Rane began caving with legendary WV cave John 'Bud' Rutherford and a teammate named Bob Handley. After returning to school in Cambridge, MA, Rane continued pursuing his new interest in caves with members of the Boston Grotto. After graduating in 1955 with a PhD in chemical engineering, he moved to the bay area of California and—along with Bill Halliday, George Moore, and Howard Shugart—formed the San Francisco Bay Chapter of the NSS. In 1960, Rane and two co-authors penned the "NSS Policy for Cave Conservation." Dr. Curl has published on topics such as a statistical theory of cave entrance evolution; the relationship between cave scallop geometry and water flow velocity; the aragonite-calcite problem; and speleothem dating and growth. Among many other things, Rane chaired the 8th International Congress of Speleology, edited the first 4 issues of American Caving Accidents, and served as President of the NSS.
