Honoring Christine Boskoff in Appleton, Wisconsin

Apple­ton East High School, where Chris­tine Feld-Boskoff grad­u­at­ed high school in Apple­ton, Wis­con­sin, is ded­i­cat­ing a new­ly installed, spec­tac­u­lar rock climb­ing wall to their proud alum­nus. Since her death in Chi­na in 2006, it has been the school’s dream to give some­thing to the com­mu­ni­ty in remem­brance of her.

Steve Walk­er, the Apple­ton East High School Health & Human Per­for­mance (HHP) teacher and AASD Adven­ture Edu­ca­tion Pro­gram Man­ag­er writes, ​“our school dis­tric­t’s HHP depart­ment received a grant and we added adven­ture edu­ca­tion to our Health & Human Per­for­mance cur­ricu­lum. We put up a cen­tral high ropes course (The A Sum­mit), our 3 high schools each have a Low Ropes Course and indoor climb­ing walls, and our mid­dle and ele­men­tary schools all received boul­der­ing walls. ​“Chrissie’s” quote was ​“Live Your Dreams.” It is so true and final­ly com­ing togeth­er as we ded­i­cate this wall to her.”

The ded­i­ca­tion will take place at the Apple­ton East High School in Wis­con­sin on Jan­u­ary 12, 2012.

Mark Gun­log­son, Moun­tain Mad­ness cur­rent own­er, writes in a mes­sage to the school:

“It was with great sad­ness that in 2006 Moun­tain Mad­ness lost its sec­ond own­er. As with Scott Fis­ch­er, the company’s founder, Chris left a mark on all whom she touched; myself includ­ed. As her friend Jane Courage wrote, ​“When Chris died, she was as hap­py, con­fi­dent and as bal­anced as she’d ever been. Her emo­tion­al mat­u­ra­tion was mir­rored in her climb­ing – she began to feel, on a deep lev­el, a syn­er­gis­tic mind-body con­nec­tion, and it inspired her to be the best per­son she could be in all areas of life.”

For many, her suc­cess as a female climber will stand out as an inspi­ra­tion and serve as a role mod­el — my two daugh­ters includ­ed! But for oth­ers, the inspi­ra­tion lies not direct­ly in her suc­cess as a climber, but in her deci­sion to fol­low her dreams, and when pos­si­ble share them with oth­ers. Her com­pa­ny, Moun­tain Mad­ness, pro­vid­ed just such a vehi­cle to do this, to pro­vide climbers with life chang­ing expe­ri­ences. I will always feel hon­ored to have worked along­side Chris and know that she would be over­joyed to see this rock wall put in place, a place that might well plant the seed of adven­ture in one of you!

But, it was not just about climb­ing. John Wood, founder and chief exec­u­tive offi­cer of Room to Read, an orga­ni­za­tion ded­i­cat­ed to increas­ing lit­er­a­cy through­out the world’s poor­er regions said of Chris, ​“She was pas­sion­ate about climb­ing and her love of the peo­ple and the cul­tures she trav­eled to, espe­cial­ly the chil­dren of Nepal. She was self­less in pur­suit of our mis­sion and pas­sion­ate in her belief that chil­dren through­out the devel­op­ing world should have access to great schools, teach­ers, libraries and books.”

As Jane not­ed, ​“There were many oth­er things that drove Chris to climb and share a cer­tain zest for life. How­ev­er, mov­ing through life with grace, grat­i­tude, humor, and humil­i­ty had become Chris’ great­est com­mit­ment. Chris was many things to many peo­ple, but if noth­ing else, Chris defined ​“Make it Hap­pen”.” All of us here at Moun­tain Mad­ness wish you the best with this rock wall and ask that you make Chris proud and start climbing!”

To read more about Chris’s life, click here.

The climb­ing wall at Apple­ton East High School

To give you some perspective…

Chris on Mount Elbrus

Chris­tine Boskoff