I never told anyone about this. On the very last Mt Marcy hike, in 1974, I was picked to lead the trip. Dave Gelfand was to help me. Everything went great. We actually climbed Mt Skylight, in addition to Mt Marcy, which is next to it. On the third morning, Dave, I and another counselor (his name escapes me after 36 years), set out to climb Mt Colden. Just before we struck out, I witnessed the other counselor shooting up in his thigh with a hypodermic syringe. I asked him what was up with that? He told Dave and I that he was a diabetic. I didn't know much about such things and didn't give it much of a second thought.
Just as we were approaching Mt Colden's summit, the diabetic dude collapsed- out cold. Dave and I tried frantically to get him to come to. Finally, he opened one eye and mumbled "get me sugar...". I didn't have any, nor did Dave. I started to run down the mountain. When I got to the bottom, I ran into a couple of hikers. I explained to them the situation and they reluctantly gave me a large bag of chocolate chips. I thanked them profusely and proceeded to run back up Mt Colden.
I made it to the top in what was surely a world speed record for climbing that mountain. He was still unconscious when I arrived. We slapped his face and got him to wake up a little. We started to feed him the chips. After a few seconds, he became wide awake and consumed the entire bag and wanted more. I convinced him that we should get down off of that mountain and get back to the trailhead to meet Bernie. He complied. We got back to the campsite, saddled all of the campers up, and made the long, downhill hike back to Tahawus parking lot.
When we got to the lot, Bernie was waiting there for us. He was livid with me and didn't want to hear anything about that we practically saved the guy's life, there on the top of Mt Colden. He also didn't care much that for possibly the first, and only time in Balfour Lake Camp's history that 3 of the Adirondack High Peaks had been conquered on one trip. No thanks were given, but none were expected. However, I ended up with an exciting memory with a happy ending, which I will always remember.
