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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Sep 11, 2009 - 03:13pm PT
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Clint,
love your posts. Let me know the next time you're in IC- I'd love to hook up for a climb.
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Mike Bolte
Trad climber
Planet Earth
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Sep 11, 2009 - 03:27pm PT
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Yes! Same as the Chiloe thread. Clint is so modest that you have to take care to note while reading his posts that this man, in additional to all that other great stuff already noted, climbs hard and apparently every weekend.
Jim - IC = intensive care? Next time i'm in for chronic old guyness I'll look for you.
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Ben Emery
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Sep 11, 2009 - 03:42pm PT
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An amazing font of information, generous and modest to boot. A rarity in the climbing world! Anyone interested in collaborating in a project trying to clone him? We could have a Clint at every crag…
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couchmaster
climber
pdx
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Sep 11, 2009 - 04:07pm PT
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Whoh! Shoulder belays! Woot!
I'd tie in with Clint any time he'd have me.
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cragnshag
Social climber
san joser
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Sep 11, 2009 - 04:33pm PT
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To REALLY show your appreciation to Clint, give him a pair of tube socks next time you see him at the crags. Last time I saw Clint his socks had more holes than a wiffle ball! :)
Seriously though, he's one of the best persons you could hope to be tied in at the other end of your climbing rope. Clint is a walking encyclopedia of Yosemite climbing history, and shares his knowledge freely with everyone.
When Ken gets the Yosemite Museum up and running, there needs to be an interactive "Clint Exhibit" where Clint is stuffed into a display case- the museum patron pokes at Clint with his "prison shiv" nut tool (hanging from a wire attached to the exhibit) to get his attention, and then asks any Yosemite climbing related question. Then Clint would reply with the correct answer.
Example:
museum patron: (pokes Clint in the ribs with the shiv to get his attention)
Clint: ouch!
museum patron: Hey, who did the FA of Book of Revelations?
Clint: Gordon Webster and Chuck Ostin in October 1965. The first free ascent was by Bob Finn and Chris Falkenstein in 1974.
museum patron: cool!
Clint: (looking famished) Hey you got any Little Debbie's in your pack?
museum patron: (holding up the shiv) Hey buddy, I'll be asking the questions here!
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Sep 11, 2009 - 04:44pm PT
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it should be Chris Falkenstein and Bob Finn in 1974.... my bad
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Sep 11, 2009 - 05:49pm PT
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Holy photoshop, Ben! Looks scary.
I checked my "beta files" and found the original photo from 2/08.
It's not a shoulder belay - I'm really just pulling up the slack
before setting up the real belay.
Top of Sacherer Cracker.
My dad likes to use a shoulder belay, but I'm too much of a pencil neck to be able to deploy one safely.
I've used that style to haul a pack a couple of times, though.
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G Murphy
Trad climber
Oakland CA
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Sep 11, 2009 - 05:51pm PT
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It's a fact that Clint eats only out of cans. If he were to loose his can opener, he would starve!
Clint weighs all of 120 pounds and made some homemade rivet hangers that conservatively hold 122 pounds. I borrowed some for the Shield and found myself gettting some big air when these time bombs blew.
Clint is a fountain of Yosemite knowledge and a voice of civility and reason on Supertopo.
Thanks Clint!
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Melissa
Gym climber
berkeley, ca
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Sep 11, 2009 - 06:23pm PT
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Nice bump.
Clint was one of those internet folks that we recognized without ever seeing a picture or hearing a physical description of him.
J and I were going up the lower (ill advised) part of Awahnee Butress trying to skip ahead in the Serenity Crack conga line one weekend so that we could do an FA that we'd scoped and cleaned some the day before.
J sort of barked at me (uncharacteristically) to haul ass up the bolt ladder bit where the routes come together and ordered me up the last layback pitch as soon as I hit the belay. While I was racing a guy on the SC crux pitch up the ledge, J could hear calls ringing down to "Clint".
When J got to the ledge, he said "I think that's Clint Cummins down there." As a tried and true Yosemite obscurista and lover of the Cathedrals, his statement had that edge of excitement usually reserved for encounters with the more broadly famous.
Moments later, A lanky and somewhat British looking fella easily pulled himself onto the edge. Everything that he was wearing or carrying appeared to have been climbing a lot longer than me. J asked if he was Clint Cummins. He was.
We told him that we were headed to the right and would only be near them on the 1st pitch. Clint asked about the nice hand crack up higher. The strange patch of extreme cleanliness was his very own handiwork, a potential FA to which he'd never returned. Small, small world it was right there on Sunset Ledge.
Sharing that bit of knowledge and appreciation for the line made it more fun to do. Unsolicited, Clint took pictures from the parking lot, drew in the line, and e-mailed it to me.
I love it when people from computerland turn out to seem very much as I imagined them from their postings when the way that I imagined them was kind, interesting, and admirable.
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Sep 11, 2009 - 06:42pm PT
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> I love it when people from computerland turn out to seem very much as you imagined them from their postings
Ditto for Melissa and J - nicer than could be imagined, and pretty cool floating that FA.
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Melissa
Gym climber
berkeley, ca
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Sep 11, 2009 - 07:03pm PT
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Thanks, Clint.
BTW, I wasn't sure I was referencing the right ledge, but according to the first hit on my Google search, your web page, I had the right one. ;-)
Do you track your web traffic stats? I'm curious how many hits per month your fact and TR pages draw.
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kev
climber
A pile of dirt.
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Aug 18, 2011 - 12:59pm PT
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Bump - since I was just hunting down some old info he'd emailed me in the past!
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Aug 18, 2011 - 01:32pm PT
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I guess it doesn't mean too much to say someone is a nice guy,
because there are lots of nice guys and lots of intelligent ones.
More specifics perhaps would help. I had the great fortune of
staying with Clint and his family when I gave a show at Stanford
about a year ago. Imagine a somewhat wild-haired thin gentleman...
storms into the train depot late, to pick me up. He's smiling,
takes my bags. We take off in a rickety old car that doesn't
seem it will make it anywhere. He assures me it goes to Yosemite
regularly. His home, an extremely quiet setting. Mother works. Daughter
in college, son as quiet as Clint. Pictures all over the bedroom
walls show these are fine students and very good athletes.
His family and I enjoy a very good supper Clint's wife prepares,
very still setting, simple easy conversation....
And Clint spends a great deal of time at the computer, in the
little cluttered office in his house and at his office at the
campus. His work at the campus, I was never sure, but much is
his labor-of-love research and data building in climbing. He took
me on a little walk through the Stanford campus, showed me around,
set up the show originally of course, with the kind of competence
one greatly appreciates, a first rate gentleman all around. I was in the
middle of ending a relationship and was in a deeply pained place,
so I wasn't too much fun to be with and snapped at people in subtle
ways who didn't deserve it. But the nights, I slept so peacefully.
He helped me with my computer, showed me how to work a dvd projector,
in fact then loaned me his projector for the remainder of the little
tour. Always willing to help, not a discouraged word at any turn,
and whether he remembers me or not, I will never forget the gentile
effect he had on my soul.
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tolman_paul
Trad climber
Anchorage, AK
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I haven't met Clint, but I've been impressed by his selflessness in replacing so many manky old bolts. His tr's and pics of his re-bolting adventures are a highlight of the taco, and his knowledge of the valley is beyond impressive.
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tahoe523
Trad climber
Station Wagon, USA
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The annoying thing I find about Clint is that he has too many climbing partners. Booking a weekend with him would be, I imagine, like reserving a spot at French Laundry- you have to know someone that knows someone to get bumped up the list.
Most of us aspire to be as helpful and as kind. And if you happen to catch this yourself, don't forget- me and my two #6s are waiting (im)patiently. I look forward to holding a rope for you sometime this fall.
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cragnshag
Social climber
san joser
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Tahoe-
Charlie don't surf
and Clint don't do OW (not unless you disguise it by putting it in the middle of a long route...)
Maybe put away the #6's then see if one of his weekends magically opens up :)
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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"I know somebody, who knows somebody ... who robbed somebody." - Snoop Dog
My favorite line from the remake of Starsky and Hutch.
I haven't forgotten about the ow project - your lead once the temps cool down! :-)
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J. Werlin
Social climber
Cedaredge, CO
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The Machete Direct TR reminded me of all the rebolting work Clint has done. Not to mention his generosity in providing copious route info whenever someone asks. One of the best citizens on this forum and in the climbing community.
Many thanks for your efforts Clint. Appreciated.
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survival
Big Wall climber
Terrapin Station
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Clint is one of the tops here, Fo Sho.
Rock On!!!
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