic-the ice axe used in the honorary member plaque design in 1992. He purchased the wood-shafted axe from veteran climber and honorary member Frank Hefferlin, along with old GI crampons he "rebent" to fit his boots. "Frank said he wanted to make sure the axe got to somebody who would use it," Mike recalls. "It stopped me in a few falls."

Mike helped "save" the club's Mt. Spokane Chalet, though he gives Will Murray the most credit. "There was a lot of talk about getting rid of the Chalet. I worked with Will on a major renovation...when we put all that gingerbread on," Mike remembers. "I like to think I'm part of the reason we didn't let it go." A regular as a weekend manager in the days "when three cables held it together," Mike muses. "I really miss the companionship in the Chalet."

Mike was "practically dragged" into the club in 1963 by an enthusiastic Will, a United Paints coworker (and 1968 club president). "He talked it up so good." Will, then publications chairman, wanted to use photos in the then-mimeographed 8-1/2 by 14 inch Kinnikinnick. So he needed to change printing styles, and today's format was born-with Mike as printer.

"I'm kind of a workaholic," Mike claims, remembering the hours in his garage print shop. I loved working overtime...I liked the money."

Memories abound, though, from the times he DID get out of the shop. Almost freezing to death at -3 degrees in his Forest Service feather sleeping bag on a Salmo-Creston Pass ski trip. "I came home and bought a -10 degree bag, which I still use." Initial trepidation at backing up to a cliff and stepping off and then, "when I was an instructor, telling everybody how much fun rappelling was!" Trying to inject a bit of humor into a Rocks of Sharon rock practice by stowing a 5-inch TV into his pack. Two stony-faced Air Face survival instructors guaranteed "a joke that fell on its face." The "abominable snowman hunt" in Twisp Pass, bike touring on his old English three-speed, snow-plastered faces in a Mt. Hood whiteout, search-and-rescue committee meetings in the Selkirk-Bergsport loft...

Born in Cherokee, Iowa, Mike-second of eight children-moved to Sioux City, Milwaukee, and at age 10, Spokane. "My Dad really liked to move," he says, recalling 11 schools in 12 years.

He studied printing at trade school and earned astronomy credits at Spokane Falls Community College. A former Astronomical Society president, he has visited planetariums, Meteor Crater in Arizona, and still goes to star parties in the middle of the state. Mike also was president of the Independent Order of Foresters here in Spokane and a member of Mensa, the high-IQ group. He's an avid photographer.

A wooded 6-1/6 acres he owns a Lake Joy near rural Carnation is Mike's home today. He chops a lot of wood. "My four grandsons love the place," he enthuses. "They're always hunting the frogs buried in the mud." Their visits are a treat. Two daughters are in Spokane, a hospital RN and a legal secretary, the third is an Anchorage bank loan manager.

Mike drives daily to his Lake City job as a letterpress operator at Continental Printing. Much of the work is dye cutting, foil embossing, etc. My fingernails aren't black any more," he exclaims. When the big change to color printing came, Mike was a disadvantage-he's colorblind.

"I want to retire!" Mike, now 59, stresses. "I have a motorcycle I don't ride and an inboard boat I haven't had in the water. I'm waiting for 62 and some drier area. Maybe northern Idaho."

"I loved the club," Mike says with fervor. "I met so many good people. The Mountaineers were such a big part of my life."

Lorna Ream