The Kor Way...

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Chewbongka

climber
लघिमा
Topic Author's Original Post - Mar 2, 2008 - 03:59pm PT
The guy had it all...excellent style, bold routes, and great hair.





Anyone have any stories of climbing with him?
Russ Walling

Social climber
Out on the sand.... man.....
Mar 2, 2008 - 04:02pm PT
I went and got a hot dog with him at a 7-11 once in Vegas
rich sims

Trad climber
co
Mar 2, 2008 - 04:07pm PT
Only lucky enough to climb with him once.
What a frigin reach.
Plan on making two or three moves in between his.
Hearing history first hand would only have been better if we could have lived it.
Chewbongka

climber
लघिमा
Topic Author's Reply - Mar 2, 2008 - 04:08pm PT
Essays on 'partying down' with Kor are also encouraged.
the kid

Trad climber
fayetteville, wv
Mar 7, 2008 - 11:07am PT
i never got to climb with Layton but i had met him a few times while living in Colorado..
The first time i went to Rifle, i was going back to my van to get some gear and i saw this really tall guy with a fishing pole coming down the road.. as he got closer i though: "thats Layton Kor"..
sure enough it was and he said: "I knew you guys would find this place one day"..
so he proceeds to walk over to the Wasteland and watch me bolt (off hooks etc) Vision Thing....
It was really cool to have one of my heros watching us climb that day! A great way to start bolting in Rifle!
KS
SteveW

Trad climber
Denver, CO
Mar 7, 2008 - 01:40pm PT
I never did--came close to meeting him once as he was driving
busses in Colorado like I. But the story of his and Tex Bossier's ascent of the Diagonal Direct in CLIMB is unbelievable.
One sentence in particular about the storm that enveloped them:
'There's only one person in the whole United States who can get me off this climb, and I'm with him!' Another, after Bossier
had fallen backwards in the snow while traversing Broadway--'One leg stayed in the step. I was on my back with my head looking down the lower wall. The whole panoramaof the face went by as I fell backwards. . .' 'He's got one knife blade in, that you could take out with your fingers! That you couuld take out with your fingers, for God's sake!'
You can almost feel the terror in Bossier's account of this climb. Unbeliveable!
climbhigh

Trad climber
western slope Co.
Mar 7, 2008 - 02:10pm PT
I never met him ,use to party with his son in the early nineties and his ex wife was our mid wife and delivered my son its sweet,having the name Kor on his birth certificate
Gooney

Trad climber
Longmont, CO
Mar 7, 2008 - 02:57pm PT
Camping at on the North Rim of the Black Canyon in late fall, 1992, my long-time climbing buddy Rick and I had the place to ourselves. We had our sights set on the lesser routes in the gullies, and not on the big and proud ones (way too hard and scary). We had a certain sense of paranoia that somehow, someone would arrive late and then scoop our route. So when the small pick up arrived at the other end of the campground around 5 pm, Rick just has to saunter by to see if we have any competition. Upon his return, Rick gleefully stated "Nothing to worry about, just some old guy!"

We turned our attention to dinner, beers, and carefully sorting gear for the next day's adventure. Soon, another truck appears and joins the "old guy" at his campsite. But we're not worried...

After dinner, the duo from down the way walk up to our site to introduce themselves and chat. It was an old guy alright - Layton Kor, and with Ed Webster no less! Turns out we had nothing to worry about. Ed had done the first ascent of our intended route years before; he and Layton were headed for a new first ascent.

The next day, after finishing our little jaunt, we watched through the binoculars as Layton and Ed masterfully ascended their new route - Gothic Pillar or something like that.

It was sure cool to have Layton sitting at our picnic table.
cmalcolm

Mountain climber
Mar 7, 2008 - 04:07pm PT
climbhigh, that's cool your kids name.

How about Bridwells kid

" Layton Kor Bridwell" ?
graniteclimber

Trad climber
Nowhere
Mar 7, 2008 - 05:06pm PT
Where is he now?
survival

Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
Mar 10, 2008 - 12:38pm PT
My youngest son's name is Layton also. After Kor of course.
It is fun to watch him climb and to read him stories about Layton. Then, I think about the great daisy chain of life keeping us all tied together.
swill

Social climber
Colorado
Mar 10, 2008 - 12:44pm PT
Arizona
hungry man

Trad climber
around
Mar 10, 2008 - 01:36pm PT
Russ, that's the scariest story I've ever read on supertopo!
Prod

Social climber
Charlevoix, MI
Mar 10, 2008 - 01:54pm PT
I met him once in Eldo way before I knew who he was. Too bad for me.

I was just talking about him this weekend. Does he still climb. The guy I was talking to seemed to think he was retired. Did he find religion or something?

Prod.
TwistedCrank

climber
Ideeho
Mar 10, 2008 - 02:03pm PT
Does he still climb. The guy I was talking to seemed to think he was retired. Did he find religion or something?

That, young man, is the stuff of legend bordering on mythology.

He stopped climbing after a negative adventure on the Eiger, joined a religion (Jehovah's Witnesses I think).

Ed Webster managed to have him unretire long enough to do some routes in the Black Canyon. I'm not sure if he still pulls.

In the early 80's in Colorado there was a far amount of rumormongery about Kor unretiring. It was funny to hear people whisper "They say Kor is climbing again" around the campfires.
Michael Hjorth

Trad climber
Copenhagen, Denmark
Mar 10, 2008 - 04:50pm PT
My climbing buddy and I have been pushing each other for the last twenty odd years. One of the ways have been to use the old Kor-sentence:

"Maybe I should take this lead!"

Well, I've never succeeded to get in front that way ...

In 2005 we had three weeks in Yosemite. Both used those words a few times. For some days our neighbour in C4 was an old man and a boy of 10-12 yrs. They were walking around camp, the old man giving boulder lessons to the kid. I instantly thought he looked familiar, and the tent tag proved: "KOR."

I took my wall guide to his tent one evening, asking if he would sign the Southface, Washington Column. "Sorry no. Stopped that many years ago." But I think he felt a bit puzzeled that two guys from Denmark should recognize him. So he mellowed and started asking us questions.
"How fast do people these days climb [this or that or those routes]?"
Well we were not exactly the best to answer, being from a country where the highest point is a 30 feet gravel heap, and being notoriously slow on all we put our hand on on that trip. Which of cause ment nothing, as he used our silence to put forward his own insanely fast times, some of them in tennis shoes. And it came as no surprice when he told us that Steck-Salathe was one of the best routes he did back then (have forgotten how fast he did that).




Michael
k-man

Gym climber
SCruz
Mar 10, 2008 - 06:47pm PT
Fantastic Michael.
Tarbuster

climber
right here, right now
Mar 10, 2008 - 06:57pm PT
I was introduced to him over lunch on the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder.
These were the days when he spent a lot of time in the Philippines or some such place.
I was pretty much speechless.

Only thing I could get out of my mouth was: “Dude, uh, um,...I like your work”.
swill

Social climber
Colorado
Mar 11, 2008 - 12:34am PT
Great pictures of the man.
He was living in Guam at one point.
My only encounter was at the Morrison Inn in maybe 83 and he bought a pitcher of beer for us kids. I still have the receipt (like a teenage girl!)
guido

Trad climber
Santa Cruz
Mar 11, 2008 - 04:43am PT
Kor-oh yeh Kor how could I ever forget. I was fortunate to to climb and socialize with Kor back in the early 60's. I think it was Dec of 1962 when I was in The 11th grade in high school, Kor wanted to do the first winter ascent of Steck-Salathe on Sentinel. The approach alone was epic, one ice axe, no crampons since we were wearing thin Zillertals and absolute minimum in bivy gear. Made three hundred feet the first day, all the cracks were iced up and it was cold. Decided it was probably not really such a grand idea and bailed out.

Kor had this repetoire of "Ole and Lena" jokes that was bottomless. Jut when you thought you had heard the last he would come up with a new one. Always wondered what his source was.

Another time I got into an arm wrestling contest in camp four. Everything was fine until i came up against Kor. He slammed my arm down so fast and hard that he drove a beer opener into the back of my hand. Humble pie.

Couple of years ago when we were making the transition from house to sailboat i decided to divest of most of my climbing books and other related paraphernalia. This book dealer in Colorado was also interested in my old hardware collection. I was curious what he did with the old pins. "I buff them up and send them off to be autographed and then sell them as souvenirs". He was perplexed why, of all the great climbers of the 60's, only Kor refused to participate in this endeavor. He certainly could use the money I was told. "Well maybe, he still has some soul" my friend I said. Needless to say, I did not sell any books or hardware to this individual.

It was wonderful to see the recent photos of Kor posted on Super Topo. Still a classic looking dude.

We are currently living in New Zealand on our boat and setting up residency. The Yosemite years seem so far away but the memories are still so vivid.

Someday when we are back in Americaca, I will pull out come old photos of Kor and share them on ST.

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