Bill Rotecki

I think 75 out of the 80 houses in the neighborhood were completely owner built. Owner-built houses were not so rare in previous times. Building your own house was not really an exercise in expression or artistry or stuff like that. Co-op members had few if any resources; they built their own houses because they had very little money—but also because by helping each other they could get closer to their dream of living in a community, one where they could raise a family. The owner-built house was secondary to them reaching for their dream of creating a new world of people who believed in community and helping their neighbors.

The moral emphases learned from York Center's families led Bill to volunteer at MLC:

Even though many had come back to the States after being in the war, there were many conscientious objectors who refused to fight. When the Vietnam war came actually I was classified as a CO. Which is how I ended up at MLC; that was my alternative service to the draft. American Friends Service Committee had an 'education' program and they accepted my application and put me on a stipend of $150/mo so I could volunteer in schools for my alternative service.

Bill had moved to Portland to attend Reed College:

I pretty much came to Portland because I was accepted at Reed. I went to Reed '66-'69. High School was pretty boring and easy so I wanted to go to a school that was a little more challenging, but also its reputation as a place of liberalism and intellectualism was very attractive. Mind you, back then they were so desperate I think the acceptance rate was maybe 50%. Their endowment was about equal to one year's operating budget and they were financially in a tight spot. Fortunately for me I score pretty well on those normal tests.

At MLC, Bill worked at Shaw and taught Mountaineering and Packmaking:

I guess it was '69-'71 that I worked at MLC. I believed in and thought MLC was a great alternative education and it gave me a good education as well. I thought Camp Cedar Rock was a brilliant idea. I was personally recruited to the camp; John and Adi Angell offered me a further stipend to help me go to college, perhaps because they figured if they did not, I would take a summer job to help defray my expenses. I met Rosemary Williams at MLC; we were actually pretty good buddies. I remember Jane Giese (I knew her son Sam at Reed College; he was one heck of a guy) and Jan Taylor (and of course her kids are amazing). As for Mountaineering and Packmaking, I am somewhat surprised by what sounds like my inspiring you peeps to do some fun stuff; feels way good to know our shenanigans had some longer lasting positive impacts. That feels good.

At the end of his second year at MLC, Bill got lured back to his studies by the opening of the new Evergreen State College:

One of the fallouts of my volunteering at MLC was I somehow got a bunch of high school seniors up to Evergreen State College because they were interested in applying to go there. I still had one more year to go to complete my Bachelor of Arts degree. I was so impressed that I ended up going to TESC for my last year INSTEAD of finishing my BA at Reed. I was in the first graduating class! I studied Environmental Design.

Bill was one of 11 men and 10 women to receive Evergreen's first diplomas, on June 2, 1972.

I worked at TESC as sort of a roustabout for a year, then a summer for Outward Bound. Friends started 'Ecosummer Canada,' a summer outdoor program for kids rather like OB, and I worked there then I worked with friends in BC tree planting for a few years then we climbed Denali in '76 then I had built a cabin on Bainbridge Island so living was very cheap like I did without a car or motorcycle for a couple of years ....

Bill at Angel's Rest in the Columbia Gorge on a 1970 MLC Mountaineering trip (photo courtesy of Lolita Celsi).

BILL ROTECKI came back into our lives this Spring when Jevan Williams cajoled from him a brief and charming reminiscence of his time as a "so-called counselor or something" at MLC/Couch's Camp Cedar Rock on Shaw Island. In subsequent conversations, Bill told us more about his path before and after his time at MLC—which was shockingly brief, considering his impact.

There seems something fated about Bill and MLC finding one another. He grew up in the York Center Community Co-op, 20 miles west of Chicago:

The founders bought a tired old farm and turned it into an intentional community of their liking. It was a time of creation of many co-ops: housing co-ops, buying co-ops, farmers' co-ops. The community in which I was raised was rather unique, a cooperative corporation in which members had exclusive use of the property on which they built their house. 'The Co-op' was designed to foster the values they believed in: equality among races and sexes and freedom of religion and on and on. All those ideals in which some of us believed so deeply we were ignorant of those who thought otherwise. These were a bunch of idealistic young couples starting out in post-war idealism.

Bill, who ended up a builder—among many skills and trades!—remembers the ethic of the owner-built home:

Bill a few years back.

As a friend of mine says, I am on a downhill slide at increasing speed. But as long as I am not in too much pain and my brain is working I am going to stick around. If I ever lose my faculties, just put me on an iceberg and push it off to the vagaries of the wind and the tide.

Hopefully that story was entertaining enough although simplified. Pretty spotty, incomplete, but gives you a rough picture of my younger life. I suppose if I had the time and half a memory, if I were to write it down, it might make a good story.

Bill, it does!

Wait ... Denali?

Denali was not that difficult. We did the Pioneer Ridge route and got to see the Harper Icefall, way impressive, but had to slog through lots of slush snow until we started climbing at night and sleeping in the day. We encountered some climbers who had fallen; two had died, the other two were in terrible shape so we ended up engaged in a rescue. I never really climbed that much I think compared to others. I climbed a bunch of volcanoes in the NW and yes had some fun rock climbing at Horsethief Butte, but mostly I would call what I did simply wilderness travel. I did some high routes, did some cross country without trails, and loved it.

As Bill breathlessly sets out to recount his life—including the ascent of 20310' Denali!—after 55 years we finally get to learn of his post-MLC passage:

I worked on trail crews and for the USFS. Built a cabin at Atlin Lake. Built a cabin near Denali for a friend. I had a business making backpacks for a couple of years. Some of my packs are still in service. I made all the packs for climbing Denali so I guess that makes them 50 years old! Backpacks, kids' packs, dog packs, fanny packs, day packs, frameless packs, etc. I only just recently sold the last sewing machine I had held onto after all those years.

I had a couple of woman friends, all of whom I thought and think highly of and am still actually very good friends with. I ended up hooking up with a woman who got an amazing job—a fisheries job up in Ketchikan and I followed her up here, planning on staying for a year—but she got cancer and lived five years and somehow I got stuck here. Now it's been 45 years.

I went longlining for 18 years in the North Pacific. Gillnetted in Bristol Bay for three years. I fished until I had back problems—the back problems having nothing to do with fishing but one time after an injury I decided to do a bit of building because I was not the slightest bit intimidated, due to where I grew up. So by circumstance I transitioned to building, became some kind of carpenter/builder/contractor and had some fun jobs. One house had a 6-ft-diameter spruce tree in the middle and we cut a stairwell through the spruce to get to a different floor. I did energy audits in Ketchikan on 200+ houses and evaluated every AHA housing project on the Pacific coast in AK.

I look back now and think I could and should have had a lot more adventures but I got to do some good things. Kayaked in the Queen Charlottes for quite a time, and on the Sheenjek River in the Brooks range, and in the Sea of Cortez for a month and Barkley Sound and Clayoquot Sound and a smidge in the Alexander Archipelago. I led some kayaking trips in Desolation Sound between Vancouver Island and the mainland. Rafted the Grand Canyon and the Tatsenshini. A female friend and I went to Nepal for three months—not for climbing although we did a little trekking off the beaten path where a rope and real hiking boots were pretty useful. I did get to travel in South and Central America for six months and was able to visit Torres del Paine and Fitzroy in Argentina—I stayed in the house of the first kid to climb the Fitzroy which was quite a feat back then.

Bill, these days, sounds pretty philosophical:

I am trying to transition out of building and into being a small manufacturer. Fact is I was a pretty good hippie and a terrible businessman. I should be sitting in a rocking chair watching the sunset but instead will work until they throw dirt on me. Not so bad as I like to work but not good timing as the body fails.

Bill at Eagle Creek on a 1970 Mountaineering trip (thumbnail, courtesy of Lolita Celsi); Bill looking good these days!