You may know Tom Brokaw as the former anchor of NBC Nightly News. But did you know he was an avid mountaineer?

In the mid-1980s, he embarked on his first ice climb, on Mt. Rainier.

In His Own Words...

[Expert climbers, Rick Ridgeway and Yvon Chouinard,] thought Mt. Rainier, the 14,410-foot-high dormant volcano that lies 60 miles southeast of Seattle, would be a fitting test of my appetite for major mountains.

They had been attempting to convert me from a simple backpacker to a real climber. So far, we had been up Grand Teton and Mt. Moran in Wyoming; and a number of lesser routes in California, New York and Colorado.

Rainier is appealing to climb because in two or three days you can distill many of the experiences of a major expedition: It is covered by massive glaciers with foreboding ice cliffs; the elevation is taxing because climbing begins near sea level; and the weather is wildly unpredictable, everything from sunshine, snow, fog, ice, wind and rain in any given 24-hour period.

The first day on Rainier went well considering that, as an ice-and-snow climber, I was a work-in-progress. I had been introduced to crampons just the night before when Chouinard turned me loose on a small patch of glacier at our embarkation point.

Like a small child with a new pair of shoes, I strutted across the icy surface, careful to keep the sharp points of the crampons out of my trouser legs. Snagging yourself, apparently, is a common problem and a potentially fatal one if you're on a steep pitch, attempting to make the next step.

That was the extent of my crampon training: 15 minutes on a relatively level section of glacier. Little wonder I was tentative as we started up the steep slopes of Rainier, especially since the other men, given their experience, didn't feel the need for ropes.

I was not sure how to use the ice ax, so later that morning Chouinard organized another short course. He took me to a small, moderately steep pitch and told me to fall face down on the snow, planting my ax in one motion. It worked. I self-arrested, as they say.

After half a dozen more falls, Chouinard pronounced me ready to proceed, although he did say that, as a rule, he spends two full days with students who want to learn ice-climbing techniques.

'But you'll be all right,' he said.

I took him at his word.

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Photo: Tom Brokaw, right; Yvon Chounaird, founder of Patagonia, center)