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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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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Feb 15, 2017 - 01:39pm PT
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BooDawg
Social climber
Butterfly Town
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Feb 15, 2017 - 01:42pm PT
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In 1961, my Dad, brother, and I went to a place in Pasadena whose name I can't recall just now to buy our first hiking-mountaineering boots as well as some pitons, a hammer, and carabiners. We probably got some of our gear at Sport Chalet in La Canada. We also found Army biners at local (Canoga Park) Army-Navy surplus stores.
By '62, I began going to Stoney Point with my friend from junior high school and Canoga Park High School, Dennis Hennek. It was at Canoga High, that we met Russ McLean, and we 3 joined the "regulars" (Kamps, Powell, Higgins, Couch, Cohen, and more at Stoney nearly every weekend. There we also met Robbins, Chouinard, and others who came less regularly.
Also, in '62, my Dad, brother, and I went to Washington to the Seattle World's Fair when we climbed Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Rainier. While in Seattle, Dad joined REI and we bought gear there and from a shop owned by Dick McGowan.
Having met Yvon while he was still living in Burbank, we began working for him grinding pitons and carabiners and other tasks, sometimes getting paid by the piece and sometimes in trade for our hardware.
After Yvon moved to Ventura, on some rainy weekends we'd go spend the weekend at Yvon's, and we also attended the "Raves" that were held at his first beach house where California climbers would gather for music and slides. Dennis eventually moved to Ventura and worked full-time for Chouinard Equipment Co. for several years.
I remember clearly that the motivation that Don Lauria, Tom Limp, and Don Nagy had in starting West Ridge was so that Don L, especially, could get boots and outdoor clothing, etc. for his growing kids. I also remember that they chose the location in the L.A. area by plotting on a map the residences of all of the Sierra Club's trip leaders' addresses which could be found in a small directory that they published and gave out to their L.A. area members.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 15, 2017 - 02:01pm PT
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Lots of good stuff here, bringing back long-buried memories.
Bill--I don't have any memory of Veterans, but do recall the other 2 very well. The Ski Hut (Connecticut version not the Berkeley one) started, as its name implies, as a ski shop in Wilton,Ct owned by the Maxwell family. I don't know if the Wilton store initially carried any climbing gear. The New Haven (later moved to Hampden) store opened in the fall of '70 (a big year for climbing store openings it seems) and was managed by the late Rocky Keeler. That store focused more on general outdoors and climbing with skiing being secondary and it quickly became the gathering place for climbers in that part of Connecticut and eventually 'gave birth' to the Mud and Slush Club--such stores were often much more than merely places to buy gear (as also seen in the West Ridge thread). I think Clapp and Treat didn't start carrying climbing gear until a good bit later.
Reilly--I think I was in that same REI basement store in the summer of '66. I was a hiker then but wanted to become a climber. I was on a 'teen tour' that summer--the highlight for me being a hike up Mt. Whitney and we visited Seattle and stopped in REI (whatever it was then called)where I bought my first item of climbing gear--an ice axe.
Gnome--While I remember Hermans, I forgot or never knew that they carried climbing gear.
Ed H.--The store in Amherst was called Whitewater Outfitters back then--later changed to Adventure Outfitters. They closed about 2 years ago when the owner retired--kind of a funky store!!! When were you in western MA? Did we cross paths or just miss each other--I moved out here in the summer of '88? EMS in North Conway (now IME)opened in (I think) 1969, though the original store was in either Natick or Framingham MA. and itself was a combination of 2 earlier stores. This occurred, I believe, sometime in the mid-60s when they also opened a store on Commonwealth Ave. in Boston and the North Conway store followed not too long after. I now recall that there was an even earlier and quite 'eccentric' store in Boston that sold climbing gear--Wilderness Outfitters I think it was called. As rgold said Rock and Snow was another store that opened in 1970--after Ranger Donahue's back-of-the-truck operation was terminated by Mohonk.
Ed B.--I'd forgotten Helmut--yes he was definitely an early east coast supplier.
Divad--you are still young. Haven't seen you in quite a while. Come out to Farley when the weather warms up.
Todd--yes, "long timer" is better than "old timer"!!!!
Keep 'em coming. I still hope to hear from some of the previous generation on here--Fossil Climber and BAA for example, about how they first got gear. I'm sure there was also a lot of personal creation going on in those days by folks in addition to Chouinard.
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mastadon
Trad climber
crack addict
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Feb 15, 2017 - 02:06pm PT
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Alpine Hut, University Village in Seattle.
The same REI that Reilly talks about. I remember Big Jim Everest being there.
Reilly, what's your REI number??
Those are GREAT pics, BooDawg! How's it in Mariposa right now? I'll be down there at my house next week. Lots of dead trees.
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Feb 15, 2017 - 02:07pm PT
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Shawnee Trails...funny...I met a prospective climbing partner there for a foray unto Giant City. We grabbed pizza next door post climbing I dimly recall.
Good times gettin' So. Ill!
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lars johansen
Trad climber
West Marin, CA
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Feb 15, 2017 - 02:10pm PT
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The Mountain Shop on Grant Avenue in San Francisco. They were decent enough to trade gear for some of the etchings I was doing at the time.-lars
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Tom Patterson
Trad climber
Seattle
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Feb 15, 2017 - 02:17pm PT
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If starting in 1975 is old-timer, then here's where I got my stuff:
First rope: The Tackroom, Poway, CA (a store that sold ropes for use in rodeo, etc.).
Second rope (when it was clear we were going to die by using my first rope): a Plymouth Goldline from a surplus store in Escondido, CA.
'Biners: All three of them, from a surplus store in Escondido. They were solid steel, and gold-colored.
Nuts: Stanley Andrews in San Diego and Escondido.
Friends: A-16, San Diego (worked there for a while, too)
Shoes: PAs, and EBs, by mail order. Better than the Wells Fargo Wagon when they arrived.
Harness: Swami material from Stanley Andrews, Whillans and eventually Forrest Harnesses from A-16.
All parkas and down gear, made by Mom (Frostline and Holubar kits).
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slabbo
Trad climber
colo south
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Feb 15, 2017 - 02:17pm PT
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I'm not quite that old but....Hilton's Tent city in Boston had some crap and Wilderness House (near the original EMS)
I though us rookies should just take gear from the guys older than Us ?!
I do remember Hermans in braintree MA I bought a copy of Mountain mag #45 there...maybe 1976? as well as SMC stuff and I think a rope
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BooDawg
Social climber
Butterfly Town
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Feb 15, 2017 - 02:23pm PT
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Dick Long made his own line of hardware, "LongWare" which I think was sold to friends and possibly wholesaled to outfits like Holubar, Ski Hut, Gerry, and REI, but I'm not sure of that.
Jerry Gallwas acquired a nice selection of pitons from John Salathe, and I believe he forged some of his own that were used on the 1957 FA of Half Dome.
Jerry and Dick both spoke at the 2012 Oakdale Climbers Festival. Steve Grossman recorded/filmed the whole festival, so the answers are probably in Steve's archives.
Later, Charlie Porter made much of his cutting edge hardware. How far it traveled, I don't know.
Guido, who climbed with BBA, was a Berkeley Ski Hut dude. I expect he'll chime in any moment, but he's in NZ, possibly sailing, so it may be a while.
I'll try to get in touch with George Whitmore who climbed the Nose with Harding and Fossil Climber, and see if he can add his perspective. It'd be great if he could say how much of the pitons they used were made by Dolt!
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the goat
climber
north central WA
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Feb 15, 2017 - 02:44pm PT
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This is the kind of thread the taco was made for.
In early 70's Seattle, REI at 11th and Pine or the downtown store on 6th was it. The Swallow's Nest at 55th and Roosevelt was the serious climber's hang starting around 1974?
Jim Whittaker was GM at REI when I was hired on in 72.
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BooDawg
Social climber
Butterfly Town
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Feb 15, 2017 - 03:41pm PT
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I had a nice conversation with George Whitmore (now 86 years old). His view is that while the book, "Yosemite in the 50's, refers the decade as the "Iron Age," George calls it the "Age of Improvisation." He began climbing as a mountaineer in 1953. He said that by the time he got involved with the Nose, there were only 4 places they could get gear: The Coop (which became REI) the Ski Hut, Holubar, and Gerry. When he inquired about obtaining larger angle pitons, the Ski Hut folks told him that no one would pay as much as it would cost to make them. Frank Tarver made 3 Stoveleg pitons and they had to place three of them in a row then lower down to remove the lower 2, then place those above what had been the highest one of the 3. After quite a while, got spooked by the process and exposure. He said that that was why they retreated to the ground before reaching Dolt Tower on that push.
George, himself, made some "pitons" using crude steel I-beam extrusions, some from T-Shaped extrusions, and others from aluminum angle extrusions.
Because they needed heavier hammers, he also made a hammer head from a blacksmith's punch. But he reversed the head and attached it to a handle. While it was crude, he said it worked.
He also said that he made some wooden wedges with wire rings for attaching carabiners. Harding apparently didn't like them, but George knew they'd work for "Class 6" (aid) climbing.
About the time of the 50th anniversary of the Nose FA, he gave all of his stuff to Ken Yager.
He says that he doesn't like social media, so he doesn't post here or anywhere else.
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Feb 15, 2017 - 03:50pm PT
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Mid 1950s: Holubar, Sporthaus Schuster, and Jackson Hole Hardware (I think that was its name). White laid nylon rope was army surplus in 1954. First boots were J. C. Higgins from Sears, with Red rubber cleated soles attached later.
No 9 year-old girls cavorting on the rock those days!
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Bushman
climber
The state of quantum flux
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Feb 15, 2017 - 04:35pm PT
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My first climbing gear came to me by way of a family friend around 1973 whose husband had died the year before in a
P-51 racing plane accident while testing his aircraft over the desert at night. The accident was caused by an altimeter malfunction at 400 mph, really sad, for he left behind a widow and four children.
It was his climbing gear; a white Edelrid kernmantle rope, five oval carabiners, three lost arrow horizontals, and a 1 inch swami that she sold me for $100. She heard that I was getting into climbing and sold it to me with her blessing. I recall her telling me how he had taken her climbing with the gear, and I can't imagine, looking back on it now, how much that handful of equipment probably meant to her.
I probably used that rope for three or four years and took several long falls on it before retiring it. Funny, and a little sad in some cases, the memories a topic like this stirs up. I don't think I've shared that story with anyone for at least twenty five or thirty years.
PS
Her oldest boy, Kier, went on to become a climber as well.
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hobo_dan
Social climber
Minnesota
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Feb 15, 2017 - 04:39pm PT
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I started climbing during the famous gear famine of 1977-no gear to be purchased anywhere in Minneapolis- anywhere- forcing me to purchase the orange anodized SMC ovals as the only 'biners available at EMS.
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Edge
Trad climber
Betwixt and Between Nederland & Boulder, CO
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Feb 15, 2017 - 05:37pm PT
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1977, as a sophomore in high school with no drivers license and living in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire, I mail ordered from EMS: a 3/8" x 120' gold line rope, 40 feet of 1" tubular webbing for tying slings, and 10 steel oval biners. Total cost with shipping was around $80.
The next year, when a climbing friend and I got our licenses, we would drive 1 1/2 hour every weekend to North Conway, and every trip I would buy a new hex here, a pair of EBs there, a Whillans harness, all from either the North Conway EMS or from IME.
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eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
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Feb 15, 2017 - 05:42pm PT
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Stanley Andrews in San Diego and Escondido, like Tom Patterson.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Feb 15, 2017 - 05:49pm PT
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BooDawg, good stuff, Old Timer.
Your photos of Skunkworks made me think of a purchase of piton "seconds" from the GPIW in the winter of '70. Millis drove his Olds to the Valley that fall and when the snow hit in December, took Jeff Mathis and myself and his dog Spats to JT for a break.
His mother and brothers lived in Ventura so we stayed there one night. The next day we visited Chouinard's yard, where I spent some of the money we had made ($100 for packing in one load up to the rim from Tamarack and back down) from working with CBS News when they covered the Dawn Wall circus.
I remember limiting the purchase to angles, no flat pitons. Mostly, the seconds were larger angles with rivet problems. Meh. Such a deal.
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Batrock
Trad climber
Burbank
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Feb 15, 2017 - 06:12pm PT
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Boodawg,
Where in Burbank's the shop? Down off Victory someplace? I have been in Burbank my entire life and would like to know if its still there. Lots of old shacks are still hanging on near the tracks and the freeway.
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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Feb 15, 2017 - 06:41pm PT
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1952, white 1" tubular webbing from army surplus stores. Often stained.
Pitons - ring angles and ringed wafers and verticals, same source. (And of course Gallwas and I made our own, which usually lasted a couple of placements before the heads came off.)
Army aluminum carabiners, same source, also some OD 120' 7/16" ropes which came on a tight little spool and crackled when you unwound them. I gave a dinged one to Ellen Searby for her horse one time, and he jerked his head and broke it. We discontinued those pretty quick.
I was in the Navy and out of the country between '54 and '56. Missed developments.
After 1956 or 7, Ski Hut in Berkeley and Holubar in Colorado for most stuff. Holubar was making some pitons which I liked. European pins from both sources, as well as steel and alu biners.
Got my first down sleeping bag, a Trailwise, from Ski Hut. Compared to the surplus "60%" down, 40% feathers" (Used on the Nose) it was like sleeping on a cloud. Thought I'd gone to heaven.
Harding gave Cindy and I a wedding present of a Kelty pack, purchased at Ski Hut, 1958.
Can't recall for sure, but Gerry in Colorado came into my viewvabout then and had some good gear. Got my my impecunious loyalty for a time.
I started the Yosemite Mountain Shop by persuading YP&C Co. to give me a couple of shelves in a dress shop at the Lodge to sell webbing and 'biners and a few pins. It exploded from there. At first we could buy only white webbing, but I asked them to dye some blue and some orange. That was a revolution.
After that I lost track.
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Peater
Trad climber
Salt Lake City Ut.
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Feb 15, 2017 - 07:07pm PT
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While I've bought gear from many of the places mentioned above, I also used to dumpster dive in the GPIW dumpster up in Ventura on Sundays.
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Batrock
Trad climber
Burbank
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Feb 15, 2017 - 07:20pm PT
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Who remembers or used the Trapper Nelson wood pack frame? That was my first pack along with a surplus down bag.
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:39pm PT
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Yes, Batrock, I remember them from when I was a Boy Scout carrying a frameless rucksack full of cans with shoulder straps about an inch wide. Trapper Nelsons were considered the best, but I never had one. However, in the late 50s I used an Army equivalent, a moulded plywood frame with a canvas back piece. The good thing about them was that you could lash damn near anything to them, no matter size or shape. The downside was no waist band to distribute the load. I carried one all summer in 58. At the beginning of the summer I was six feet four. At the end I was five foot eight. And still shrinking. Ought to hit five five pretty soon.
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TYeary
Social climber
State of decay
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Feb 15, 2017 - 08:43pm PT
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REI, The Backpacker in Claremont ( where Largo worked),Sport Chalet,
and this place
TY
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Bruce Morris
Trad climber
Belmont, California
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Feb 15, 2017 - 09:24pm PT
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The Ski Hut in Berkeley, California.
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throwpie
Trad climber
Berkeley
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Feb 15, 2017 - 09:49pm PT
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Jeff Mathis' pickanik table in camp four.
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BruceHildenbrand
Social climber
Mountain View/Boulder
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Feb 16, 2017 - 12:30am PT
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The Ski Mart in Costa Mesa, CA had climbing gear. In the early 1970's there were a couple of high school kids, Mike Graham and Steve West who worked there. They even brought in a 10 foot high granite boulder and put it in the parking lot so you could do a few problems. I am certain that the statue of limitations has long since run out so... Mike and Steve had developed a system for acquiring gear by supposedly sending it back as defective.
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BruceHildenbrand
Social climber
Mountain View/Boulder
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Feb 16, 2017 - 12:32am PT
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The Swallow's Nest was a nice place up in Seattle that opened around 1972, but went out of business in 1998.
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mcreel
climber
Barcelona
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Feb 16, 2017 - 12:37am PT
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Early to mid-70s, my father was ordering stuff from REI, Eastern Mountain Sports and Holubar, for the most part, as I recall. I recall studying the catalogs with great interest. He bought goldline, pitons (never got used), biners, tubular sling, maybe a hex or 2. I remember several body rappels using goldline - wow!
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wivanoff
Trad climber
CT
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Feb 16, 2017 - 05:37am PT
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> Bill--I don't have any memory of Veterans,
Al, Veterans in Hartford was an Army/Navy surplus store that had pitons, army carabiners, goldline, etc. I think I first went there with the late Chip Tuthill.
I vaguely remember Rocky Keeler. After he passed there was a ton of snow pickets left in the store from one of his projects. At Ski Hut I more remember Ben Ailes, Karin Aleckson and Tony Julinelle. I remember the name "Mud and Slush" club but have no recollection of who was in it.
BTW, you and I first met early in my climbing career (1971) when I was a fledgling leader. I was alone at the Main Cliff at Ragged looking for someone to climb with and you happened along and were willing to follow me as I struggled up "Main Street"
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Tom Patterson
Trad climber
Seattle
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Feb 16, 2017 - 06:16am PT
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Who remembers or used the Trapper Nelson wood pack frame? That was my first pack along with a surplus down bag.
Batrock: That was my first backpack, too. I inherited the use of it from my Dad who'd used it up in the Sierra. My first backpack trip also involved a few cans of pork and beans, and lots of water, so you can imagine how that sucker cut into my shoulders. I think I may still have some grooves worn into them...
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EP
Trad climber
Osteoarthritis Shouldervile
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Feb 16, 2017 - 06:18am PT
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Bakersfield had Bigfoot. Still have my Camp Seven jacket bought there.
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Nick Danger
Ice climber
Arvada, CO
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Feb 16, 2017 - 08:06am PT
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In the mid-1960's in Colorado Springs it was the Mountain Chalet run by Muff Cheney (a hella good climber in his own right). Got my first Goldline rope and steel biners there. The silly Goldline would twist up like a drunken rattlesnake every time I used it, but boy did it give good dynamic fall protection!
Hoobie, your remarks about the Bonna 2400s brought back fond memories. I loved those skis. I replaced mine with a pair of Europa 99s, which I am convinced had a core constructed out of the leaf springs from a 5 ton truck. Could not break them, though. All of that happy early ski gear came from "The Chalet" in Gunnison.
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storer
Trad climber
Golden, Colorado
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Feb 16, 2017 - 08:15am PT
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My dad and I made a Trapper Nelson-style pack by bending ash slates in homemade steamer. Vertical pieces were oak. Bag made by mom...a thing of beauty. Load too high for skiing so l used an army rucksack.
The only places to buy "real" gear was the Ski Hut, REI, and Sporthaus Schuster, the latter two by mail order. North Face in SF came later. I could walk to the Ski Hut on University Ave. from campus and talk to Steck but had to wait forever for my order to come from Munich. I got my first kernmantel, a really long 30 m, from them, boots (carefully drawn foot outline), and a great pair of knickers which I still have although I've had to enlarge the waist a bit. I could order in german as I was taking it at Cal. The package would arrive wrapped in brown paper always ripped open presumably by customs. Dick Long and Al Steck came up to Lovers' Leap to climb with us Sacto boys and Dick gave me a couple of his angles.
Being in Sacto near McClellen AFB where they had a Saturday public surplus sale I got hermetically sealed and unopened droge chute webbing sewn into a peculiar shape. It could be carefully cut apart to yield 10 ft of pristine 1" webbing. Some friends at Cal (UCHC) were making sleeping bags with down from China, I think, and ripstop and one of those replaced my army bag. BTW UCHC prolly deserves it's own thread as quite a few here probably spent lunch time in Eshleman.
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lars johansen
Trad climber
West Marin, CA
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Feb 16, 2017 - 08:17am PT
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Batrock-
My first backpack was a Trapper Nelson also. I grew up in WA State and backpacked in the Olympics with it. No waist belt and heavy wood and canvas construction.-lars
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mongrel
Trad climber
Truckee, CA
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Feb 16, 2017 - 08:48am PT
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Starting in 1968 in a supplier and knowledge vacuum, I mail ordered some hiking boots (Henke Tundra) from REI, intending to rock climb in them, which I did despite their diamond-hard soles and the fact that I'd gotten them hiking boot size. This meant stuffing a pair or two of extra socks behind my heels in order to climb at all.
I got climbing gear from a hardware store in Santa Monica. About 3 or 4 Army pitons and 3 of those same heavy Army steel biners that Alan mentions up top, and some white 1" to make a couple of runners, and 120' of 3/8 yachting goldline (much softer than that wiry stuff that was used for climbing) from a big reel in that same store. And off we went to Tahquitz, with no guide and only the barest notion of where the rock even was (somewhere around Idyllwild, figured we'd see it - which worked). The following summer I led Mechanics Route on that same rope, which made for a very authentic ascent of that historic route (1930s?). "The leader must not fall" certainly applied to that rope, which by then was seriously fluffed out from toproping.
West Ridge existed at that time, within bicycling distance, but our knowledge vacuum was so interstellar we didn't even know about it. Once I did, that's where I got everything.
Ho, man, it is something else to see the Mud and Slush mentioned on ST!! Who was in it? Anyone who like to climb but didn't take himself or herself too seriously, and was willing to show up annually to participate in the spaghetti eating contest and risk winning the hideous trophy.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Feb 16, 2017 - 08:48am PT
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Mastadon, my REI number is 8*0*0. When I give it nowadays the cashiers stand there waiting
for more digits. My friend's dad had a two digit number.
The U Village Alpine Hut - where Marts worked. He sold me my first bolt kit, which was almost
my undoing. Another time I dropped by there to say hello and he asked if I wanted to guide a
nice lady up Rainier. Turns out she was in on several FA's in the Tetons. It also turned out
that not only was she fookin' ancient (like 55!) but she was on some med, which she didn't
deem telling me was relevant to the situation, but had run out of! And just why would not
taking, or informing me about, a med for her inner ear (which just has a teensy bit to do with
balance) be relevant? Because when we were descending the fooking Cleaver in the wet
glop with crampons balling up she suddenly started losing her balance and falling every 50'!
When I got her sorry ass down to Muir she confessed. I don't think I said a word to her the
whole way down to Paradise.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Feb 16, 2017 - 09:33am PT
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I ravaged corpses whenever I could but the glaciers were reluctant to give them up so I can recall even paying retail on occasion at stores like Midwest Mountaineering and Teton Mountaineering.
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TYeary
Social climber
State of decay
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Feb 16, 2017 - 10:15am PT
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With climate change and global warming, you should be flush with new(old) gear Jim!!
TY
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 16, 2017 - 10:59am PT
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Great stuff here--just what I was hoping for. It is particularly good to get responses from Fossil Climber, jgill, and BooDawg's report on his conversation with George Whitmore to learn what the situation was in the '50s. I hope we get even more responses, especially from folks active in that time period.
Bill I.--Ben, Karin (later Ben's wife and now sadly deceased), and Tony were all Mud and Slushers.
Mongrel--great to see input from you. Please get in touch directly--it has been WAY too long.
Jim--I thought that your gear had a 'funny' odor!!!!
I want to make a correction to one of my earlier posts. The visit I made to the original REL and ice axe purchase there was in 1962 not 66 as I originally wrote. That's what I get for writing something late in the day. It is funny, I recall purchasing that ice ax, ordering my first 'mountain boots' from Peter Limmer, and getting my first pitons, biners, and klettershue from Camp and Trails, but have no memory of where or when I got my first rope. I do remember that it was 120', 7/16 goldline---but weren't they all back then?
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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Feb 16, 2017 - 11:33am PT
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Anybody remember Dave Meeks sleeping bags? Got a couple - I think it was early 70s - and still use one occasionally. Great down bags!
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BooDawg
Social climber
Butterfly Town
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Feb 16, 2017 - 11:40am PT
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BatRock: My dad had a Trapper Nelson. I think I used a Kelty from 1961 onward which I got directly from Kelty's store (in or near Glendale?). I think their factory was in the back.
Since I didn't drive much at the time, I can't remember the address of the Skunkworks. But it was less than a mile from Santoro's Submarine Sandwich deli. Everyday at noonish, the crew would go down there for our lunches. I remember Yvon's favorite was Prosciutto; mine was Italian sausage. I loved the onions and pickles! It's still in business on Burbank Blvd, west of Victory. Now that I think about it, I'd guess that the Skunkworks was farther west on or off Burbank Blvd., since I seem to remember driving eastward for our lunches. Perhaps Dennis Hennek (who drove us) would remember. Maybe I can get him to chime in.
Wayne: I got Dave Meeks to make me a down half-bag. Best down ever! Very light and compressible. Great guy too!
Edit:
I just spoke with Dennis Hennek, and he can't remember the exact location of the Skunkworks either, even tho he used to pick up and deliver hardware in various stages manufacture between the Skunkworks and the die-maker, heat-treating place, and finish-coating place among others. Yvon, who grew up in Burbank would certainly know.
Received an email from Guido today; he's sailing along the coast of Tasmania, so he may not chime in for a while...
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clode
Trad climber
portland, or
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Feb 16, 2017 - 12:59pm PT
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Early 70's: most of my gear (climbing, backpacking and mountaineering) came from REI in Seattle, mail order. But we had a local store called Oregon Mountain Community on SW 12th & Jefferson. Later on the Alpine Hut and Mountain House became additional outlets for my meager teenage allowance!
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Feb 16, 2017 - 02:46pm PT
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Early '70s I went to Paragon on 19th str.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Feb 16, 2017 - 02:59pm PT
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We used to get what we considered great gear for reasonable prices. Now on eBay you can get the same gear, shitty by today's standards, for astronomical prices.
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Batrock
Trad climber
Burbank
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Feb 16, 2017 - 03:11pm PT
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BooDawg,
Santoro's is still alive and kicking, the hot pastrami is my favorite.
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guyman
Social climber
Moorpark, CA.
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Feb 16, 2017 - 03:22pm PT
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I purchased my first rope a Edelrid, IIRC 10.5mm 165 foot long, + 20 aluminum Eiger Ovals and a pair of Kronhoffers.
At Sports LTD in Woodland Hills CA.
This was in 1973... One had to ask about "Climbing Gear" then they would break out a "steamer trunk" that was full of gear.
This young climber was smitten with the thought of what was in the trunk...
shortly afterwards Peater, Bullwinkle and myself discovered GPIW in Ventura and the throwaway hex bin out back.....
I also made my own chalk bag, butt bag and stuff sacks at my Grandparents awing shop in LA ..... my Grandma taught me how to sew that stuff up, I made some for myself and my friends, all 100% white rip-stop and some were tie-dyed just to be hip.
This is a great thread, reading about the wooden pack frames, Semi-Down Sleeping bags and cobbled together climbing equipment makes me understand just how far out of the mainstream climbing was at the time. Times sure have changed ..... maybe for the better.
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Gorgeous George
Trad climber
Los Angeles, California
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Feb 16, 2017 - 05:31pm PT
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The Cobbler, Manitou Springs, Colo, circa 1974. My 14 y/o partner Lenny Coyne took me there.
My first pack was a tube pack made by Great Pacific Iron Works, bought in downtown Colorado Springs at the mountain shop (still there and still have it).
We bought our wool knickers and knee socks at an Army surplus store, our pot in MS also.
jg
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Feb 16, 2017 - 05:52pm PT
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My first gear was bought out of a store in Boston run by some old timer, in 1968. We also visited a place called REI in the neighborhood that year or later.
I bought a Bell Toptex motorcycle helmet on the command of my mentors, and some other stuff.
Last night a full house at the Vancouver International Film Festival listened to Glenn Woodsworth talk about the history of climbing in the Coast Range of British Columbia.
There were many tales of hardship, and now long obsolete gear, including the Trapper Nelson pack, in which they often carried 80 pounds of supplies to spend weeks in places where the maps only said: INCOMPLETE.
Glenn and his good friend and partner Dick Culbert went in to the Waddington area in 1964. He showed us a picture of their ice-climbing gear. He described the ice axe as, "a refugee from the Mummery/Irvine days on Everest." The crampons looked woeful. Here is what the rest of the gear looked like:
from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_screw#/media/File:EishakenSchrauben.JPG
He then showed us this:
http://vimff.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/GJW-1964-Waddington-Radiant-headwall-from-Unicorn_595x400.jpg
It was old and inadequate gear, but they got up Serra V despite the handicap. Getting down was a problem.
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bvb
Social climber
flagstaff arizona
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Feb 16, 2017 - 07:59pm PT
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In 73', there were two pretty good stores for gear that were within 2 miles of my parent's house -- A Striving After Wind in PB, and Stanley Andrews in the Clairemont Square. There was a third shop closer to downtown (it's been mentioned upthread) and there was gear at Andy Drollenger's A16 store in El Cajon, so, as I exited 9th grade and discovered climbing, it never occurred to me that getting gear was an issue. I mean, A Striving After Wind was literally two blocks south and five blocks west of the school where I attended in kindergarten. And there was already an established scene at Striving -- Werner Lander would lord over grommets like me and Mike Paul and Off White. I saw my very first climbing magazine there -- the 1973 issue of Ascent with Cerro Torre on the cover. They had copies of the seminal GPIW catalog with Robinson's article on clean climbing, and we were ditching school and hitchiking to crags on the weekends. Nothing else existed in our world. It was all climbing, all the time, and I barely made it through high school. Man, I was hooked. But we had no money at all. So the Goon and I shoplifted a rope from Stanley Andrews, we bought some 2.15 cent Eiger ovals, some slings, and about 6 or 7 of those newfangled stoppers and hexes, and we set off to teach ourselves to climb. Our development mirrored the guys up in LA. No classes, no teachers, no experience, no mentors, just copies of Basic and Advanced Rockcraft. We we high as kites on ragweed, Mountain Magazines, just overwhelmed with a compulsion to climb. In a space of about four weeks I went from being a curious kid to a hard core full time lifer. My parents were stunned but supportive and once they saw our first photos and realized this was it, that it was happening and there was no stopping it, my mom bought me a Joe Brown Helment, some EB's to replace my hiking boots, a pair of herringbone tweed knickers, and helped out with getting a proper rack together. Within just a couple of months we joined forces with the other raw newbies in the scene and we got busy, busy, busy. Two years later during a serious ragweed and Coors session at Off White's house the Scumbags were formed. The rest is history! Right place, right time, located in a Burmuda Triangle of climbing shops and nascent local scene that was really popping by 74 or 75. Good times.
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Jim Herrington
Mountain climber
New York, NY
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Feb 17, 2017 - 06:34am PT
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1970s
Jesse Brown's
Charlotte, NC
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guyman
Social climber
Moorpark, CA.
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Feb 17, 2017 - 08:46am PT
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BVB.... you have a very nice Mom..... My Mom always thought I was out hiking.... that ended when I had a projector and a copy of "The West Face of Sentinel" that I showed her.
the Scumbags ruined the whole scene at Josh... we- my friends and I- were all pure and totally focused on climbing before, but you guys somehow would score BEER and Green, well Brown and people would get sick and sleep in... wasting valuable daylight that could be better used climbing the rocks.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Feb 17, 2017 - 10:15am PT
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Ed H.--The store in Amherst was called Whitewater Outfitters back then--later changed to Adventure Outfitters. They closed about 2 years ago when the owner retired--kind of a funky store!!! When were you in western MA? Did we cross paths or just miss each other--I moved out here in the summer of '88? EMS in North Conway (now IME)opened in (I think) 1969, though the original store was in either Natick or Framingham MA. and itself was a combination of 2 earlier stores. This occurred, I believe, sometime in the mid-60s when they also opened a store on Commonwealth Ave. in Boston and the North Conway store followed not too long after. I now recall that there was an even earlier and quite 'eccentric' store in Boston that sold climbing gear--Wilderness Outfitters I think it was called. As rgold said Rock and Snow was another store that opened in 1970--after Ranger Donahue's back-of-the-truck operation was terminated by Mohonk.
I lived in Leverett from 1986 to 1995. We could have crossed paths, no doubt we did, but somehow didn't connect.
Now that you say "Whitewater Outfitters" some memories emerge... but at the time I was "all over the place," climbing for me during that time was mostly visits to the west in the summer, ice climbing in VT and NH, and trips to the 'Gunks and N. Conway. Along with hikes in the local hills.
IME, I remember buying stuff from them too, my current 3-man tent, marketed briefly by Wild Country, is still built by the same British company that markets them today (I had relatively recently bought a replacement rain fly, the old one died a glorious death from UV aging, well used!).
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Al Barkamps
Social climber
Red Stick
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Feb 17, 2017 - 12:07pm PT
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I used to get my stuff at Tent and Trails in NYC...a couple of blocks from Wall Street if you can believe it. Paragon's was waaaaay too far uptown! There was a place in Brooklyn around 1978 that closed that winter after only 2 years, where I scored a matched set of Forrest Lifetimes and all the gear that would send me to Robson.
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slabbo
Trad climber
colo south
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Feb 17, 2017 - 12:42pm PT
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This reminds me of a conversation with george Hurley years ago- I asked him about the legend that he had the first kernmantle rope in the USA around 1957 ? for the F/A of the Titan.
He said quite possibly
Tha old place in Boston was Wilderness House,, you could still buy army piton there in the early 80's and other crazy stuff
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Feb 17, 2017 - 06:11pm PT
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Tha old place in Boston was Wilderness House
Could be. Does Bob Smith go back to 1968?
Gives me a chance to correct REI to EMS.
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Mark Rodell
Trad climber
Bangkok
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Feb 17, 2017 - 07:24pm PT
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In the San Jose area, Mountain Life, 1972-75. Fun and crazy times there.
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
Sands Motel , Las Vegas
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Feb 17, 2017 - 08:32pm PT
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
Nothing creative to say
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Feb 17, 2017 - 10:09pm PT
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at the risk of not actually being an old timer, but loving to talk about old shops having worked at a couple, my first shop visit/purchases was either REI Orange, CA or Adventures Unlimited in Orange, CA on Tustin ave. This was in the early 80s. Gramicci posters adorned the walls. They sold scuba gear upstairs. My shweeenard Whillans look alike was awesome in retrospect. CMI figure eight to rappel with. Asolo Onsights for the foots.
It would likely be another 4 years before Doug Robinson's narration in Moving Over Stone would melt my brain and I knew that I wasn't ever going to stop rock climbing.
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steveA
Trad climber
Wolfeboro, NH
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Feb 18, 2017 - 03:26am PT
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That shop in Boston was indeed named Wilderness House. I worked there briefly, but that type of job quickly bored me. I think the owners name was Charlie Kalman?
In Boston, in the mid 60's, the only shop I knew where you could buy any type of climbing gear was Asa Osbornes? I bought steel carabiners there, and several pair of 8 point Stubai crampons, ( which I still have).
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Concerned citizen
Big Wall climber
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Feb 18, 2017 - 05:41am PT
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In 1969 at Leon R. Greenman, Inc., 132 Spring Street, NY. They were in an old industrial building and to my recollection they did not have a real showroom when I first visited; you told them what you were looking for and they would lay the items out on a counter for you. I remember buying a rope, goldline for slings, 12 Cassin Bonaiti carabiners, a pair of RDs, and two guidebooks. I bought the Gran guide to the Gunks and the red Roper guide to Yosemite, because I had a compulsive aspiration to climb (someday) in the Valley.
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slabbo
Trad climber
colo south
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Feb 18, 2017 - 06:42am PT
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Wilderness House later served some of Bostons' "less desirable" citizens when it went upscale.....no names from me
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Feb 18, 2017 - 07:41am PT
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Pretty sure it was Charlie we bought gear from in Boston, in the little store where it seemed things might fall off the shelf on you. The EMS store was bright and had neat displays.
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Batrock
Trad climber
Burbank
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Feb 18, 2017 - 10:01am PT
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I also remember bumming rides to the REI in Carson. Seemed like an odd place for an outdoor store. When did the Carson store open? What year did it close?
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Rick A
climber
Boulder, Colorado
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Feb 18, 2017 - 11:44am PT
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Got my first climbing magazine (Summit) before I started climbing and before I could even drive. My mom drove me out to Highland Outfitters in Riverside for some camping gear for Boy Scouts, talked her into buying the magazine, and the rest(46 years of climbing) is personal history!
I recall that the Backpacker store closer to home on Foothill Boulevard came later, but I may be wrong.
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wayne burleson
climber
Amherst, MA
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Feb 18, 2017 - 04:14pm PT
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Thanks Al and everyone else for this great thread.
My first exposure to climbing gear was at REI Seattle like so many others.
My mom went to high school in Seattle with Jim and Lou so she was somewhat aware but I assured her that I would just be hiking.
But my first purchases were at Outdoor Traders in Greenwich, CT in summer 1975.
I couldn't drive yet so rode my bike and came home with a pair of yellow shoe-nards, some peck crackers, both on wire and loose, and an Edelweiss rope.
I also went into Manhattan and bought a few things at Kreeger and Sons, including some orange SMC biners and a bonatti D with an orange gate.
A few other things for Al:
Did AJ Lafleur's Mountain Goat in Northampton ever sell gear?
I caught your 1966-62 error Al, knowing that you already quite active by then.
I do remember Paragon in Manhattan and Wilderness House in Boston.
And we used to buy EB's and other Euro gear from Paul Duval at his home.
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TRo
climber
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Feb 18, 2017 - 04:25pm PT
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Skimeister Ski Shop in North Woodstock, NH, just down the road from Cannon. John Porter (?). Had an early rudimentary guide to Cannon, which I still have. Al, you must have gone there.
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Don Lauria
Trad climber
Bishop, CA
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Feb 20, 2017 - 03:44pm PT
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Batrock -
When I was asked if I wanted to go my first ever Sierra backpack trip (1957), I told the guy that I didn't have a pack. He suggested two alternatives: Buy a Trapper Nelson from the Co-op or make your own. Since I didn't foresee any future in backpacking, I decided to forego the expense of a Trapper Nelson. The guy that made the suggestion, a fellow aerospace engineer, said he had drawn up a set of plans for making your own wooden pack frame. I used them and made my own. Then I went to an army surplus store (remember those?) and found some padded straps and a canvas sack about 22"x18"x8". Don't remember how I attached everything to the frame, but it served my purpose until I purchased my first Kelty in 1961.
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Feb 20, 2017 - 03:48pm PT
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Then I went to an army surplus store (remember those?)
Yep. Got my first backpack at one in 1953, USArmy surplus from WWII or the Korean War eras.
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Chris Jones
Social climber
Glen Ellen, CA
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Feb 20, 2017 - 09:53pm PT
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At my English boy’s school, Marlborough College, one of the schoolmasters, Edwin Kempson, had been on the hoary Everest trips of the 1930s. (In fact three members of the successful 1953 Everest expedition, John Hunt, Mike Ward and Charles Wylie, were also alums). Kempson was the sort of figurehead of the “Mountaineering Club” at the school, and no doubt the reason there even was such a club. For the most part we climbed on the college buildings at the crack of dawn on those long summer days, or climbed the trees in the Savernake Forest. All illegal of course.
For the 1957 summer vacation, our ringleader, Peter Bell, proposed an actual climbing trip to North Wales. He was quite explicit on what we should bring, and where we should obtain it. One steel carabiner and a hawser-laid nylon sling. And a waist loop of small-diameter hemp cord that one wrapped several times around the waist; the thinking was that hemp was better than nylon, as in the event of a fall nylon could be burnt thru by the running rope. All this was to be purchased at Robert Lawrie on Seymour Street, in one of London’s fanciest neighborhoods. I remember walking down the street. There were no retail shops at all in evidence, but rather discreet nameplates for this surgeon or that solicitor. But there it was, “Robert Lawrie, Alpine Bootmaker.” I pressed the bell, and after a short while the door discretely opened and I was ushered into a small room. There in front of me, in what was rather like a specimen case at a museum, were a few Austrian pitons, a piton hammer, a desultory rope sling or two, a pair of crampons and a couple of French ice axes. The salesperson hovered around in that annoying way that such staff do in high-end stores, until I eventually purchased my kit. I remember buying a steel Stubai carabiner with a screw locking gate, which I must have figured was stronger. It likely was, but it was a real pain wrestling with first the hefty steel spring and then the damned knurled ring to lock the biner.
Here is an ad:
http://www.smhc.co.uk/objects_item.asp?item_id=31793
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Charlie D.
Trad climber
Western Slope, Tahoe Sierra
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Montrose Army and Navy for canteens, steel carabiners and awful backpacks before we discovered Kelty was right down in Glendale/Burbank. Sport Chalet opened in La Canada and that was the place only to be out bargained by the Saddle Shop up on Foothill Blvd. in La Crescenta which sold klutter shoes for around $10 or $15.....I had to deliver a lot of newspapers to afford those.
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Tom
Big Wall climber
San Luis Obispo CA
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In the mid-1970s there was a store in San Luis Obispo, called the Granite Stairway. Apparently, there was also a mothership store in Santa Barbara. It had everything from oversized topographical maps, to everything the GPIW manufactured, to Swiss ropes, to Snow Lion down jackets and sleeping bags. Nice.
I still have a rucksack I purchased in 1976, emblazoned with "Granite Stairway". I have dropped (and recovered) that rucksack off of El Capitan, as a sleeping bag container, twice. Both times, it was when climbing the same section of El Capitan, New Dawn, Dawn Wall.
In the Old Days, I was too young to know who Hot Henry Barber was, but the cashier at the Granite Stairway educated me, and my younger brother, about how Hot Henry had free soloed the Steck-Salathe. The cashier demonstrated the impossible-to-duplicate craft of Hot Henry by faux-bouldering around the shelves and countertops in the store.
My brother and I were impressed enough we bought a red 11mm Edelrid lead rope, and a yellow Edelrid 9mm haul line. No more Goldline, for us. The story about Hot Henry sold us on a better rope, that wouldn't twist and snarl and foul. We believed that our new kernmantle ropes were key to becoming Real Climbers. And, it was true.
That same cashier would not sell us bolt hangers, until he was assured that we were not going to just drill all over the rock, and ruin everything. We assured the cashier that we had read our Royal Robbins, and we had read The Vertical World of Yosemite, and we knew that our drilling had to be done judiciously, and not randomly, and that we had an obligation, to those who would climb after us, to not bring the level of the game down to an inferior level.
I was 14 years old, and my brother was 13.
Today, the San Luis Obispo Granite Stairway brick-and-mortar location is a head shop.
tempi cambiano.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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For a while, early 80's, there was a GS satellite store in Bezerkly on universoiy, by the university. John phelan worked there.
I joined REI in 1970. No gear stores where my family lived in Park Forest Ill.so mail order and as thing. I'd also bought gear at the holubar store in Boulder when on vacation.at that time Boulder struck meh as an outdoor oriented town by the mtns. Unlike the suburban strip mall sprawl it is today.
We moved to the sf Bay Area in '72. The north face store on telegraph and ski hut on university were Meccas. Shortly after that came wilderness exchange, sunrise, smiley, marmot, Eddie Bauer, and finally rei in Berkeley, (then many other ba locations.)
Mostly all gone now except for REI.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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"The north face store on telegraph and ski hut on university were Meccas."
And on behalf of the staff at TNF/Telly I thank you for your patronage, Jaybro. Did we have some hotties working there or did we not?
Gretchen, so fetchin', and Rebecca (not really from Mecca but Oakland), were two of the best salespeople I knew.
They once had a bet with Hap Klopp, the top dog, on whether they could sell something to the two ordinary-citizen types who were plastering a hole in the wall; so they sold one a cheapo P-38 can opener for a quarter and won lunch at Trader Vic's.
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Nick Danger
Ice climber
Arvada, CO
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Mouse, love your story about the P38 can opener. I think a whole thread could be posted just for that item. Even today my lovely wife and I will have can opening speed contests where I use my old and original P38 against her modern can opener - a continuing source of amusement for us.
BTW mine is still the original one I got to open my c-rats at Camp Pendleton in '69.
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Reeotch
climber
4 Corners Area
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I'd like to take this opportunity to thank the folks at Sunrise Mountaineering in Livermore, CA ( Kim G. and EC Joe).
I bought all my first gear there in the 80s. Those guys were sort of mentors to me although I never climbed with any of them. They gave me the "bro deal" after a while. They were also very forthcoming with route information and keen to hear about our latest adventures.
I think it still exists, although in a different location than the little hole-in-the-wall shop it was, with creaky wooden floors and barely enough room to walk around, down there on old Main Street in Livergulch . . .
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Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
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Skyline Outfitters in Keene, NY ran through the 1970s and into the 1980s. It was owned and run by Caroline Schaefer. It was in an old house with gear tucked into every corner. Her son was a skilled climber that was involved with Powderhorn Mountaineering in Jackson, WY and was friends with Chouinard. Caroline always has a good selection of Chouinard-ware. The shop was open mainly on weekends.
Many cold ice climbers welcomed the tea and cookies she would bring out of the kitchen.
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