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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Original Post - Sep 30, 2014 - 10:37pm PT
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“Valley Uprising”
I got to see the video, finally, in the relatively staid atmosphere of the theatre, not the more raucous auditorium. The movie is a retelling of the history of climbing in Yosemite Valley, but as a particular narrative which traces the arc of “Edenic” periods followed by the inevitable casting out from Eden.
The video has to abbreviate the history, Half Dome is climbed in 1957 by Royal Robbins, El Capitan in 1958 by Warren Harding setting up the “Golden Era” and the competition between Robbins and Harding. This first era comes to the end in 1970 with Harding’s ascent of the Wall of the Early Morning Light which was partially chopped by Robbins. We are told they never climb in the Valley again… the end of the Golden Era.
This leads nearly directly into the “Stonemasters” period lead by Jim Bridwell, a psychedelic ringmaster of a band of climbers who show up in the Valley and push the limits of climbing (and everything else). The Stonemasters surpass the accomplishments of the Golden Era with the notable one day ascent of The Nose in 1975.
The Stonemasters also encounter an apparently hostile environment, and are in conflict with the park rangers. This is a part of the counter culture and, oddly, the 1970 “riot” in Stoneman Meadow (which the climbers were not a part of) is used to illustrate the cultural clash between the “establishment” and the “counter culture.” A further illustration is the crash of the plane carrying bushels of weed, and the subsequent salvage by the climbers before the NPS got out to the site.
Impressive progress in pushing climbing ends in a fist fight over style in 1988, when Chapman punches out Bachar…
The next “epoch” begins with Dean Potter’s arrival in the Valley in 1995 and the “Stone Monkeys” take up where the “Stonemasters” left off… pushing the boundaries even more. This not only includes incredible climbing, but also BASE jumping and slacklining. In a twist I didn’t see coming at all, Chongo is the “Yoda” of the Stone Monkeys, revered for his ability to apparently stay in the Valley beyond the reach of the NPS law enforcement and with no visible means of support.
The basic fantasy of the climbers, going back into the early sixties (and probably even before then), is that somehow the Valley would be a wilderness domain in which all the tourists would be banished, or at least required to endure the physical tests of journeying to the Valley without cars, etc… and that the Valley would then revert back to a wilderness not requiring the management of the NPS or any other organization. In such a scenario, the climbers believe that they could practice climbing free from the over bearing constraints of a federal bureaucracy and the need to share this unique place with people who could not visit without that vast bureaucratically provided access.
John Long makes the case that climbers are “special” because they actually use the landscape in pursuit of their “lifestyle” choice. Many times the video makes the point that climbers risk their very lives in pursuit of an essentially unjustifiable (to the “establishment”) end. Dean Potter pleads that he just wants to practice his Art.
Interestingly, Alex Honnold is quoted as saying, in his rather quiet way, that he wants to climb in the Valley as much as possible and he understands that he has to share it with the other 4 million people that visit each year… so he figures out how to accommodate the rules. He doesn’t claim to be special, but he is, arguably, the most special climber in the video.
But the “specialness” argument is dead on arrival.
The very creation of the United States is based on equality. There is no special status, we are all equal under the law. So it doesn’t really matter if we risk our lives for some noble idea in Yosemite Valley, whether it be spiritual or artistic or anything else.
And there in lay, potentially, a more interesting and nuanced “history” of the Valley, more sophisticated than the climbers v. the rangers, a tired tale told so long, and actually not really supportable by the various justifications offered in the video, John Long again: “they (the rangers) were pissed because history would remember the climbers for their feats and ignore the rangers as they did nothing of significance.” Really?
Equality under the law does not observe “specialness” expressed as either privilege or persecution. And while the climbers have no grounds to claim a privileged status, they certainly seem to be under persecution in the Valley. Profiling climbers, pulling cars over and interrogating the occupants broadly (we all know the drill, and can probably recite what the rangers are going to ask); “driving under suspicion of being a climber.”
While the “law” regulating 7 days in the Valley may have a logical justification, do we actually know that it is enforced uniformly for all visitors? Are visitors at the Lodge or the Ahwahnee Hotel subject to the same restrictions? The idea is to free up space for other visitors to enjoy the Valley, after all. What distinguishes “visitors” from concession employees? especially in a “wilderness” setting.
Climbers aren’t special, and neither is anyone else. Yet we are all aware that some people are treated specially, with privilege. Who hasn’t observed the unmolested Winnebago with out of state plates parked on a turnout overnight. When I had the VW Vanagon, I was regularly quizzed: “where did you sleep last night?” “where are you going to sleep tonight?” “how many beers have you drunk?” etc… maybe I looked like a climber.
Tom Frost had a sophisticated approach to engage the NPS, he got Camp 4 listed as a Historic Place, a legal and political act that did recognize, within the law, the special nature of that place. He worked with, and sometimes against, the NPS to establish this designation.
Climbers need to become more like Tom.
Another way to look at the history of the Valley during the period covered in the video would be to see the governance of the Valley. In particular, the judicial branch headed by the U.S. Magistrate and the executive branch by the Superintendent. In our system of government, these branches balance each other. The rangers, and the law enforcement policy, is executed by the Superintendent. Challenges to the effects of the policy, individuals seeking redress to persecution, proceeds through the court.
During the modern era the chronological list looks like this:
remarkably, there were only 2 U.S. Magistrates that sat in the court from 1942 through 1993, Gene Ottonello and Donald Pitts, a time that saw 11 Superintendents. It would be worth pursuing the history of the court findings, especially with regard to climbers and what the rangers were allowed to do and what they were not allowed, by court ruling. The interactions are more subtle, and the nature of the court often determines what cases are brought and what are dropped. The longevity of the Magistrates certainly provided the law enforcement with a well known expectation of what they could and couldn’t do.
It could be that the “Golden Age” and the “Stonemasters” actually benefitted from the Magistrates. Wouldn’t that be interesting.
Recently, the terms of the U.S. Magistrates seem to be getting shorter, and that fact might be an interesting factor in how the balances in the Valley are maintained, or not. But my point is that the social dynamic in the park has broader influences than our old story, as much fun as it is to be an “outlaw” we really just want to climb as much as we can there.
Anecdotally, I was told that after the Camp 4 designation, the Superintendent was receptive to increasing the length of stay for climbers. The incivility of the climbers changed his mind. Another story had it that “back in the day” the stay limit was applied to “trouble makers” and ignored for others. Both stories run contrary to the uniform application of the rules, the laws, there should be no “privilege” there should be no “persecution.”
The only way we climbers can influence what actually happens in the Valley is to get involved in it, a civic responsibility to understand the laws, our responsibilities and our rights. This is a drag for someone who is young and relatively naive, but there are enough of us older climbers who could be involved, who have some time, and more importantly, have the expertise. The climbers have just as much access to the Superintendent as anyone else, I wonder how often they use it. The climbers could get much more involved in the governance of the park, it is a wonder that they do not. The FaceLift is an example of how we might approach the issues of climber/ranger interactions.
While “Valley Uprising” was very entertaining, it ultimately fails to point the way to realizing its goal. One can violate the law, but one could also try to understand that law and harness it, and perhaps even change it or its enforcement.
The NPS’s mission is huge and often contradictory, it has to execute that mission with resources that are challenged by the prioritization of other federal programs. There will never be a mandate to recognize climbers as a special class of privileged users of the parks.
The sooner we can recognize that, the sooner we can get on with making the parks a better place.
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BuddhaStalin
climber
Truckee, CA
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Sep 30, 2014 - 11:39pm PT
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Thankfully, there are alot of places to climb that are not yosemite valley.
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, CA
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Sep 30, 2014 - 11:52pm PT
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Cool post, Ed!
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Wow Ed, great perspective. I like how your review segued into your own view, & then ideas as to how what so many hold dear, could become possibly a better place.
Thanks for taking the time to put that together.
As someone who has not seen the film yet, I'm enjoying all the reviews shared on ST.
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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I just saw the film tonight and enjoyed it.
Especially the way they worked in most of the great images from Yosemite Climber and from Ken Yager's archive collection.
The TV footage of Harding (and network news anchors David Brinkley and Walter Cronkite mentioning the Dawn Wall) and later Bachar was a riot - I wonder who obtained that?
And little stuff like the clip of Beth Rodden on Meltdown, which was not a direct subject of the time period, but was cool to see.
The slide animations were a nice improvement over the preview version from last year.
I don't take the climber/ranger conflict theme very seriously. It is dependent on the individual ranger. If they are a jerk, complain about them to their boss. Most of the rangers I've interacted with (on traffic stops) have been excellent. Although I haven't been driving a van. :-)
If it was important to me for base jumping to be legal, I might have a different view. Randomly, I just saw the "top ten BASE jumping fails" video on youtube today. It promised "Nobody was killed during the making of this film", but showed several fatalities.... Not entirely unexpected, though.
The 7 day camping limit is something I wasn't really aware of. I suspect it is a method for keeping people from monopolizing campground reservations in the summer. It seems there has been a 14 day camping limit since the 60s that has not been actively enforced. Personally, I don't care, because I don't like staying in campgrounds. But it could be a problem if you are a good climber and want to spend 1-2 seasons a year in the valley. It seems the answer is to develop low profile camping options like driving outside the park boundary. If you want to stay in the campgrounds you will have to give other people a chance to use them....
It is an inherent conflict in the national park system. To keep the valley a nice "uncrowded" place, you stop people from trampling/burning the entire valley floor (fully unregulated camping) so you limit camping areas. But it means not everyone can camp there who wants to.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Donald Pitts!
Now, there's a "special person" indeed.
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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Nice analysis Ed Hartouni.
I picked up some of the same points. The movie's narrative is a simple one of climbers practicing their art through the years and how the very nature of their art/sport, when taken to extremes, creates conflicts with park authorities. The movie celebrates the outlaw, anti-authority aspect of what climbers get up to.
It does this in style. If the storyline can be criticized as simplistic, it's still streets ahead of whatever narrative arc exists in most climbing movies.
And yet, and yet.... The two climbers who have, arguably, done the most impressive Yosemite Valley feats of recent years, Hill and Honnold, don't fit this outlaw image at all.
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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hey there, say, ed... wow... say, i will have to come back to read this...
but say, i really appreciate this...
good to read... will post again, after i read it...
thanks so very very much for the trouble to do this... wow... :)
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Dingus McGee
Social climber
Where Safety trumps Leaving No Trace
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So important for Ed to have a separate post for this movie event that I must say something of BITD.
The Good Old Boys said, "American: Love it or Leave it" and some boys even went to Canada.
Well it just so happened one day down at the mine [Homestake Gold Mine, Lead SD] that a stout looking good ol' boy said "America Love It or Leave It" to my HipWeed friend (circa 1974) who retorted quickly, "America Love It or Change It".
The politics of change have been around since the Declaration of I and long before but not such a culture so immersed in drugs that there is no motivation to work the channels for change was apparent when watching and briefly living in the Camp 4. I very quickly left #4 and went to Upper Pines with the WY and Montana Contingency.
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Charlie D.
Trad climber
Western Slope, Tahoe Sierra
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Looking forward to seeing it, thanks Ed for the thoughtful post.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Very interesting, thoughtful, review-resolve-call to action, Ed!
I can't wait to see this!
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MisterE
Gym climber
Bishop, CA
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Very astute analysis, Ed.
If the storyline can be criticized as simplistic, it's still streets ahead of whatever narrative arc exists in most climbing movies.
+1 what crunch said.
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clinker
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, California
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Damnit Ed.
Seeing it 2nd week in Oct,
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mastadon
Trad climber
crack addict
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Bruce Morris,
Pitts was definitely part of the valley lore. I read about his passing in the Mariposa newspaper this summer and had no idea of some of his accomplishments.
2014-08-07 / Obituaries
Donald William Pitts
Born in Madison, S.D. on April 15, 1928, Don William Pitts showed early signs of his independent nature when he traveled alone on the train from his birthplace to join his parents in California at the age of 13.
He passed away on July 31,2014 in Fresno. He was 86.
Pitts was a pre-med major at UCLA, then joined the U.S. Army as a paratrooper, only to be drawn by his love of the mountains to obtain a degree in logging engineering from Oregon State. He served three seasons as a smoke jumper and worked as a forester before attending Boalt Law School at UC Berkeley to start a career in law.
Don worked in the district attorney’s office in Porterville and then in Fresno, established a private practice, found time be a scoutmaster and to raise four children, all before being appointed the Federal Magistrate Judge for Yosemite National Park in 1975. Soon after becoming a judge, he married Kay Keim Tolladay. Kay was the love of Don’s life, and he the love of hers.
In his 18 years on the federal bench, “the Judge” was known for his skepticism for the well-fashioned fabrication, for his kindness to court neophytes and for his “Bailiff”—a 160 pound Rottweiler who often accompanied him to court. In addition to his love for Kay and his family, hiking, skiing and Yosemite National Park, one of Don's great joys in life was performing weddings.
During his years in Yosemite, Don established the cross-country skiing division of the Yosemite Winter Club. Generations of cross-country skiers finished an Ostrander Hut or trans-Sierra ski trip in Don and Kay’s wine-barrel hot tub.
Because he was a true “mountain man,” even retirement could not persuade Don to leave his beloved Yosemite. Add that to his natural hospitality and Don’s final career choice seemed obvious. He and Kay built a bed-and-breakfast business, the Yosemite Peregrine, which they successfully ran from 1994 until 2011.
Don is survived by his beloved wife, Kay Tolladay Pitts, his children Donald P. Pitts and wife Roberta Jue of Petaluma, Linda Tolladay and husband Mark Graves of Clovis, Michaela Pitts of Ukiah, Laura Tolladay of Roseville, Anne Acuna of San Francisco, Eric Tolladay and wife Teri Davis-Tolladay of Valley Village, Robert Pitts and wife Nickol of Ahwahnee, 12 grandchildren and 5 great-grandchildren. He is also survived by his brother, Dale Pitts of Yucaipa and sister MaryAnn Block of Evansville, Ind.
Don’s celebration of life will be held at 4 p.m. on Friday, August 8, 2014, at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Fresno, 2672 E. Alluvial.
Remembrances can be made to KVPT (Valley Public Television), Restore Hetch-Hetchy or the Unitarian Universalist Church of Fresno.
Pitts wasn't the one you needed to be wary of, this was the one you needed to be careful around:
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RP3
Big Wall climber
Twain Harte
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Excellent post, Ed.
The interesting thing to me is that climbers already DO receive special treatment by the NPS that other user groups do not enjoy. Climbers are allowed to camp in wilderness (on walls) without a permit and they are allowed to install fixed metal anchors on cliffs, even if those cliffs are in wilderness! NO other user group has privileges such as these.
Most of the climbers who complain about poor treatment are not following the objective rules that are in place to protect the resource. OB camping, driving while intoxicated, and mouthing off to other visitors or authority figures is poor behavior, wherever you are and whatever sport you are pursuing.
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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The interesting thing to me is that climbers already DO receive special treatment by the NPS that other user groups do not enjoy.
The reason: climbing is an old activity, stretching back to the days of Muir. Climbing was seen as an entirely appropriate activity for wilderness areas and national parks. Sort of an extension of hiking into steeper terrain. Especially back then, climbing was an activity that was human-powered, with little reliance on equipment and left little trace. Very few "fixed anchors" were left on the rock up until the last few decades. At this point climbing on El Cap (which is technically a "wilderness" despite its crowds and roadside access) is grandfathered in.
It was a stroke of genius for Tom Frost, building on the long and respected history of climbing in Yosemite, to come up with placing Camp 4 on the List of Historic Places.
BASE jumping, biking, slacklining, rope-swinging; all these and many more are highly gear dependent. They are also very newly invented sports. They are not seen as appropriate for wilderness (they do nothing to promote wilderness values, like solitude and quiet contemplation) and suffer all kinds of bans. Though, had folks been parachuting off El Cap back in the 1920s, BASE would likely be legal now.
Sport climbing, with heavy bolting, crowding, etc is entirely inappropriate for wilderness. Has sport climbing arrived, fully formed, without the existence of trad climbing, it too would be banned.
Some land managers have been trying to establish rules that can differentiate, banning particular aspects of sport climbing (e.g. placing bolts with a motorized drill) while allowing "climbing" to continue.
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WBraun
climber
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The film is supposed to be entertainment.
Try not to get so all deep and heavy into it.
If you do, you will end up way to heavy and will fall off all your climbs ......
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 1, 2014 - 08:58am PT
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...well, one can have entertainment that evokes thoughts, too, WBraun, denying one's nature is another way to fall off of things.
Speaking of which, another interesting aspect of the video was that treatment of the "other side" of climbing, that which we defy, apparently, in pursuit of our sport and that injects the danger there.
Obviously Sender Films has to be tread carefully, as the spectacle of solo climbing, popularized now in video, is not usually something that benefits from the external pressures of maintaining celebrity and fame.
I'm talking about falling off of the cliffs and being injured or dying.
Bachar's death was treated as a mere footnote "...fell off a climb at age 52," the only recognition of the dangers of climbing, though there was the nearly breathless statements of Hill explaining that "there is no margin in soloing."
Yet, somehow, the fraction of climbers seriously injured or killed climbing in Yosemite Valley is small compared to the numbers engaged in climbing. Dean says he is compelled to "push the boundaries" yet the boundaries remain relatively undefined. There are not many who exceed them, apparently.
Climbers have yet to fully explain soloing, we all do it but we don't all talk about it, one wonders why. John Long's short story "The Only Blasphemy" is an interesting attempt, though I think misunderstood by readers who thrill with the narrow avoidance of death depicted therein. How do we reconcile that thrill with the title?
Climbing is the balance of forces, the attraction of gravity against the resistance provided by our attachments to the rock, be they edges or friction. When jumping, add our resistance moving in a fluid, when walking, the equilibrium of our centers-of-gravity over the line. Upsetting these balances and we are either plunged to the ground, or walking harmlessly on its horizontal extent.
Our mastery is no protection against the loss of balance.
It is another aspect of climbing that we tend to avoid dwelling on, yet is so integral to the activity.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 1, 2014 - 09:16am PT
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Last year at the "Oakdale Climber's Festival" there was a "roundtable" discussion on the Camp 4 designation with Tom and Dick and park representatives, etc...
My point above is that we older climbers, having moved on with our careers, either have the expertise of Dick or know some climber that does... this expertise is critical in addressing these issues. While our youthful passions often burn on into our old age, we acquire the ability to use that energy to productively engage in change.
Some might call it compromise, we all would have when we were young, but the Camp 4 designation is an example of what could be done.
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Footloose
Trad climber
Lake Tahoe
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Hey Ron, Valley Uprising is showing tomorrow, Oct 2, at High Altitude Fitness in Incline, 7:00pm. You should come on up. As a member, I can comp you if you do. We'll watch it together!!
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