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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Original Post - Feb 15, 2017 - 08:05am PT
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Comments in recent threads such as those concerning The West Ridge Store and the Carabiner-Brake Rappel have made me think about how different it was in being able to obtain climbing gear necessities 'back then' than it is today.
These days there are myriad sources of climbing gear--outdoor gear stores--many carrying at least some token pieces of climbing equipment--seem to be everywhere, most climbing gyms, also seemingly everywhere, carry a selection for their patrons, more specialist shops are common at major climbing areas, and the internet provides many further easily accessible sources of supply.
When I started in 1963,in the Midwest and the Gunks, the situation was very different. As far as we were aware there was no place to purchase climbing gear anywhere in the Midwest. Even high quality lightweight outdoor gear was impossible to purchase in the region (in the large university community in Madison. WI if you were a climber and saw someone wearing a down jacket--synthetics were not yet in use, it was either someone you knew or they were geologists who'd been to Antarctica). Back home in NY, I remember that Abercrombie and Fitch--then a sporting goods store for the rich--had a rope or 2 and maybe an ice axe available and there was a store--Camp and Trails, I think--in lower Manhattan that had a small selection of climbing gear--I remember purchasing my first pitons, carabiners (heavy steel ones), and 'klettershue' there. Up in New Hampshire, Peter Limmers sold a small amount of gear along with their hiking/mountaineering boots which were the standard for east coast climbers of the day. That may have been 'it' for gear sources on the east coast back then.
Otherwise you had to either mail order--often a lengthy process--or travel to get gear, and even there the choices--both for sources and gear selection, were very limited. I remember there were a couple of places that specialized in certain outdoor gear (tents, packs) in the Boulder area, that also had some climbing equipment available--Holubar and Gerry's, but the main source in the US was what was then called the Recreational Equipment Coop in Seattle--but you had to be a member to purchase from them and my recollection is that that wasn't easy to do from afar. I'm sure there were some stores in California (such as West Ridge after '64 and, maybe, the North Face in Berkeley), and likely some other locales, but I don't recall that they had large 'profiles' beyond their local areas, so I hope folks can mention their favorites.
The other possible sources of gear were to order from overseas. I remember getting a catalogue from Sporthaus Schuster in Germany and being blown away by the seemingly huge selection of gear that they had compared to the very limited amounts that were available in the US. A number of years later I remember purchasing, via air mail, my first set of nuts from Joe Brown's store in the UK, even though by then more options were available in the US.
One of the biggest steps towards more readily available sources of climbing gear, at least for climbers in the Northeast, was when Joe Donahue, then the Ranger in the Gunks for the Monhonk Mountain House, began to sell a good selection of gear out of the back of his truck in the late '60s/early '70s--rgold or others do you remember when?
Undoubtedly earlier generations of climbers found it even more difficult to purchase climbing equipment--with even smaller amounts of gear available and fewer places to purchase it. I imagine that the late '40s and '50s generation was able to get war surplus gear from Army-Navy stores or the like, but I'd like to hear stories from those of you on here about your early experiences in trying to equip yourselves as well as from others in my or subsequent generations.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:20am PT
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Don't leave out The Ski Hut in Berkeley as an early supplier of quality outdoor equipment especially once it was captained by the estimable Allen Steck who not only ran the shop but also became a pioneer in clothing and sleeping bag design under the name of Trailwise. Al did lots of innovative things like invent the fill designations for rating down quality by its displacement per unit weight.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 15, 2017 - 08:30am PT
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Thanks Dingus and Steve. It was The Ski Hut and Steck, I was thinking of when I mentioned "the North Face" in my initial post. Didn't the original "North Face" morph out of the old Ski Hut? Did the Ski Hut always carry climbing gear or did that start only after Steck took over? Also, what year did Steck take 'control'? I recall stories--perhaps apocryphal, but probably true, of certain well-known 'golden age' Yosemite climbers, some of them employees, 'equipping themselves' at the Ski Hut's 'expense.
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wivanoff
Trad climber
CT
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:32am PT
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Al, you might remember some of these places:
Ski Hut in New Haven (later in Hamden and Wilton I think)
Veteran's in Hartford
Clapp and Treat, West Hartford (I always thought that was a funny name)
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:36am PT
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Shopping list, August/1970
All cash purchases on one day from TNF's Berkeley store.
Larry Horton, manager, had earned my business when he gave me a pair of Robbins blue boots
one of which had the toe rand separated (nobody was gonna buy them, he claimed)
from sitting in the shop window in the sun some months prior.
Horton was a subversive and took pride in screwing the bosses.
He went on to start up Rivendell Mtn. Works.
Kelty frame pack
Optimus stove & white gas bottles
2 kernmantle Edelrids, 11 mm & 9 mm
lots of Chouinard biners
lots of iron from same
webbing for runners/aiders/tie-offs
lots of oval biners from Eiger
RD friction boots
TNF Ultralight down bag
TNF Tuolumne tent
ensolite
CMI hammer and a holster
butt bag
nylon hammock
nobody knew nothing about clean climbing, so no chocks
Ready for anything after that.
edit: cash discount of 10%, too!
Also, Al, when I began working in this TNF store later on, there was a ritualistic Saturday progress of folks looking for gear at Sierra Designs, which was TNF's original sewing and manufacturing partner, down on 4th Street, at the Ski Hut on University, and TNF on Telegraph at Stuart.
They'd come in, look around, go to the other places to compare prices, etc., and decide. We had a map printed for out-of-towners to help them find the other places. They did not return the favor. We won lots of customers by doing that.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:40am PT
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Bought my first set of gear from the original REI in some basement downtown from Big Jim himself! Woot! That store was probably all of 800 SF.
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Gnome Ofthe Diabase
climber
Out Of Bed
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:45am PT
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Hey Al, If I rememember correctly
The stores to first carry modern climbing gear On the east coast: "Hermans Wide World Of Sports" stores.
As far as where I bought all those 'wafer' pins & ' tent-pegs' ring pins,
Bill's Army-Navy in Milburn NJ, had a literal ton of surplus army iron,
gold line in three widths and ' parachute cord, (for racking & bailing from?!
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:48am PT
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my first purchases of climbing gear were at a place in Claremont CA out along Foothill Blvd. near Cable Airport... my creaky memory keeps recalling "The Backpacker" or something like that... I'm sure DonC remembers.
That was 1969/1970.
When I went to UC Berkeley in 1972 there was the already mentioned Ski Hut....
In 1976 in New York I remember Rock & Ice in New Paltz, and Eastern Mountain Sports in Conway...
I almost always bought gear "in person" and never recall ordering it until the mid-1980s
In the mid-1980s there was a shop in Amherst MA, who's name I also forget... Alan might remember.
All these shops provided the additional benefit of having a group of climbers who knew a lot about what was going on in climbing. My first (and only) trip up to the Laurentides for ice climbing included notes from such a discussion to find the home of one Rael, who could arrange ski-doo portage into the ice. We found Rael after an all day drive from western Massachusetts and enjoyed a long discussion with him, which ultimately ended in us deciding to ski in (it was late February and we were worried the ice was not in, so paying for the rides wasn't all that attractive given the likelihood of finding the ice unclimbable).
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Feb 15, 2017 - 09:41am PT
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Most of my first purchases were from Gerry and Holubar in Boulder and Camp and Trails in NYC. Certain Klettershue (Spiders) had to be purchased from Ski Hut, I think. Then Doug Thompkins opened the North Face, which was the source for contemporary mountain boots. Hardware from the Chouinard catalog once it came out.
In 1970, Jim McCarthy, Dick Williams, Hans Kraus, Raymond Schrag, and myself opened Rock and Snow in New Paltz, and from then on I got most of my gear from them. (Eventually Williams bought the rest of us out and later sold the store to Richard Gottlieb, who is the current owner.)
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EdBannister
Mountain climber
13,000 feet
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Feb 15, 2017 - 09:54am PT
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The place in Claremont was "The Backpacker" owned by Don Douglas who also owned Alpenlite Packs.
They later opened a store in Pasadena where Clark Jacobs worked for a while, and maybe John Bald???
In Burbank on Victory Blvd. the Kelty store, bought the new "Tioga" pack there in 1973, and a Camp7 sleeping bag, and remember driving to the Northridge Kelty location to buy a North Face Sierra tent still marked $110.00 because burbank only had new inventory marked $125.00, gas was 25 cents a gallon.
In La Canada the original Sport Chalet, i remember as a kid seeing a white edelrid rope, pins,and carabiners there about 1965. by 1978 The up on the balcony of the then LaCanada only Sport Chalet had a very complete selection of climbing and backpack gear.about 1982 I remember calling Mike Graham who was sewing harnesses for the diamond C, and selling ledges direct, and convincing him to make 4 ledges at a time and selling them to sport chalet... or calling Ray Jardine's mom to order friends, cash in advance.
Hopefully those that know better fill in the details:
Gregory Mountaineering
A-16
Granite Stairway
The Mountain Shop
Littlestones
In Brezerkly there was
Marmot Mountain Works
The North Face
and i am sure others.
In Chatsworth Laurie Zimmet owned a shop on Devonshire in the mid to late 80's.
I opened "Art of Climbing" on Topanga Canyon in 1990 but closed just 3 years later due to repeated burglary. A year later a gang specialist in the LAPD told me it was the North Hollywood boys getting equipment they used to tag freeway overpasses.
Edit:
I also knew Helmut Lenes, who had an import/distribution business and retail store in Burlington, Vermont; "Climb High"
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Feb 15, 2017 - 09:56am PT
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Initially, the Ski Hut in Berkeley. Then from Yvon, and then Royal once he opened his shop in Modesto, both of whom extended discounts to me. The only place I can remember ever being able to buy bolts was at the Ski Hut. The place went silent once when I asked the clerk for a dozen 1 1/2 inch Rawl drives.
Regarding the North Face, I think that Doug and Susie Tompkins started it in the mid-1960s. They sold and then started Esprit. Style matters!
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SilverSnurfer
Mountain climber
SLC, UT.
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Feb 15, 2017 - 10:07am PT
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I think we first got some biners and webbing from Barneys Sports Chalet in Anchorage-before the arrival of REI- for top roping along the Seward Highway , probably '75 or so.
Some of our first outdoor wear were made from Frostline kits-my older brother was handy with a sewing machine and Speedy stitcher.
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Feb 15, 2017 - 10:21am PT
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Cumberland Transit on West End in Nashville TN,. right next to Vanderbilt U
I think I still have a worn out old t-shirt from that place...! Great shop. Still catering to climbers in the 90's.
Growing up in Missoula, it was always the Trailhead in the 70's. Has changed location twice since 1974 but still going strong (have their Dolack poster in my kitchen from the late '70s!). Butte had Pipestone later on which opened a spot in Missoula in later years but now both are gone (2010 for the Missoula location, early 2000's for Butte).
Most Montana climbers had an MEC and REI co-op card. Mail order was popular from both of those locations.
For me, early 80's, there was Mountain Air in Bozeman, and, Tackle's Bridger Mountain Sports. Also, North Face (?) had a retail store by JC Billion? Northern Lights. Barrel more recently. There was a small retail shop north of Main Street in the mid 80's as well (Gearhead?).
When I moved to SLC, Timberline was still on Highland Drive. Wild Rose used to carry climbing gear. Wasatch Touring has and still does (since 1972!). IME has been here for quite awhile (80's?). Used to be North Face in Olympus Cove (all the local gang used to hang there before IME and BD moved here). Kirkhams on State Street is a long time retailer (over 70 years).
Was also Sunridge but they were mostly clothing. Closed mid 80's I recall.
On business travel, I sought out local climbing stores. Usually a good source of info on the local climbing scene. Some memorable ones...
Swallow's Nest. Marmot in Berkeley. A16 in LA. Rock and Snow in New Paltz. IME in North Conway. Black Dome in Asheville. Cumberland Transit in Nashville. Summit Hut in Tucson. Boulder Mountaineer and Neptunes. I'll have to think up a few more...
Was a climbing shop in Shreveport Lousiana of all places but I can't remember the name. Was weird because there was no climbing anywhere near there (north in Arkansas the closest).
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divad
Trad climber
wmass
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Feb 15, 2017 - 10:25am PT
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Well, this thread makes me feel young as my first gear came from EMS and established climbing shops near popular climbing ares. Ok, maybe not so young, just started climbing later in life.
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hooblie
climber
from out where the anecdotes roam
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Feb 15, 2017 - 10:40am PT
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kelty frame pack, saved for it (coins in a jar) out of allowance ... 35 bucks ~'63 JFK 50 mile challenge.
my dad drove me up to the gerry store in san francisco, my first major purchase.
first incidental fetish: mallory flashlight. packed away deep in muscle memory are the slurpy jaw cramps
and gag reflex that came from biting the end of this thing in the days before that red 4-Dcell headlamp. i still ascribe a certain marvelous quality to the ability to throw a beam of photons.
white 1 inch tubular from some army surplus. if you couldn't tie a swiss seat, fair guess you would never be able roll your own.
on the sidewalk in front of the berkeley ski hut i tied a pair of rossi haute route with marker tr bindings to my bike and rode off to the bart.
but my first skis were bonna 2400's bought from a nordo shop in fairbanks sporting an intoxicating mix of smoky woodstove
and pine tar. the next year fancy fiberglass fischer 99's were on reluctant display. the guy actually told me in scandi-glish
that he would drop the line should the company try to employ the annual graphics obsolescence ploy.
don't recall where my 3/8" 120' goldline came from, but it belonged where it leaned stiffly in the corner.
i'd still like to strangle whoever sold me the plastic tube tent
with the pasted-on grommet tab upgrade.
my inner codger groans/sighs when the luscious nubile behind
the REI counter gushes over my six digit member (ship;) #
~~~~
then there's this:
http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.php?topic_id=1248089&msg=1248147#msg1248147
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stunewberry
Trad climber
Spokane, WA
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Feb 15, 2017 - 10:46am PT
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Cortina boots from Ski Hut in Berkeley about 1967
down bag from Sierra Designs, Berkeley, about 1968 or 9
pitons, carabiners, and webbing from North Face at the Stanford Barn, also about 1968 or 69.
Rucksack via mail order from Holubar in Colorado about the same time.
My mom sewed a down jacket for me from Frostline kits somewhere in there too.
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Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
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Feb 15, 2017 - 11:46am PT
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Limmer's in Intervale, NH...
... as noted by Mr. Rubin
I'm a long-timer, not yet an old-timer...
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Batrock
Trad climber
Burbank
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Feb 15, 2017 - 12:54pm PT
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Holubar and Kelty in Glendale on Victory and Western. Bought my first pair of EB's there and pair of Asolo Chouinard Canyons.
My aunt and uncle used to own and run The Apple Farm in San Luis Obispo so when I would go up there I always stopped at the Granite Stairway.
In the mid 80's I worked in the mountain shop at Sport Chalet in La Canada and spent all my pay checks on gear there.
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ron gomez
Trad climber
fallbrook,ca
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Feb 15, 2017 - 01:26pm PT
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Southern California, 70's, Mountain Affair in Laguna Beach, Ski Mart in Newport Beach and Laguna Hills Mall, Holubar in Costa Mesa, REI, Sport Chalet, A-16 and Rock and Ice in Fullerton. All great shops that were for the most part small and the people working them were knowledgeable climbers.
Peace
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crankster
Trad climber
No. Tahoe
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Feb 15, 2017 - 01:34pm PT
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REI Berkeley.
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