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Mtnfreak
Mountain climber
Epicenter of North California
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John was an inspiration.
Chris
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Fletcher
Trad climber
not very much, recently.
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Lot's of passings this season, I'm sorry to say. My condolences to the many that John touched.
Eric
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Six or eight years ago I ran into John at Paradise Resort on Lower Rock Creek. It was Dana Miller's wedding party. Dana's dad George Miller had climbed and skied a lot with John and me back in the early Seventies when we first lived in Bishop.
John was in great form, not drinking, gracious and full of energy. I was happy to see him doing well. He invited me outside to see his bike.
John had always been into motorcycles. Back in the Haight-Ashbury, he lived in a house that was more defined by the road racing motorcycles being rebuilt in the living room than anything else, even the sidelight of climbing. I was intrigued, so one day I borrowed a race-tuned Ducati with triangle-section tires that made it stick to the pavement better when heeled over at 45 degrees, but when it was upright the narrow tread would skitter over streetcar tracks. I got it downtown on Mission Street before it sank into me what I was riding. The bike was far from street legal, missing such niceities as plates and a muffler. It wouldn't run under 3000 rpm either, loud enough that its racket echoed down the canyon of buildings and causing people a block away to turn and look. I would sit at a stop light trying to sink into my jacket away from the attention this screaming machine generated, and back off the throttle another notch. Which killed the bike and meant that without a kick starter I had to push it down the next block to bump start it. Coming back, I rode the winding road over Twin Peaks, which made the whole thing worth it.
On the mantle of John's communal house, overlooking the cardboard boxes of disassembled transmissions, was a stuffed armadillo named Jeffrey. When John followed me to Bishop in the fall of 1969 and "Crazy Lester" Robertson came along, The Armadillos segued from fast bikes into a climbing group we called the Armadillo Rock Group. We fancied ourselves as similar to the Alpine Climbing Group in England. You can still see us signed into summit registers up and down the Sierra and especially in the Palisades.
At Dana's wedding, John's bike was parked right outside the bar at Paradise. It was one of those hybrid dirt-street BMWs, with high clearance and a big engine. He had ridden over for the wedding from Half Moon Bay, and taken a shortcut up the old Foresta road from El Portal, which was impassable to cars but that machine made short work of it and John was proud of the sophisticated bike.
Apparently John had gotten a new bike within the last year. The last time I saw him, he came to my slide show last November in Bishop. I was glad that I had put in slides of our early routes in the Buttermilk, the ones that first cranked the place into a bouldering area, and other adventures like the Checkered Demon ice gully that John and I had put up together in our first autumn of living on the Eastside. It felt good to honor my old friend.
John Fischer was my first climbing partner when we were in High School. We shared the intensity of early fumblings into climbing, which took so much longer then, when every simple 5.5 climb was a trad lead with chrome-moly angles ringing into cracks for pro and a twisted chunk of Goldline knotted onto your waist.
Yesterday morning John's trajectory up Conway Summit intersected a deer and two sentient beings went down.
I miss you my old friend.
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pud
climber
Sportbikeville & Yucca brevifolia
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DR,
You obviously were a good friend who understood this man.
I wish I had the opportunity to meet him.
He sounds like a man that was not afraid to live!
His connection with two wheels is something I get.
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the boy
Mountain climber
santa cruz,ca
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RIP, to the deer.
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Carolyn C
Trad climber
the long, long trailer
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I am so sorry to hear this. We ran into him once as we were hiking up to the Palisades, and he was hiking out. I'll never forget seeing the big, happy smiling face heading towards us as he swung those ski poles with his very rapid stride. What a great guy. Rest in peace, Mr. Fischer.
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Moonwatcher
Mountain climber
Sierra Madre
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John was coming to meet my friend Asher and I at the Virginia Lakes trailhead in the Eastern Sierra. We had seen him the evening before in Bishop and planned to climb Excelsior Mountain together. When he didn’t show up we asked some skiers arriving at the trailhead if they had seen any accidents on 395 and they said they had seen emergency vehicles. We went down to highway and it was John. His motorcycle had hit a deer and he was killed instantly. It was one of the most horrible moments of my life. I dealt with the police and called his children and brother. We spent most of the rest of the day with his girlfriend Shawn and friends at their house in Bishop. John was a very special person who always gave more than he took and enriched the lives of everyone he touched. My heart is broken and there is a hole in me that will take a long time to fill. I loved him dearly. Go well dear friend. Climb on.
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Japhy
Mountain climber
Kathmandu, Nepal
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My sincerest condolences to all. This life is precious, and for me, John's life is an inspiration to live fully. Let us honor his spirit by living well.
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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John on the North Ridge of Lone Pine Peak in the late sixties. Mountain boots, skinny Goldline, Rebuffat guide pack.
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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John (left), Jay Jensen and myself, the evening before the first continuous ascent of Dark Star in 1972, in profile behind us.
John (left) on the summit of Dark Star, Temple Crag, two days later. We had dropped acid an hour before, when its winding upper ridge finally began to show us glimpses that we would top out.
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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John styling in PAs on the Grandpa Peabody in the Buttermilk
John and me in the Palisades in the Seventies
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amuirman
Mountain climber
Los Angeles
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Thanks for your photos and your memories, DR.
John was blessed in recent years to have come to terms with old demons and achieve a wise and experienced sobriety, as well as to have connected with a wonderful, loving woman (Shawn) and on his way to making his future as rich as his past.
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sister mercy
Trad climber
Eastside
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Thanks, Doug, both for the pics and the eloquent descriptions. Sad days here on the Eastside. I still can't believe he's gone.
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johntp
Trad climber
socal
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DR-
I met John for the first time at your slide show in Bishop last November. In fact, you introduced us. We chatted for a bit outside after the show; he was a really nice guy.
Truly sorry to hear this news. I feel honored to have spent the time with him.
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don'thaveone
climber
bishop
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John Fisher is the only man I have met that can do yoga in jeans!
Always smiling. RIP
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dipper
climber
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A little tune-up for a deserving tribute.
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