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Raydog
Trad climber
Boulder Colorado
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May 20, 2007 - 04:02pm PT
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Thanks Steve.
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F10 Climber F11 Drinker
Trad climber
e350
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May 20, 2007 - 05:08pm PT
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Steve,
I lost my copy of the catalog, but perhaps you could do me a favor.
Post up the photo with the quote "loose your dreams and you'll loose your mind"
Thanks, James
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - May 20, 2007 - 05:14pm PT
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James, that would be in the 1972 clean climbing catalogue (mine is buried right now) and captions a pic of the Moose's Tooth. Go to Frostworksclimbing.com and you should find it.
Edit: Regrettably, as a highschool student, I cut that very quote out for a coat of arms art project.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - May 20, 2007 - 05:32pm PT
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I'd have to go digging for that classic old Patagonia buttshot. The photographer was lurking around the C4 lot, identified herself, and said she was looking for oldschool clothing because pics of the stuff made YC happy. I went back to my tent and proudly put on the coffee colored garb of yesteryear.
She blanched a little when I happily showed her the plate-sized sardine oil stain on one leg while telling her I'd never washed those pants because I was convinced that any laundering would hasten their demise. I should say the only thing bad about the whole deal was the slightly smarmy caption, "Tailor wanted, no experience necessary." Just ain't what you'd really find on the C4 bulletin board. Got two pairs of new wall pants for my effort.
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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May 20, 2007 - 08:05pm PT
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Ruby Tuesday (Rolling Stone)
"She would never say where she came from
Yesterday don't matter if its gone
While the sun is bright
Or in the darkest night
No one knows
She comes and goes
Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday
Who could hang a name on you?
When you change with every new day
Still I'm gonna miss you...
Don't question why she needs to be so free
Shell tell you it's the only way to be
She just can't be chained
To a life where nothing's gained
And nothing's lost
At such a cost
Theres no time to lose, I heard her say
Catch your dreams before they slip away
Dying all the time
Lose your dreams
And you will lose your mind.
Ain't life unkind?
Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday
Who could hang a name on you?
When you change with every new day
Still I'm gonna miss you..."
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F10 Climber F11 Drinker
Trad climber
e350
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May 20, 2007 - 08:30pm PT
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Steve, thanks for pointing out the right catalog. Seeing those crampons made me go and dig mind out.
I bought them in the early seventies and were matched up with a pair of Super Guides. Later I used them on Scarpa Invernos, but in the mid nineties I figured the crampons should be retired before I was left stranded with a broken rig. I included a Charlet ice screw and a Salewa ice hog. I can't say the Charlet screw saw any action, especially when there was a Salewa tubular screw on the gear sling.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - May 20, 2007 - 11:11pm PT
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That old Warthog does make a dandy dagger. I wonder if YC is using one on the catalog cover shot?
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F10 Climber F11 Drinker
Trad climber
e350
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May 20, 2007 - 11:18pm PT
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Steve, your memory is better than mine. The Warthog was great cause it could be hammered in but screwed out. I was half right calling it an ice hog.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - May 20, 2007 - 11:32pm PT
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You can call it anything but RELIABLE that's for sure!
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 18, 2008 - 12:15pm PT
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Keep your heels down going over that bump!
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Dec 18, 2008 - 01:10pm PT
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Steve
You're amazing. Though I wasn't climbing until a few
years later ('72), I have a pair of those crampons, in addition
to the salewa type, and used to have a few of the screws, including warthogs. I donated them to a play, K2 at the CMC a few years ago and never saw them again. . .
Keep up the history!!!
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TwistedCrank
climber
Ideeho-dee-do-dah-day
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Dec 18, 2008 - 01:14pm PT
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Those Annapurna glasses were the shiznit!
I had a pair of those. It was so bitchen bopping around on glaciers looking like a bug.
About that french technique - did anybody ever really use it? Pff...
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philo
Trad climber
boulder, co.
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Dec 18, 2008 - 01:18pm PT
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The Chouinard cramp was a thing of beauty, a work of art. As were the droop picked bamboo shafted ice axes he produced.
Yeah TwistedCrank I have seen Jim Nigro French +70% ice without getting his tongue stuck. Won't work in double boots.
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Dec 18, 2008 - 02:15pm PT
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Philo
Jim and I started climbing together back in the east,
waaaaaaayyyyyy back!!!!
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TrundleBum
Trad climber
Las Vegas
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Dec 18, 2008 - 04:19pm PT
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Cool thread ;)
That Chouinard article was huge !
Speaking of French Technique:
Ok so I have not even seen a climable ice flow in over 20 years. So I see all this new fangled gear that looks like it rox on steep/vert ice. Tools with no leashes, crampons with heel hooks etc.
So getting back into climbing now I have had a conversations with active ice climbers. When I ask "do you know all the terms for the various foot work techniques in French style?" they look at me funny and say something like "Who uses any French technique these days?".
I figure either:
1. they do not ever climb things less than vert, never do/ encounter any long 70 degree ice.
2. They look like these contemporary pictures I have seen of people climbing 60 degree hard snow ice, front pointing with double, short tools...
To which I look and say I don't get that ?
Then I ask "but on a long less than verticle section, don't you get tired for no reason, like your calves and shoulders from swinging that extra tool? I usually get responces with rationale that I don't think makes sense, but 'what'ahey' I don't go ice climbing since all these new tools, so I'll take their word for it.
It just seems to me the influence of the new tools and the hype to climb more spectacular climbs has left a lot of todays newer ice climbers ignorant of the whole revo/evolution that was the combining of what was known as German or front point and the French or flat foot techniques. Then of course our hero YC tops off the revolution with his advancements in tools and then protection.
in the near future, with all this mixed climbing using bolted pro, will we start to refer to 'sport ice' and 'Trad ice' ?
I am drying out gear from being out in the Mojave the past couple days.
It was awesome, perhaps a 50 year snow storm. (I hope I got a few good pics)
Trooping around in the big boulders covered in snow got me thinking a lot about ice BITD.
I am gunna dig out my old set of crampons and post a pic.
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TwistedCrank
climber
Ideeho-dee-do-dah-day
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Dec 18, 2008 - 05:00pm PT
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That's real funny. Yeah the heel hookers and -- what's the wierd thing they do when they hang their leg on their arm while upside down and 3 feet away from a bolt -- well those guys, they couldn't climb 70 degree ice fer nothing.
As for the so-called french technique well, I've always hated the french so I generally refused to call those techniques frog names like Pinot Noir Neve and Chateau Blanc Boofoo. They were just efficient ways to cover lots of vert in the hills.
I guess Yvon had some french blood - well, french canuck at least - so I guess he musta felt obliged to call it something. I don't think Fred Beckey ever gave much thought to what it was called.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 18, 2008 - 06:36pm PT
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Classic ice axe ad from March 1973 Mountain 26.
Another from Mountain 24.
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Larry
Trad climber
Bisbee
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Dec 18, 2008 - 08:53pm PT
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Also speaking of "French" technique...
I was retreating from the Run Don't Walk Couloir in the early '80s with Scarpelli. I faced out, flat-footed, using YC's techniques. I got outta there 1/2 hour before Bob did.
He was facing in, front pointing. How can you swing an axe that way, when you're down climbing? Five minutes after he exited the gully, the sun hit it, and major sh#t started falling. Nearly cost him big time.
Larry
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Fritz
Trad climber
Hagerman, ID
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Dec 21, 2008 - 04:12pm PT
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Got bored last week and dug a pile of my 70's climbing gear out of my garage. In going through it and matching up stuff to my old Chouinard catalogs I've established a pretty good timeline.
One item I can't find in my 72, 78, 83 Chouinard catalogs is his U.S. made WartHog ice piton. It is marked Chouinard-USA on one side and Wart Hog on the other and replaced the Salewa Warthog in his line-up.
I bought 4 of them between 1978 and 1983---but I'm uncertain when. I retired from ice-climbing in 1983 when it dawned on me that I had used up an incredible amount of luck in the previous 12 years. Still climbing---just not that slippery cold stuff.
Can anyone provide more history or a time-line on this item? thanks, Fritz
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Dec 21, 2008 - 05:03pm PT
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Somehow I've always thought the ice pin in YC's hand on that catalog cover was not a warthog but a way old-school one that looks basically like a very long vertical blade pin. Somebody gave me one recently; when I'm posting again, I'll show it off.
My fuzzy recollection is that Warthogs didn't come along until later, like early 70s. YC liked em enough to make his own; I always wanted a bomber Salewa screw.
I'm still climbing with my 70 cm bamboo Piolet. What a beautiful tool! Ultimately esthetic hand forging, fine balance, and over the years grain rises in the bamboo to improve grip. All the wood-handled axes (and ice hammers) dampened vibration nicely, helping the pick to stick in brittle ice. But when Yvon started comparing the bamboo handle to a fine fly rod, I thought he had gone round the bend.
That Salewa "coathanger" ice screw was way sketchy. On the water ice FA of the V-Notch with Yvon, he placed one for his only pro halfway up a pitch. Coming up behind, I pulled the shank end right out. It had snapped off at the top of the corkscrew. That was the end of that for me. Except for pulling wine corks.
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