2008 Woodie Awards
The hog turns silver
Ericka Christensen
Issue date: 9/13/06 Section: Life
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Tom Whittaker founded C.W. HOG with the vision of making outdoor recreation accessible to everyone. Whittaker began working for Idaho State University's Outdoor Program in the mid 1970s. He taught climbing and kayaking classes for the Outdoor Program and organized a variety of trips for all seasons.
After completing a Master of Arts degree at Idaho State, he decided to move on. On Thanksgiving Day, 1979, he was traveling north of Pocatello when the driver of a vehicle in the opposite lane lost control on a patch of ice and crashed into Whittaker. He sustained multiple injuries and fractures to both legs, which resulted in the removal of a kneecap and the amputation of his right foot.
The Outdoor Program went to work putting together the Outdoor Relief Fund, raising money for Whittaker. Earl Pond, the Student Union Director, volunteered free use of a guest room for Whittaker's long recovery. The ISU Nursing Department also helped with rehabilitative care.
Slowly Whittaker recovered, and working with the Outdoor Program put together C.W. HOG. It was the first program on a university campus which provided the resources and tools for disabled people to participate, like their able-bodied counterparts, in adventurous outdoor recreational activities. Away from the university setting, other disabled programs around the country experimented with outdoor activities for disabled people; but Whittaker catapulted the concept forward and redefined it. To some usually sedentary, overly protective individuals in the rehabilitation field, Whittaker's ideas were outrageous and dangerous heresy. Life for Whittaker, however, just didn't feel the same without his active outdoor life. Whittaker realized how powerful his conception was, brushed aside the nay-sayers, and forged onward.
Tom Whittaker insisted that disabled people have the same right to risk as anyone else, and under his leadership, no reasonable outdoor activity was off limits. Through the supportive structure of the ISU Outdoor Program, Whittaker organized C.W. HOG river trips on some of the most challenging whitewater rivers in the west, including one journey, the first by a disabled party, down the Colorado River. C.W. HOG's schedule includes: climbing, dog sledding, skiing, winter camping, kayaking, canoeing, and sailing trips.
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