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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Topic Author's Original Post - Aug 15, 2008 - 01:25pm PT
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Kevin Worrall posted on my thread on Barry Bates and Mark Klemens Barry Bates and Mark Klemens--Valley free climbing that I stopped short of the spectacular end game of 70s Valley climbing. He is certainly correcct in this, but it was purposeful.
Linking all of the elements of the great climbing of the 70s in to one story line is complicated. For sure, it is possible to trace each step along the way, but the span of accomplishments and the differences in scope of the climbs and changes in style is hard to pull together.
What follows here overlaps with the Bates and Klemens thread:
In a way the period from New Dimensions (1970) to Astroman (1975) is the Bridwell era. This is a gross over simplification in almost all regards save for the beginning and the end of the period. The beginning is pretty much covered, but I glossed over the ending.
In 1973, Bridwell and Chapman climbed Hotline with some aid. In 1975, Kauk and Bachar free climbed it. I don’t know anything about the route, but it was a huge watershed--"Bridwell route free climbed." (The Hotline that I mention in my post on Barry and Mark is the FFA in 1975.)
Kauk, Bachar, and Long followed it up with Astroman. You can trace the antecedents of Astroman back into the early 70s free climbing—I would put the Good Book (1973, I think) at the head of the list of antecedents given that it was an obvious long corner with a hand crack that was just too long and steep to contemplate free climbing before you guys climbed it. At least that was the old view: the new view, “Let’s try it.” When I followed the long corner of Good Book, I remember thinking that I had just not pushed hard enough to try stuff.
Aside from the spectacular line and climbing on Astroman, it was also marked by two other features. The first is that Jim was not on the first free ascent. He was part of the team on the Good Book, Geek Towers, and Free Blast, the other ‘Big Wall’ free climbing, but absent on Astroman. The second feature was that all of the prior generations had nailed the route and could visualize what it would take to free climb it, but had not tried it.
Nobody said anything, but it was sort of demoralizing—we could see you guys moving away into the future and rolling up the ground behind you, leaving us moored to the past. We quickly developed a more personal understanding of Royal spending an afternoon free soloing the routes at the base of El Cap after Hot Henry tooled up the Steck-Salathe without a rope, on sight, and Chuck spending time with close friends on easy routes in then obscure areas around the Valley, and Jim discovering his inner ice climber.
We were young, we were strong, we were forward looking…we were history.
So if Astroman marks the absolute end of the prior era of climbers who started in the 1960s, then how best to describe the next phase. The climbs I know about that seem to close out the remaining of the 70s are The NW Face of HD free, Space Babble on Middle, the Chouinard-Herbert all free, Gait of Power, Crimson Cringe, Hang Dog Flyer, Tales of Power, Owl Roof, The Phoenix, Separate Reality, Elephant's Eliminate, Hall of Mirrors, The West Face of El Capitan all free.
This list is almost certainly incomplete, but it seems to me to be way too short—what was everyone working on? If Valley climbers were spending more time in other areas, there might also be a good case to broaden the view of influences from other areas on Valley climbing. There is also the story of new shoes and new cams for protection.
And, perhaps more contentiously, someone needs to sort out an accurate historical view on narrow issues such as establishing for the record who really climbed the Owl Roof, with and without preplaced protection, but no aid, and on broad issues such as the influence of sport climbing and Ray Jardine’s hang-dogging learning style and how these influenced the general adaption of modern free climbing.
I would really like to flesh this period out, but I don’t have the first hand knowledge to do it.
Maybe we can sort it out collectively.
RB
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Aug 15, 2008 - 01:36pm PT
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Roger
One thing I would add to the mid seventies ('76?)
was Charlie Fowler's solo ascent of the DNB.
That was something that put a lot of people in awe at the
time. . .
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 15, 2008 - 09:01pm PT
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From Climbing number 51, November/December 1978:
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 15, 2008 - 09:02pm PT
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Great post, Kevin.
You are right in your timing of me leaving the Valley as a full time climber. I still climbed and guided in the Valley until 1980, between school years, but 1976 was my last full year there.
I think we should use the capabilities of the Forum to develop the history of the Valley. It will take a while, just as it did for the earlier periods. But it will otherwise be lost.
RB
Nice article, Tar. You know, when I saw Jim about 5 years ago, he showed me his Friends. Even let me hold one for a bit. Then he took it away. Sad.
Buzz
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 16, 2008 - 12:27am PT
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You betcha' Kevin.
Hey, I'd like to see someone nail the late 70's as well as Roger pegged the Bates/Klemens reign.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 16, 2008 - 12:44am PT
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From Climbimg 54, May/June 1979:
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Double D
climber
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Aug 16, 2008 - 02:07am PT
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Roger, Kevin and Roy…great read. I think it’s important to see the building blocks of free climbing through a respectful eye toward those who brought the sport to the next level in our prior generations. Roger your words were very thought provoking and seemed to hit the nail on the head for the mid-seventies era. I remember climbing with CF one day on this little 5.9 overhanging lie-back (Kat pinnacle???) that was by the days standards easy. Chris mentioned that the first free ascent was protected with pitons placed on the lead. As I pondered this, I was extremely humbled. Even though my climbing ability was several grades higher at the time, I really couldn’t picture leading it and hanging in there to place a pin, draw the hammer, beat it into submission, replace the hammer, clip it and then continue on to do this all over again several times while steadily getting pumped on the overhanging lieback.
Fast forward to the first prototypes of friends that Ray graciously lent us on several occasions and the doors they opened. Protection went from a fairly intricate ordeal that needed a strategic, well thought out plan to…blam, it’s in. So of course the standards were pushed but what really struck me at the time was how many more climbers stepped up to the plate and were doing hard routes for the first time. Were the standards pushed proportionally or was the learning curve just shortened for the masses?
Now enter the tactic of hang-dogging. Although it seemed like an insult to the purer styles of the day, the reality was that many of the harder routes were “worked” repetitively before they were sent. The difference was that traditionally they were not worked section by section but from the ground up. Butterballs was tried numerous times by many prior to Hot Henry firing it off. Does that imply a decline in aesthetic style? Within just a couple of years of the first ascent it had been done by perhaps hundreds and in good style with essentially the same gear for pro. In fact it was hard to imagine why some of the more talented climbers of Yosemite didn’t do it first after it became a well traveled climb. What changed? Perhaps it was only the vision of what was possible.
Hang-dogging IMHO was nothing new to the mid 70’s if you broaden the definition to include top-roping (Short-Circuit, Bad-ass Moma and numerous other technique-inspiring climbs of the day) and working to free bolt ladders (The Calf & several TM classics). Tales of Power and Separate Reality were certainly worked repetitively prior to completion by Ron and same thing with the Cosmic Debris when Bill did it. The one difference with Ray’s routes was that he was rather secretive about his ascents tactics and that really didn’t set well at the time with the Yosemite boys. Most of the harder bouldering problems were certainly worked but again, from the ground up.
But then, John Bachar and Peter Croft made many of the classic hard routes... into mere boulder problems!
Enter the era of sport climbing. Although I checked out of climbing for years due to physical reasons when I was able to get a glimpse again of where climbing had gone, I was stoked about the quality and sustained nature of climbs that were being done both in the sport and trad venues. My first introduction to modern sport climbing was walking into an ancient Roman stadium in Nimes France where instead of gladiators pitting their skills against lions, there were masterfully-set artificial climbs set for a competition being televised on French TV with the same enthusiasm as our Superbowl. It was a very surreal experience.
What really impressed me was how many folks are climbing really hard stuff and how far sport climbing has taken the standards of both trad and sport. Linking long, hard sections together has given climbers not only much better physical conditioning but mentally has crystallized their vision on the pushing the realm of what was impossible to possible. Equipment has definitely assisted with the explosion in standards, but overall climbers are just doing a lot more hard moves and etching them into their minds a lot quicker than prior generations.
The vision of past generations might well be today’s stepping stones.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Aug 17, 2008 - 11:08pm PT
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These last posts of Worrill and Diegelman are really tremendous!
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Double D
climber
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Aug 17, 2008 - 11:36pm PT
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Kevin... good points...you know I'm really just a yoyo yahoo at heart!
(-;
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Aug 18, 2008 - 12:06am PT
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Roy,
You really need to post RR's response to JB's editorial for full flavor!
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 21, 2008 - 03:45am PT
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Notable FAs and FFAs from 1975 to 1979
Fish Crack 5.12b FA 1975 Henry Barber
Free Blast 5.11b FA 1975 Jim Bridwell, John Long, Kevin Worrall, Mike Graham, John Bachar, Ron Kauk
Hardd 5.11b FA 1975 Henry Barber, Ron Kauk, Steve Wunsch
Kauk-ulator 5.11c FA 1975 Ron Kauk, John Yablonsky
Mother Earth 5.11c A4 FA 1975 George Meyers, John Long, Kevin Worrall, Mark Chapman, Ron Kauk
Realm of the Lizard King 5.11c FA 1975 Kevin Worrall, John Yablonski
Short Circuit 5.11d FA 1975 Stone Masters
Hotline 5.12a FA 1973 Jim Bridwell, Mark Chapman FFA 1975 Ron Kauk, John Bachar
The Moratorium 5.11b FA 1969 Bruce Price, Bill Griffin, Bob Edwards FFA 1975 Pete Livesey, Trevor Jones
Washington Column, East Face (Astroman) 5.11c FA 1959 Warren Harding, Glen Denny, Chuck Pratt FFA 1975 John Bachar, John Long, Ron Kauk
Crimson Cringe 5.12a FA 1976 Ray Jardine, John Lakey
Hang Dog Flyer 5.12c FA 1976 Ray Jardine, John Lakey
Chouinard-Herbert 5.11c FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard, TM Herbert FFA 1976 John Long, Pete Minks, Eric Erickson
Half Dome, Regular Northwest Face 5.12 FA 1957 Royal Robbins, Jerry Gallwas, Mike Sherrick FFA 1976 Jim Erickson, Art Higbee
Owl Roof 5.12c FA 1977 Ray Jardine, John Lakey
The Phoenix 5.13a FA 1977 Ray Jardine, John Lakey
Tales of Power 5.12b FA 1977 Ron Kauk
Hall of Mirrors 5.12c FA 1978 Chris Cantwell, Bruce Morris, Scott Burke, Dave Austin
Separate Reality 5.12a FA 1978 Ron Kauk
Red Zinger 5.11d FA 1979 Ray Jardine, Dave Altman
El Capitan, West Face 5.11c FA 1967 TM Herbert, Royal Robbins FFA 1979 Ray Jardine, Bill Price
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eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
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Aug 21, 2008 - 10:01am PT
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I love this stuff!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 21, 2008 - 10:57am PT
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Right on Ed!
Mr Grossman:
Do you have Royal's rebuttal on friends?
Of note -Hot Henry doesn't dig cams.
'Still climbs with a slim rack of nuts.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Aug 21, 2008 - 11:23am PT
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Sorry Roy but I don't have the followup issue handy. Worth finding it though since Royal takes JB to the woodshed! LOL
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 21, 2008 - 11:24am PT
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interesting to look at the next 5 years
Notable FAs and FFAs from 1980 to 1985
Alien 5.12b FA 1980 Tony Yaniro
Controlled Burn 5.11a FA 1980 Don Reid Grant Hiskes
Cosmic Debris 5.13b FA 1980 Bill Price
Energy Crisis 5.11d FA 1980 Bill Price Randy Grandstaff
Goldfingers 5.12a FA 1980 Chick Holtkamp Eric Zschiesche
Mary's Tears 5.11b FA 1980 Bill Price Mike Borris
Pegasus (East Quarter Dome, North Face) 5.12 FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost FFA 1980 Max Jones Mark Hudon
Quarter Dome; North Face (Pegasus) 5.12 FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost FFA 1980 Max Jones Mark Hudon
Crest Jewel 5.10a FA 1981 Dan Dingle Michael Lucero
Soul Sacrifice 5.11c FA 1981 Werner Braun
Essence 5.11b FA 1983 Werner Braun Don Reid
Lost Arrow Tip 5.12b FA 1946 Fritz Lippmann Jack Arnold Anton Nelson Robin Hansen FFA 1984 Dave Schultz
Autobahn 5.11d FA 1985 Charles Cole Rusty Reno John Middendorf
The Crucifix 5.12b FA 1973 Jim Bridwell Kevin Worall FFA 1985 Peter Croft
The Rostrum, The Regular North Face Route FA 5.11c 1962 Glen Denny Warren Harding FFA 1985 Ron Kauk John Yablonski Kim Carrigan
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 21, 2008 - 05:10pm PT
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Hi Ed,
Does your data base include good data for free climbs in the 80s, 90s, and 00s? If so, can you post a list? Maybe campers who climbed during those times can fill in the stories and relationships.
RB
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Aug 21, 2008 - 05:18pm PT
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You guys trying to get a wikiclimbia going around here or something?
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 22, 2008 - 11:10am PT
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there are inherent problems with any selection of climbs as "notable"
I have used a rather simple criteria: is it a climb I know about.
Further, I have used only documented climbs, and the rather limited identification of "First Ascent" or "First Free Ascent." Climbs that are not identified as such are not a part of the selection process. So significant free climbing projects, such as the West Face of Sentinel a long time, unsolved free climbing project are not represented.
However, given the state of communication regarding climbing, it is difficult to use any other method. For instance, Sean Jones has put up about 100 new climbs in the Valley, I can name only two: Gates of Delirium and Growing Up, are any of the others notable?
So when I look at the list of Yosemite Valley climbs by year I have to think whether or not I have heard mention of it. Don Reid asks the FA teams that submit climbs for a "star rating," so just looking at the stars is of dubious value, who wouldn't think their climb is a "137.75 star dick wrenching mega-classic"?
What seems to have happened is that Yosemite Valley ceased being a place to develop higher standards and more a place to train. The style developed in the Valley, rapid ascents of long technical routes, has been applied to many other regions. The proximity of long technical routes, the simple logistics of visiting the Valley and the ease of getting there make it a natural place to train for climbing projects elsewhere in the world. An ambitious climber will get more mention of pushing a new wall on some Baffin Island fjord than squeezing another line onto the already crowded walls of the Valley.
The additional constraints imposed by the now enforced rules limiting time in the Valley have also greatly reduced climbing activities.
Finally, the magazines, in their quest for satisfying their reader's thirst for "the new" have long ago moved beyond the Valley, relegating it to "museum" status, where they feel that there is nothing of interest to the current equipment-buying generation of magazine readers... after all, every young Valley first timer complains that the route ratings are incomprehensible, they can pull 5.12 at their local gym yet get shut down on a 5.7 in the Valley, what is there to spray about to the local gym crowd.
Bouldering in the Valley has a long history, I haven't delved into Reid's new bouldering guide, I'm not sure it has the historical information necessary to attribute dates and FAs, though bouldering was a notoriously solitary activity when done seriously back in the day, sort of in the mold of Gill. When done socially then, I suspect it wasn't serious, more like party games to establish hierarchies, and something that could be dismissed as "just training" or "just trickery" but not "real climbing." Those days have passed, and we find climbers who are in the Valley just for the bouldering. It still boggles my mind, but there you have it.
A history of Valley bouldering is probably still possible, but as it continues to be an oral tradition, the stories should be captured before the primary historical sources cease to be. Gill has done some of this, but the Valley scene is most colorfully rendered by the Stonemaster set.
Then there are the numerous stories of excellent climbers coming in from far away places, like Wyoming, who have a quite different point of view of climbing in the Valley. The parallax they offer is quite refreshing, as the stock Valley stories told from the Valley local perspective can be cloying at times. These voices are aging too, and cultural inhibitions have prevented them from providing their stories in the past, after all, they didn't really "know" what was going on, did they? But their stories adds a richness to the history, and they were often more aware of the currents of the times than the locals, who were caught up in that fast moving stream, the world is different if you arrive at it from the banks than if you are in the current.
ANYWAY, it would be wonderful if a lot of this could be captured. Most young people will yawn, just as we did, but they will be as appreciative as we are when they get to be our age.
It doesn't really matter in the sweep of history whether or not this story gets written. But it will most assuredly be lost if it does not. Many of you will have spent a large fraction of your life living this story, it must have had some importance to you, perhaps important enough to communicate to those who might follow your path.
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horst
Trad climber
Lancaster, PA
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Aug 22, 2008 - 12:39pm PT
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I agree, this is great stuff...I fondly remember reading about these cutting-edge free ascents as a very young climber growing up in PA...it fostered many dreams of growing up to be a climber!
Anyway, I did a fun interview with Mark Hudon last month...he talked a bit about some of the routes he freed in the late 70s, and gave some insight into his attempt to free climb Salathe.
Go to Podclimber.com and look for the Masters of Rock interview.
I'll try to paste a direct link here, so you can listen to the interview.
Mark Hudon Interview
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 11:47am PT
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There seems to be a lot that is misunderstood about the culture of 70s bouldering. To talk to many younger climbers, one might gather that bouldering was invented in the early 90s.
Bouldering culture during the mid-to late 70s was very much about a group dynamic and was heavily pursued both as a means to training and as an end in itself. When getting to know an area, often bouldering was the litmus test to understanding the stone and a gateway to mastering the subtleties required of that particular style of rock.
Bouldering could be used as an introductory medium to bring a visiting climber up to speed and to test that climber’s prowess; to quickly assess strength, aptitude, and technical maturity.
Having arrived on a scene, blending into the bouldering culture helped an aspirant to get one’s bearings. In some sense, the routes would take care of themselves, because they were well known, listed in the guide, and ascents would slowly accrue in accord with long-term commitment. But the bouldering experience belonged to a discrete and fervent oral tradition.
In my first full-time season in Yosemite, 1980, Bachar took me on a tour of the boulders at Camp 4. This was an introduction and a nod to goodwill on his part; clearly he occupied a class above mine on the surrounding walls, yet he could quite easily provide the initiate with a valuable tour of the standard problems. I remember the Titanic, Blockhead, Ament’s Prow and others. (don’t believe for a second that I actually topped out on those things). As we moved through the circuit, John would divine sequences, tell stories related to the personalities engaged in the earlier ascents.
Mark Chapman graciously did the same on the other side of the Valley, one afternoon taking me through the standards among the Sentinel Boulders and a couple of other areas on that side; Housekeeping Boulders I recall. I remember the stiff mantel of the Purple Barrel most vividly. He gave me a look at the Amazon Face (just a look, haha).
In the Eastern Sierra that spring, it was Vern Clevenger at Dead Man's Summit. In Southern California we would often boulder in our running shoes, thinking that the deficit would help us to build up our finger strength. As I was fiddling about on the welded tuff at Dead Man's, Vern said to me: "You should put on your EB's and get more serious with your footwork on this stuff..."
In May of 1980 heading up into the Sierra Nevada, on the way to Mammoth Lakes, I stopped at Wheeler’s boot repair, where Al Bard seemed to stand as an emissary of sorts, holding forth in his signature white cap, happily dispensing directions to the storied Buttermilk Boulders. This is a bouldering haunt I returned to many times; a particular day during that summer a bunch of us from Mammoth Lakes, Vern, probably Claude Fiddler, Bob Finn, Marco Milano and others went down and scattered about among the problems, had a picnic, hung out and soaked it all in. That evening we got together with bishop locals Bob Harrington, Rick Wheeler, and more Bishop locals. This was (and still is) a fairly tight knit yet sociable group of itinerant high country regulars. Bouldering was just such a handy means to affect a casual gathering.
Midsummer in Tuolumne Meadows, Katherine Besio, "KB", showed me around The Knobs and Tenaya Boulders.
These introductions also served to provide an avenue of autonomy; to know a circuit intimately was to possess knowledge of something akin to a training apparatus which one could then pursue in one's own time, training alone as needed to fill the solitary down time which would naturally arise over a season's course.
I enjoyed a similar experience with Yabo, although his introduction characteristically involved something more fringe, although not necessarily uncommon: some late evening ascents and attempts on boulders out behind Camp 4 …this was done without any light whatsoever, snatching holds on difficult problems, silently cloaked in the black of night.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 23, 2008 - 01:36pm PT
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Certainly an interesting perspective on bouldering. It seems true that the skills developed by hard bouldering have been applied to big routes. I'm less sure of the direct connection of Yosemite bouldering to freeing the big Yosemite routes, the prevalence of bouldering has raised the level of climbing everywhere.
As far as "notable climbs," I agree that these should be everything The Warbler said, but it is difficult to label a climb as "notable" if no one knows about it, or understands just why it is notable.
Below is the list of 1986 First Ascents. Perhaps the only one that could be termed "notable" is Phantom, but I'd like to know if there are any others? There are a couple of Kauk climbs in there, but I'm not sure if they make the list.
Alamo 5.11a
Amoeba, The Right Side 5.11c
Anal Tongue Darts 5.10c
Apathy Buttress 5.9
Arete Butler 5.10a
Astro Spam 5.11a
Avalon 5.10b
Back to the Future 5.12d
Bark at the Moon 5.11b
Beat the Clock 5.10c
Boogie with Stu 5.10d
Brainbucket 5.10d
Breathalizer 5.10b
Butthole Climber 5.10c
Catch a Wave 5.11d
Chicken's Choice 5.10b
Combustable Knowledge 5.10d
Crazy Train 5.10c
Creeping Lethargy 5.10d
Crying for Mama 5.10a
Dale's Pin Job 5.13
Dancing in the Dark 5.11c
Danger Will Robinson 5.10d
Dark Star 5.10b
Deaf, Dumb and Blind 5.10a
Delicate Delineate 5.11c
Destination Zero 5.11a
Doggie Submission 5.10b
Draw the Line 5.11b
Eraser Flake 5.11a
Extra Credit 5.10d
Famous Potatoes 5.11b
Fast Lane, The 5.11d
Fire Drill 5.10d
Fist Puppet 5.11a
Fistibule 5.11c
Flight Attendant 5.10c
Follying 5.11c
Free Clinic 5.11b
Full Steam Ahead 5.11d
Going Nowhere 5.11b
Grokin' 5.11b
Groundhog 5.11b
Guides Route 5.6
Guru Crack, Right 5.10a
Heading for Oblivion 5.10
Hobknob 5.8
Holidays 5.8
Isoceles Revisited 5.10b
Israeli Bomber 5.10c
Joe Palmer 5.11b
Karma 5.11d
Ken's Dream 5.10a
Kids are All Right, The 5.7
Krovy Rookers 5.10b
Lay Lady Lieback 5.11a
Local Motion 5.11d
Looking for Lichen 5.10b
Loyd's Lolly Pop 5.9
Lycra Virgin 5.11d
Lynnea's Birthday Surprise 5.10a
Marvin Gardens 5.10
Minor Kinda Unit 5.9
Mirror, Mirror Right 5.9
Moe, Larry, The Cheese 5.10c
My Rhombus 5.10a
Nanbeeb 5.10b
Neil Down 5.11c
No Teats 5.10a
North by Northwest 5.11a
Nothing Good Ever Lasts 5.10d
Nothing on the Apron 5.11c
On the Waterfront 5.9
Panther, The 5.11d
Permanent Waves 5.10b
Phantom 5.13a
Pimper's Paradise 5.11d
Pit Stop
Poker Face 5.10b
Prime Time 5.9
Princess, The 5.9
Psychic Energy 5.11b
Public Opinion 5.10c
Punch Line, The 5.10d
Rambler, The 5.10d
Remnant, The, Center Route 5.12a
Rock Neurotic 5.11b
Roller Coaster 5.8
Run With Me 5.10a
Same as it Never Was 5.11b
Sons of Yesterday 5.10a
Stay Free 5.11b
Stroke (My Erect Ear Tuffs) 5.10c
Sylvester's Meow 5.11a
Tapestry 5.9
Tennessee Strings 5.12a
Thin Line 5.11c
Through Bein' Cool 5.10c
Ticket to Nowhere 5.11c
Tooth or Consequences 5.11b
Valley Syndrome 5.11c
Violent Bear It Away, The 5.10c
Walk of Life 5.10d
Water Babies 5.11a
Way Lost 5.9
Weird Scenes in the Gold Mine 5.10a
White Dike, The 5.10d
Wicked Jones Crusher 5.10b
Yosemite Pointless 5.9
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 01:48pm PT
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Nice list Ed.
As a sidenote,
I am happy to recognize that I was the only one to champion the 5.6 standard, with Guides Route.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 02:08pm PT
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Ed wrote:
“It seems true that the skills developed by hard bouldering have been applied to big routes. I'm less sure of the direct connection of Yosemite bouldering to freeing the big Yosemite routes”
This would be an interesting point to debate. Perhaps subjective; perhaps not so. Given the amount of bouldering that Kauk, Dale, Bachar, Long and others entertained, it may be difficult to sequester bouldering from the greater achievements.
I for one, though not in any way a seminal figure, definitely leveraged my self-knowledge as attained through bouldering to free some big routes. In June of 1980, a Colorado climber, Dan Michael, approached me to partner with him on Astro Man. Prior to that, my Yosemite CV from the 70s was nothing particularly so aggressive, things like Steck Salathe, The Nose, English Breakfast Crack, first pitch of New Dimensions, Waverly Wafer and a smattering of 5.10.
But I reasoned that the East Face of the Column, done free, would technically comprise lots of endurance 5.10, and that my bouldering skills would get me through on the 5.11, (on things such as the “boulder pitch” for instance, down low), this given that I could retain the necessary stamina by staying mentally cool. We swung leads and I fell only once, while leading the weird bottomless lie back which is the pitch after the Harding Slot. That was sort of bouldery! -As is the mantle getting into the changing corners pitch. Shortly after this, Kim Carrigan and I made a free ascent of Hotline. Although we walked across the hand traverse, no doubt dropping the grade below 5.12, that was a fairly bouldery section.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 23, 2008 - 02:19pm PT
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I thought about Karma, and after the Growing Up thread you could argue that it was a visionary line, but perhaps not yet a visionary climb.
When I say I considered climbs I knew about, I wasn't referring to popular climbs, while I also know about those, I have made a point of going and at least looking at many climbs that are projects, some potentially visionary. I don't claim any special knowledge.
I'd be interested to hear about Punchline...
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Aug 23, 2008 - 02:42pm PT
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"I enjoyed a similar experience with Yabo, although his introduction characteristically involved something more fringe, although not necessarily uncommon: some late evening ascents and attempts on boulders out behind Camp 4 …this was done without any light whatsoever, snatching holds on difficult problems, silently cloaked in the black of night."
Yabo and Tarbuster invent an entirely new genre of bouldering: the night-time start. As opposed to or in combination with the sit-down start.
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Melissa
Gym climber
berkeley, ca
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Aug 23, 2008 - 02:52pm PT
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Karma is one of the more noteable (to me) adventure routes in the Valley. Unrpeated still?
SOY is noteable as the valley's most popular 10- and probably one of its best 5.10's. That a moderatish 5 pitch hand crack was right next to an already popular line unclimbed was visionary in its own way, IMO.
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Aug 23, 2008 - 02:55pm PT
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Thanks, Kevin - I suppose if we delve into it, it will turn out that Oscar Eckenstein invented the night-time start, on his eponymous boulder in Llanberis Pass. Or possibly Moses.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 03:07pm PT
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I’d say by 1979 through the early 1980s, in Yosemite, a time of consolidation and wider access to the standards ensued, largely due the advent of friends. As it turns out, most all the hard 5.11 things that you could do on site, (plus a good deal of the yo-yo’d 5.12s), were established with nuts, prior to the advent of friends. The camming devices made it easier for those of us following that act to work through the standards. The next leap was probably not one but two steps forward.
The early/mid 80s was characterized by some stagnation, inextricably linked to the advance and controversy over sport climbing. This is characterized by the route so titled: “Valley Syndrome”, a climb named after an article by Jeff Smoot, which was controversial as it somewhat accurately purported stagnation and xenophobic attitude in Yosemite.
Bachar’s The Phantom, Moon Germs, and like climbs pushed the ground up envelope in terms of technical difficulty along with boldness, while Karma pushed it in terms of adventure, yet for many, the new frontier relied upon sport climbing tactics. Things like The Punchline and Crossroads are notable in that regard.
In the early 90s, I would visit Chappy, and invariably he was somewhat distraught at the lack of international focus on Yosemite as there had once been: he was quite supportive of visiting climbers and would accommodate and introduce to us the likes of the talented Sean Miles & Johnny Dawes.
Most of this is quite well covered in Ed’s link posted on the Bates/Klemens thread. That is an excellent history and well worth the read; I’d guess that was penned by Don Reid?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 03:09pm PT
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Yes, I started climbing in Joshua tree about 1975 and nighttime bouldering was one of the many tasty treats on the menu! -But it was most often, though not always or necessarily aided by either moon or lamplight.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 03:24pm PT
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Mountain Magazine #56, Jul/Aug '77
Ray Jardine, Separate Reality:
A June 2002 special edition of Climbing,
Featuring Wolfgang Gullich on the first solo, 1986, of Separate Reality:
Skipping ahead a cuple/three years, Climbing #57 Sept/Oct '93,
Jerry Moffat, "After Midnight", Columbia Boulder, Camp 4:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 04:06pm PT
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Followed nicely by Climbing #58, Nov/Dec '93:
One of those Joshua Tree boulderers on the cover this time...
Matched up with some of the best ad copy ever:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 04:16pm PT
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From the '77 Mountain #56:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 04:35pm PT
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To my mind,
Two articles from Mountain 66, March/April 1979, exemplify the free climbing movements of late 70s valley climbing.
"The Art of the States" & "States of the Art".
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 04:36pm PT
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Windfall is one of my all-time favorites Kevin.
As I've said before, you and Chapman really bagged some nice stuff.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 04:39pm PT
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 05:11pm PT
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And just as we might try to be inclusive of bouldering's part in all of this,
Although this isn't meant to be just an article on Yosemite, as it showcases leading free climbing activity throughout the states, as Ament might say, one has to consider the broader context...
Anybody who was seriously active in Yosemite during the late 70s, had either been to or had solid intentions of going to these places:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 05:18pm PT
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Ed Hartouni's previous post on the Bates/Klemens thread deserves a spot here on this thread,
As it does such a terrific service to the topic:
From the Introduction to Yosemite Climbs
George Meyers and Don Reid
Chockstone Press
1987
CLIMBING HISTORY
The following history section, covering the years from 1870 to World War II, was written by Richard Leonard, David Brower and William Dunmire and appeared in Steve Roper's guide book A Climber's Guide to Yosemite Valley, published by the Sierra Club in 1971.
...Even in those prehistoric days before the discovery of the incomparable Valley, there were legendary rock climbing exploits. Such was the first descent to the base of the Lost Arrow. The Indian maiden Tee-hee-neh rappelled on lodgepole saplings joined together with deer thongs to recover the lifeless body of her lover, Kos-soo-kah. By means of thongs and the strong arms of the other members of the tribe, they were brought back to the rim of the Valley, where Tee-hee-neh perished in grief. This legend is reported by many different sources: Hutchings, in 1886, stated the height of the rappel to be 203 feet, a truly remarkable rock climbing achievement.
It was not until 1833 that the white man is known to have seen Yosemite Valley. From reports published long before the later and widely publicized discovery of the Valley, we learn that Joseph Redderford Walker and party came from the vicinity of Bridgeport, perhaps over Virginia Pass and along the divide between the Tuolumne and the Merced rivers, to the Valley rim. There they marveled at waterfalls over "lofty precipices... more than a mile high." The first rock climbing attempt by white man was soon stopped by difficulty, for "on making several attempts we found it utterly impossible for man to descend."
In 1851, however, Yosemite Valley was really made known to the world, when the Mariposa Battalion, organized by harassed settlers of the foothills, trailed Indians to their stronghold in Ahwahnee - "deep grass valley."
Yosemite soon became a source of attraction for tourists from all over the world. One of the earliest to arrive was James M. Hutchings, who first came to the Valley in 1855. Throughout the early history of the Valley he was interested in attempting to climb every point around the Valley.
John Muir first came to the Sierra in 1868. Through him more than any other man has the beauty of the region been made known to the entire world. His climbs in Yosemite Valley and the High Sierra, many of them the earliest of which we have knowledge, place him among the pioneers of California mountaineering. His Sunnyside Bench, east of the lip of Lower Yosemite Fall, is still one of the untrammeled beauty spots of the Valley. His early exploration of the Tenaya Canyon let to route finding in the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne. He made first ascents of Cathedral Peak and Mount Ritter, and was the first to traverse under the Lost Arrow along Fern Ledge, beneath the crashing power of the Upper Yosemite Fall.
In early October of 1864 Clarence King , assisted by Richard Cotter, fresh from a victory over Mount Tyndall, made the first serious topographical and geological reconnaissance of the Yosemite Valley. On this survey they climbed practically every summit on a circuit of the rim of the Valley. This circuit included only the easier points, such as El Capitan, Eagle Peak, Yosemite Point, North Dome, Basket Dome, Mount Watkins, Sentinel Dome, and the Cathedral Rocks. Any summits which were much beyond this standard of difficulty seemed to them completely beyond the range of human ability. In 1865 the California Geological Survey wrote concerning Half Dome, Mount Starr King and Mount Broderick, "Their summits are absolutely inaccessible."
Spurred by this challenge James M. Hutchings and two others made the first recored attempt on Half Dome in 1869, but were stopped at a saddle east of the Dome. After at least two intervening attempts the Scotch carpenter and trail builder, George G. Anderson, finally engineered his way to the top on October 12, 1875.
Inspired by the success on Half Dome, adventurous climbers turned their attention to Mount Starr King, the "extremely steep, bare, inaccessible cone of granite" referred to by Whitney in the Yosemite Guide Book. George B. Bayley and E. S. Schuyler made the ascent in August 1876, somewhat to the dismay of Anderson, Hutchings and J. B. Lambert, who, using a different route, a year later found the summit monuments built by the first party. Bayley was one of the most remarkable climbers of the time. In 1876 Muir recorded that "Mount Shasta, Whitney, Lyell, Dana, and the Obelisk (Mount Clark) already have felt his foot, and years ago he made desperate efforts to ascend the South Dome (Half Dome), eager for the first honors." Later he was distinguished by an early ascent of Cathedral Peak, and an ascent of Mount Rainier during which he was seriously injured by a fall into a crevasse, recovering only to be killed in a city elevator.
After the great ascents of the "inaccessible" summits of Yosemite, there was a period of quiet in the climbing history, for everything seemed to have been done. Hutchings had claimed the ascent of all Yosemite points, except Grizzly Peak and the Cathedral Spires, and a climber of another generation came forward in 1885 to make the ascent of Grizzly Peak. He was Charles A. Bailey, who later became an enthusiastic member of the Sierra Club, locating, climbing and naming Sierra Point for the Club.
Since it now appeared that all the major summits in the Yosemite region had been climbed, there was a long gap in the climbing history, broken only by the exploratory routes of a few outstanding climbers of the period. Those whose climbs are best known are S. L. Foster, Joseph N. LeConte, Charles and Earl Michael, William Kat and Ralph S. Griswold. Foster was best known for his canyoneering in the Merced and Tenaya canyons beginning in 1909. LeConte has been remembered through the description of his ascent of the gully on Grizzly Peak, which permits a route to the Diving Board on Half Dome. He also wrote of several other "scrambles about Yosemite" of nearly three decades ago. It has been said of the Michaels that they climbed everything that did not require pitons. The same description might apply to Kat and Griswold. All have been so modest that it is possible we may never know the true history of the interesting routes which they had pioneered.
Again it seemed that nothing more could be done. However, in the early thirties, a new phase of rock climbing was growing, based on the development of modern technique in Europe, in the summer of 1931. Robert L. M. Underhill, the leading American exponent of the use and management of the rope in rock work, interested Californians in this phase of climbing. It has been mentioned that some very remarkable climbing was done without the knowledge of this safety technique; but the early climber who have discussed the matter agree that their climbing frequently involved unjustifiable hazard. Moreover, it was clear to them that they could not attempt routes of very high angle and small holds. Thus the introduction of a new type of climbing, combined with the protection of pitoncraft, again opened a new field.
It was not until September 2, 1933 that the first rock climbing section of the Sierra Club felt competent to make organized attempts upon the spectacular unclimbed faces and spires of Yosemite. Although as long ago as 1886 Hutchings, in reporting the relatively easy ascent of Grizzly Peak, claimed that the last "unclimbed summit" of Yosemite had been ascended, nevertheless the Cathedral Spires, the Church Tower, the Arrowhead, Split Pinnacle, Pulpit Rock, Watkins Pinnacles and the Lost Arrow still stood forth without even an attempt ever having been recorded against them. In addition to these summits there was a field, practically unexplored, of route finding on faces, arêtes, gullies and chimneys. Among these may be mentioned Washington Column, Royal Arches, Panorama Cliff, Glacier Point, Yosemite Point Couloir, Cathedral Chimney and the arête of the Lower Brother. Ropes, pitons and trained experience in their use were the keys to these ascents, which were later to become so popular. Climbers, profiting by the achievements of their predecessors, added still more ascents to the growing list of Yosemite routes...
The following section, covering the years from 1941 to Chuck Pratt's climb of the Crack of Doom in 1961, was written by Steve Roper and appeared in his 1971 book. The remainder of the history section, covering the years from 1962 to the present, was compiled by George Meyers.
During the eight years between the 1933 trip and the entry of this country in World War II, about forty first ascents were made. The most active climbers of this period were Kenneth Adam, David Brower, Jules Eichorn, Morgan Harris, Richard Leonard, L. Burce Meyer and Hervey Voge. Brower made eighteen first ascents, twelve of them with Harris. Perhaps the most continually popular routes of this era were the regular routes on both the Cathedral Spires, and the Royal Arches Route.
During World War II there was a climbing hiatus, but when the war ended a new generation of climbers quickly appeared. Few of the climbers active in the 1930's were to establish new routes in the post-war era. In 1945, a Swiss blacksmith named John Salathe came to Yosemite to hike, climb and live with nature. He became a vegetarian as a result of a fleeting conversation with "angels" - these same apparitions later pointed out to him three great Valley routes: the Lost Arrow, the southwest face of Half Dome and the north face of Sentinel Rock. All had been attempted in the 1930's and all were considered great prizes. Two factors allowed Salathe to become a legendary climber: his determination and his development of the world's finest pitons. It had long been known and accepted that traditional soft iron pitons couldn't be forced into bad cracks, they would buckle and bend. Employing the skills of his life work, Salathe was able to fashion extremely stiff and durable pitons from Model A Ford axles. Using such iron, he was able to climb, with Anton Nelson, the southwest face of Half Dome without bolts. It is safe to guess that many bolts would have been necessary had conventional pitons been used. Thus, it can be seen that the invention of hardened steel alloy pitons opened up an almost limitless number of first ascent possibilities. Other climbers were not quick to accept the new pitons and the corresponding new standards; Salathe was the great pioneer of the late 1940's. His solo escapades on the Lost Arrow will be remembered far longer than the first "ascent," members of which threw ropes over the summit and prusiked. His notable five-day ascent of the Lost Arrow Chimney, also climbed with Nelson, was the first Grade V climb done in the country.
Although Salathe was the finest aid man of his day, he was not known as a good free climber. He often remarked, "Enough of this hiking, let us get on to the climbing," the hiking referring to free climbing. And yet, at times, he was bold on free climbing; a climb called the Hand, in Pinnacles National Monument, was led by Salathe, using four pitons for protection. Although only 5.6 in difficulty, the Hand is fearsomely exposed and the route is devious. Bolds have now replaced his pitons and it is impossible to see how he managed to place them. One assumes that they were used to reassure the belayer, who was out of sight around a corner.
After climbing Sentienl in 1950, Salathe began to fade from the scene; he had done his three climbs, there were marital problems and he was over fifty years old. He soon left for his native land. Returning to America in 1962, he occasionally visited the Valley, where he would be surrounded by idolators. Surreptitious tape recordings and photographs were made as John Salathe sat oblivious, cooking the grasses from a nearby meadow. A healthy glow was ever-present in his blue eyes; he could chastise Allen Steck, his climbing partner on Sentinel; "You see, Al, if only you had eaten as I did you would have felt better on the wall." Then Allen would say, "You know John, they have done our route in three hours now." And the serene reply, "But not the same route, Al - they could not do our routes that fast. Oh, now that the bolts are in, perhaps... three days?" Then he would shake his head.
Steck was the leader of the post-Salathe generation; in a period of three years he climbed not only Sentinel's north face, but also two of the classic buttress routes in the Valley: Yosemite Point Buttress and the East Buttress of El Capitan.
Most of the noteworthy climbers in Yosemite from 1933 to 1955 came from the San Francisco area. Los Angeles, the other great population center of California, developed good climbers during that period, but their efforts were largely confined to a local cliff, Tahquitz Rock. An exception was the venerable Chuck Wilts, who had vied with Salathe for the price of the Lost Arrow Chimney. Wilts and his wife, Ellen, made the first ascent of Rixon's Pinnacle, at that time one of the hardest short routes.
In 1954 a pudgy beginner named Mark Powell was taken up the Lower Cathedral Spire, and of the resulting fiasco his partner could only say, "That fellow Powell just doesn't have it." But he did, and the mid-1950's can only be thought of the Powell Era. With climbing partners of the caliber of Wally Reed, Bill Feuerer and Warren Harding, Powell established nineteen new routes. In one active ten-month period, he put up ten routes, including such classics as the Arrowhead Arete, the South Face of North Dome, and the Powell-Reed Route on Middle Cathedral Rock. A serious ankle injury in September 1957 put an abrupt end to his productive efforts. Of Powell's three main climbing partners, all went on to achieve various degrees of notoriety. Reed was without question the most unheralded climber ever to come out of the Valley; few knew of his amazing control on 5.9 routes. In the early 60's, before he "retired" to go back to school, he made many first ascents. Feuerer became known as the "Dolt" for some of his infamous blunders, and in the 60's he began making beautiful and ultra-expensive climbing equipment. While Reed and Dolt went on to other activities, Harding was just beginning to make a name for himself.
He started climbing in 1952 and was a weak member of a Grand Teton ascent, causing someone to remark on his lack of endurance. This could well be an apocryphal story, for Harding became known as the iron man of Yosemite climbing, the man who could drill bolt holes all night. His perseverance on the Nose of El Capitan is well-known by now; the first El Cap is his testimonial to his drive and vision. Pleased by his success, he turned to other intimidating walls, overcoming with bolts and siege tactics cliffs which no one had yet dreamed possible. It has been suggested that Harding was ahead of his time, that his 110-bolt ascent of the Leaning Tower would certainly be done someday, so why not in 1961. However, at the time, Harding was criticized for an apparent predilection for security. (Perhaps the question is reopened by the 1986 27-bolt ascent of a line that parallels the Harding route.) His 1970 ascent of the Wall of the Early Morning Light strained most climbers' perception of the justifiable use of bolts, and in the years that followed, Harding only occasionally climbed in the Valley, establishing a few routes up obscure and somewhat ugly walls.
Before Powell and Harding even began climbing, Royal Robbins was putting up America's first 5.9 climbs on Tahquitz Rock. During the 1950's he made few trips to the Valley, but among his early accomplishments were the second and third ascents of the north face of Sentinel and the fourth ascent of the Arrow Chimney. Of his three first ascents in the fifties, the major one was the first Grade VI in the country: the great face of Half Dome, climbed in 1957 with Jerry Galwas and Mike Sherrick. Five days were spent on the wall. During his 1958-59 incarceration in the Army, Robbins heard stories of what was going on in the Valley: Powell had just put up his great routes and a young Bay Area upstart, Chuck Pratt, was responsible for some of the best climbs of 1958 and 1959.
Pratt had immediately shown a great interest in free climbing and seemed to possess a supernatural ability. An early free lead on Phantom Pinnacle and a great crack lead midway up the north face of Middle Cathedral Rock were among his climbs. As the productive decade of the 60's dawned, Pratt and Robbins, totally committed to climbing, were the dominant figures. These two, accompanied by Tom Frost and Joe Fitschen, made the second ascent of the Nose in six and a half days. This convinced them that even the greatest Valley walls were possible without fixing ropes from bottom to top. Robbins made first ascents of seven Grade VI's in a three-year period. Pratt, meanwhile, was quietly climbing big walls and leading the most difficult crack climbs yet established; his Crack of Doom, climbed in 1961, was for many years the hardest crack climb in the Valley. Later, his strenuous and difficult-to-protect Twilight Zone left a route still well respected.
In this same period, attention turned to the monolithic El Capitan. The year 1961 saw Robbins, Pratt and Frost put together a circuitous route up the broad southwest face of El Capitan that required only 13 bolts and had much free climbing. The Salathe Wall was as much an effort to reduce the number of bolts need to climb El Cap (the Nose had required 125) as it was a progression toward less reliance on fixed ropes. With El Cap's first route behind them, Robbins and company started to look at the style in which the next routes would be established.
The next major route on El Cap, the 1962 ascent of the Dihedral Wall, by Ed Cooper, Jim Baldwin and Glenn Denny, was novel in two ways: it involved individuals from the periphery of the regular Yosemite community; it also seemed somewhat retrograde of the stylistic standards that Robbins had adopted on the Salathe. Fixed ropes were used to 1, 900 feet and about 100 bolts were placed. Other walls were climbed on El Cap and elsewhere in the Valley over the next few years. The development of aid climbing during the early 60's was in large part due to the efforts and energies of Robbins, who climbed most of the major rock formations. His 1963 solo ascent of the Harding route on the Leaning Tower was the first solo ascent of a major Yosemite wall. The culmination of the aid techniques of this period was the 1964 ascent of the North American Wall, the first route to venture onto the compact, steep, and "unretreatable" southeast face of El Cap. Four of the strongest climbers Yosemite had trained, Robbins, Frost, Pratt and Yvon Chouinard, teamed up to create what was clearly the hardest wall climber ever done anywhere. From sieged, fixed rope routes, on to semi-fixed, to reconnoitered (as was the NA Wall, climbed previously by Frost and Robbins to half height), the natural progression of wall development was for a two-man team to manage a big new route on their own. Chouinard and TM Herbert accomplished this in 1965. Robbins culminated his Yosemite career three years later by making the second ascent of the Muir Wall, the first time El Cap was soloed.
The 60's saw the first of the climbing bums, when the hard-core activist had left the lifestyles of the "outer world" largely behind them for a total commitment to the pursuit of climbing cliffs. Perhaps ten to twenty climbers were in full-season residence during the early 60's. This number was to double by the middle of the decade, and by 1970 perhaps double again.
The walls were not the sole magnet for young climbers of the 60's. Soon after Chuck Pratt plied the shorter cracks in search of difficult testpieces. Frank Sacherer arrived on the scene and used a driven approach in his free climbing to consolidate the standards that Pratt had earlier established. In a period of two years, 1964-65, he put up many free climbs and succeeded in eliminating aid from many of the older aid routes. These included such fifties classics as the East Buttresses of El Capitan and Middle Cathedral Rock, the Lost Arrow Chimney, and the Direct North Buttress of Middle. His remarkable shorter efforts included dispensing with aid on the Dihardral, Bridalveil East, and the right side of the Hourglass. These later routes pushed the free climbing standards up a notch to around 5.10c. Other climbers were also active during this period: Ken Boche, Yvon Chouniard, Glenn Denny, TM Herbert, Bob Kamps, Layton Kor, Jim Madsen, Steve Roper, Galen Rowell, and Kim Schmitz. Sacherer left the Valley scene in 1966 to pursue a physics career (though he died in the Alps in the late 70's) and it was left to Pratt, Chris Fredericks, and particulary to newcomer Jim Bridwell to lead the way to higher free climbing standards.
Bridwell first climbed in the Valley in 1962, and after some tutelage under the likes of Pratt, Layton Kor, and Sacherer, he started to repeat many of the harder wall climbs of the Robbins era, including (sometimes last known) ascents of walls such as Arches Direct, East Face of Higher Cathedral Rock and the Direct Northwest Face of Half Dome. Bridwell, together with Kim Schmitz and Jim Madsen, among others, represented the new generation of wall climbers. These wall climbers of the late 60's, while somewhat slow to establish new wall routes, made quick ascents of the existing ones.
Since the thirties, when the routes followed major chimney and crack systems, new routes had followed progressively thinner crack systems. In the 70's this trend saw routes that included long successive pitches of knifeblades and rurps, and the free climbing of finger cracks, something unheard of in the 60's.
While A5 was introduced by Robbins in the 60's, using pitons and rurps, oftentimes in piton stacks (perhaps most notoriously on the 10-hour A5 pitch on Arches Direct), the years following the consolidation of the late 60's saw A5 expressed by more and more technical means. Routes impossible using 60's technology were later climbed using mashable copperheads (and tiny aluminum heads) and an impressive array of skyhooks. The technology of the 60's aid climbing was also used more often and in a more sustained fashion. The use of rurps saw new light with Charlie Porter's ascent of the Shield in 1972, where he placed 35 in a row. Porter, a former auto mechanic and metallurgist, was the most notable of a new imaginative generation of aid climbers. In addition to his many El Cap routes, Porter produced slider nuts (refined from Bridwell's designs of 1965) and camming nuts that foresaw the future e in free climbing protection. After the introduction of Friends in 1978, the previously scary nemesis of the wall climber, expanding flakes, became slightly less scary, and some routes on Hlaf Dome in particular, saw ascents that had intimidated earlier generations of climbers.
The huge area of El Cap to the right of the North American Wall, referred to by Robbins at one point as "rotten," was opened up in the early 70's. This was done first, ironically, by Robbins himself, in an unsuccessful bid for the first solo first ascent of an El Cap route, and most significantly, by Charlie Porter. In quick succession Porter climbed the Zodiac and Tangerine Trip, now seen as some of the best aid climbing on the cliff, and certainly among the steepest.
While Porter opened many eyes to the possibilities of expanded hard aid, connecting the thinnest of flake systems to create routes up inobvious walls, it was Jim Bridwell who leaped upon the idea with characteristic energy. First he pushed a major new route up the wall to the left of the North American Wall, the Pacific Ocean Wall, with Coloradan Billy Westbay in 1975, and then over the years progressively harder and more tenuous lines: Sea of Dreams, Bushido, and Zenyatta Mondatta. One technique that was first seen with the Bridwell routes was the use of a chisel to clean loose rock from small slots in which to mash copperheads. (Later climbers have expanded this chisel use to the plain manufacture of copperhead slots in blank corners.) Also, Bridwell borrowed from Kim Schmitz and Jim Madsen the timesaving use of dowels, and from Harding, drilled hook placements.
Much of the relatively slow pace at which El Cap routes were being established was due to the plainly formidable appearance of such a huge cliff. But the aura of intimidation that surrounded the big aid routes was shaken when outsiders Chuck Kroger and Scott Davis drove into the Valley and up to El Cap in 1970, and without fanfare, established the Heart Route in impeccable style. El Cap's image suffered considerably further when Steve Sutton and Hugh Burton, teenagers from Squamish Cliff, came to the Valley in 1972 and climbed a good new route on the cliff, capping their accomplishment with a bit of irreverence by naming it the Magic Mushroom, as much a defiance of the self-serious attitudes of the Robbins era as it was a celebration of the drugs they quaffed enroute.
Others were active in establishing big aid routes. During the 70's Nose veteran and crag rat Warren Harding was occasionally active on the walls, climbing big, steep, obscure and often blank routes that have not seen second ascents and that are now largely ignored. Most notable was his ascent of the Wall of the Early Morning Light with Dean Caldwell in 1970, a route that stirred such controversy (because of the 300 holes drilled) that Robbins felt compelled to chop the route. Impressed with the standard of the climbing, he abandoned his bolt removal efforts about halfway up the route. Rick Sylvester, most known for his ski/parachute leaps off El Cap, was one of the first of the 70's residents to establish a new route up El Cap - The Heart Woute - and he furthered his reputation for weird boldness by establishing a route up the path if Upper Yosemite Fall, climbing with Bugs McKeith during a period when the fall had temporarily dried up. In the decade of the 70's the number of El Cap routes alone rose from ten to 38, primarily due to the efforts of Dale Bard, Hugh Burton, Mark Chapman, Bruce Hawkins, Ron Kauk, Bill Price, Steve Sutton and others, who, partnered with Porter, Bridwell or among themselves, established numerous routes on El Cap and Half Dome. The El Cap route tally now stands at 60; the first six years of the 80's has seen activity by John Barbella, Charles Cole, Jay Smith, Mike Corbett, Steve Grossman, Steve Schneider and others including old hand Jim Bridwell. Corbett, incidentally, notably holds a record 30 trips up El Cap, via 24 different routes. Unfortunately, the Harding Dawn Wall debate over justifiable bolting reemerged wit the ascent of Wings of Steel where close to 145 drilled holes were placed over 1,200 feet. In the 70's, foreign ascents of classic El Cap routes became commonplace, even exceptional (the second ascent of the difficult Pacific Ocean Wall was done by Australians). By the 80's four new routes were established on El Cap by foreigners, two by the Spanish Gallegos brothers, and two that included Australian Greg Child.
Since Royal Robbins first soloed El Cap in 1968, perhaps half of the El Cap routes have seen solo ascents. Jim Dunn was the first to solo a new route, Cosmos, in 1972. Later that year, Charlie Porter soloed two new routes. In the last ten years another four solo routes have been established.
While the walls were being assailed and as the available store of big, blank rock in need of a route was running out, free climbing underwent the same development of standards seen elsewhere in the country during the period. With the move toward thinner crack systems that accompanied the search for virgin territory, standards were forced to rise. The tentative acceptance of gym chalk, tincture of benzoin, and protection nuts helped crystallize the common perception that rock climbing was not as much in search of a summit as it was a gymnastic activity. In the early 70's in the "granite gymnasium," this attitude presented hundreds of opportunities. Supple, smooth-soled shoes allowed better use of thin cracks, and their superior smearing capabilities were a boon to the developing face climbs. But development of nut protection probably did more for the rise in free climbing standards than any other technological advance. With nuts, and particularly nuts that would work in Yosemite's parallel sided cracks, protection could be placed quickly, non-violently, and with one hand. At first, the use of nuts and the climbing of First All-Nut Ascents, was an event in itself, with a "Nutbook" recording all these events; practically all the classic walls of the 60's received first (and sometimes last) all nut ascents. The climbs on the Nuts Only Wall date from this period. The development of more sophisticated crack protection has paralleled the increasing standards of the sport. Ray Jardine's Friends, introduced in 1978, were matched perhaps in their impact on the climbing scene only by the Chouinard stoppers of 1972 and Polycentrics a couple years later. The 1980's see many alternative devices for use in parallel-sided cracks of Yosemite.
Coincidental to the late 60's and early 70's development of the 5.10 standard was the change from the clunky klitterschuhe to the supple E.B. For the next dozen years this shoe was standard footware for all Yosemite free climbing. The development in the last five years of newer "sticky rubber" climbing shoes has had perhaps the biggest effect on the Valley's face climbs. Some Apron routes are significantly easier with the new shoes, perhaps an improvement equal to the break made in about 1970 from edging the apron climbs to frictioning them.
Jim Bridwell was by the 1970 the moving force on the free-climbing scene. While he had always demonstrated an extraordinary ability during his apprenticeship under Pratt and Sacherer in the 60's, by 1970 he had moved out on his own, cleaning massive amounts of dirt and vegetation from routes that have since become classic, including Gripper, New Dimensions, Butterfingers and Outer Limits. Other climbers got into the act and pushed the standards, most notably Barry Bates on Lunatic Fringe, Center of Independence, Vanishing Point and Five and Dime, and Rik Rieder on Paradise Lost, Chain Reaction and A Mother's Lament. Bridwell's partner on many of his early 70's free climbs was Mark Klemens, whose talent for offwidth cracks led to Steppin' Out, Cream and ultimately Basket Case. Peter Haan combined technical difficulty with bold climbing when he free climbed the Left Side of the Hourglass, a route well respected even today. Under the wing of Bridwell, younger aspiring climbers were encouraged to push themselves up harder and harder routes. One of the earliest and most talented partners Bridwell brought out was Mark Chapman, who lead his way up some of the hardest climbs of the early 70's, including Hotline, the coveted first ascent of the Nabisco Wall, and the freeing of La Escuela, the first Yosemite climb with two 5.11 pitches. Bridwell's "Brave New World," as he titled a 1973 article, involved climbers beyond just the resident Yosemite community. Easterner Steve Wunsch was active over many years on routes such as Orangutan Arches, and with Barry Bates, on New Dimensions. The visit by Henry Barber in 1973 shook up the somewhat tight-knit Yosemite community with his firey ascent of Butterballs (creating Yosemite's hardest testpiece), an unroped and rapid climb of the Steck-Salathe, and his energetic stacking of such classics as New Dimensions, Nabisco Wall, and Midterm into a single day. Jim Donini pushed standards to a new high in 1974 with his multi-fall effort on Overhang Overpass, a route made all the more remarkable considering the parallel-sided crack and the crude nuts of the day. Barber returned in 1975 to produce a new standard with the Fish Crack, a route difficult to protect even today, and still well respected at 5.12b. More frequently, visitors to the Valley were climbing well enough to contribute routes of a good standard. England's Pete Livesey was particularly active, with first free ascents of Crack-a-Go-Go, in 1974 and Moratorium, in 1975.
By 1974 Bridwell presided loosely over a spontaneous group of young California climbers. Known as the Stonemasters, this group was the mainspring behind much of the incredible new route activity that followed over the next five years. Amid the talents of John Bachar, Dale Bard, Mark Chapman, Mike Graham, Ron Kauk, John Long, Tobin Sorensen, Kevin Worrall, John Yablonski, and others, Bridwell was no longer the top dog; he went from the sharp end of the rope to a role of director, but as such was instrumental in the establishment of some of the best routes of the time: Hot Line, the right side of the Folly, Geek Towers, and Crucifix. Even Bridwell's ten-year experience with the changing scene did not prepare him for the speed with which new routes were evolving. After the first ascent of Hot Line in 1973, Bridwell predicted with some force that the 15 feet of aid would last at least ten years; two years later Ron Kauk and John Bachar climbed the route totally free as one of the first 5.12 routes. The Stonemasters did much throughout the mid 1970's to solidify the 5.11 grade and to develop what are now hailed as classic routes. Ron Kauk emerged as perhaps the dominant figure on the free-climbing scene for the next ten years; his flash ascent of Butterballs and climbs like Blind Faith and Kauk-ulator solidified hard climbing in an uncomplicated style. While not climbing at the extreme level of Kauk or Bachar, Chapman and Kevin Worrall unearthed a host of obscure yet classic routes, including Windfall and Beggar's Buttress. Many others were also active up through the mid-70's: Vern Cleavenger, Chris Falkenstein, Ed Barry, Werner Braun and Rick Sylvester.
In 1976 and 1977 Ray Jardine made quite an impact on the free-climbing scene, though with controversial methods. Unlike the style that had evolved with most other climbers in Yosemite, where the falling leader would lower (yo-yo) to the last no-hands rest between attempts, Jardine would openly rest on protection to work out the moves. He distinguished between a "flash" ascent (climbing on sight from the bottom to top without resort to any form of aid - either resting or falling on protection) and a "free" ascent (where the climb was lead from the bottom to top - albeit after much rehearsal- without falls or resting on protection). He searched out extreme problems to work on, and over the course of many days he would get in shape, rest on protection, and get a little bit higher each time. Eventually, he would be able to lead the climb from bottom to top without resorting to a rest - his "free" ascent. Throughout this time Jardine was fortunate to have many Friends along - the world's supply of these protection devices was solely and secretly his - and they were of immeasurable help on his characteristically long endurance problems. In fact, on Elephant's Eliminate, the flared crack was unprotectable without the devices. Jardine's most difficult routes, Hangdog Flyer, Crimson Cringe, Rostrum Roof, Elephant's Eliminate, and Phoenix were among the hardest routes done at the time. Phoenix, climbed in 1977 at 5.13, remains one of the hardest Yosemite testpieces. As belayer for many of Jardine's efforts, John Lakey got in a good bit of climbing on these extreme routes himself, and in a curious twist of fate, was the first to manage the 5.12 Owl Roof when the team gave that longstanding problem a try in 1977. Jardine's style of climbing on these routes was perhaps not as close to his "flash" ideal as other leading climbers might have done (John Bachar flashed the second ascent of the Cringe, without Friends, soon after the first ascent), but it can be said that he simply altered in degree the means by which many of the most difficult ascents of the last 15 years were done, the main difference was his wiring of the moves by continuing to climb after resting on protection, in preparation for the final "free" ascent. It should be noted that during the period of these difficult ascents Jardine was prolifically making excellent new routes of a lower standard - "flashed," or at least climbed with only minimal compromising of that standard - throughout the Valley, from the base of Washington Column, the Ribbon Falls amphitheatre, to Elephant's Rock. After the remarkable free ascent with Bill Price up the West Face of El Cap in 1979, he turned his attention to free climbing the Nose, and through misguided and inexcusable action chiseled face holds in several spots to enable him to climb to Camp Four. It was later apparent that some "hold hacking" had been done on some of his earlier routes.
Other climbers were active at pushing the 5.12 standard with more conventional tactics. As mentioned elsewhere, Henry Barber was the first to introduce 5.12 to the Valley, in 1975. Ron Kauk climbed the intimidating Tales of Power in 1977, the dramatic Separate Reality in 1978, as well as more recent contributions, such as Back to the Future, in 1986. Many other climbers were active at the top levels, including John Bachar, Dale Bard, Bill Price and Tony Yaniro. By 1980 Price had established a solid 5.13 with Cosmic Debris. During the last five years many of world's best climbers have come through Yosemite, but most active establishing high-standard routes have been Dmitri Barton, Werner Braun, Rick Cashner, Scott Cosgrove, Peter Croft, Ron Kauk, Steve Schneider and Jonny Woodward. Unquestionably it has been left to local John Bachar to push the standards on the free climbing scene. Bachar has sought to counter the extreme hangdogging that has characterized much of the hardest climbing elsewhere (styles further removed from Jardine's old "flash" ascents than Jardine's himself!) by establishing difficult routes in unpreviewed fashion and doing bold routes that do not allow compromises of style. The Believer, at 5.12, steep and runout, is characteristic of his best routes. The 5.13 Phantom, climbed in 1986, is as much a testpiece because of its move difficulty as the traditional style in which it was first ascended.
Many others have been prolifically establishing quality routes over the last five years, including Ken Ariza, Scott Burke, Dave Hatchett, Grant Hiskes, Bruce Morris, Don Reid, Walt Shipley, Dave Schultz, Kurt Smith.
Third classing of difficult routes is a theme that has accompanied the history of Yosemite climbing. Since the late 60's, when Royal Robbins showcased his boldness with solo ascents of contemporary testpieces such as Reed's Direct, various climbers have occasionally sought out difficult routes to free solo. Mark Klemens first soloed the Left Side of Reed's; Peter Haan followed with Crack of Despair. Henry Barber's on-sight solo of the Steck-Salathe in 1973 clearly set a new standard in unroped climbing. This was followed by Earl Wiggins up the two pitches of Outer Limits in1974, and probably the boldest solo of the 1970's Charlie Fowler, in a remarkable on-sight solo of a circuitous route, the Direct North Buttress of Middle Cathedral Rock in 1974. John Bachar climbed the familiar but 5.11 New Dimensions in 1976, and later that year cruised up more familiar territory on the Nabisco Wall via Butterballs. In 1980, Bachar made the hardest climb in Yosemite yet soloed on sight, the 5.11b Moratorium. Peter Croft has been active, soloing many of the 60's classics in remarkable bursts of energy; on a more ambitious day he soloed the North Buttress of Middle Cathedral Rock, the Northeast Buttress of Higher Cathedral Rock, Steck-Salathe, Royal Arches, North Dome, and Arrowhead Arete. In 1986, German Wolfgang Gullich free soloed Separate Reality. In the 80's, many of the classic 5.10 testpieces of 15 to 20 years ago serve as training ground for Valley regulars and as medium for gaining a lot of ground fast, as if doing laps in a pool.
Another recurrent theme that has expressed itself sporadically throughout the last 20 years of Yosemite climbing has centered around speed ascents of the big walls. Eric Beck and Frank Sacherer stunned the 1965 Yosemite community with their one-day climb of the West Face of Sentinel, the first time a Grade VI had seen a one-day ascent, and this without Jumars. This was followed a year later when Steve Roper and Jeff Fott climbed the Northwest Face of Half Dome in a day. Since the late 60's, when Kim Schmitz and Jim Madsen were halving the standard times on the classic 60's walls, climbing the Nose in a day had been an unspoken goal: Bridwell teamed up with John Long and Billy Westbay in 1975 to do just that. Since then many of the walls have seen very quick ascents, culminating in an extraordinary day in 1986 when John Bachar and Peter Croft climbed both the Nose and the Northwest Face of Half Dome in 18 hours and 3 minutes.
The mid-70's saw a concentrated effort to reduce or eliminate aid from the big walls. The super-clean East Face of Washington Column was a natural target of free-climbing efforts. While it saw several attempts by 1974, the route went totally free to John Long, Ron Kauk, and John Bachar in 1975. A year later Kauk returned, leading all the pitches in a no-falls ascent, a feat repeated by Bachar a short time later. Astro Man, as the line was renamed, provided the most sustained free climb yet produced in Yosemite, and even today remains as one of the very best free climbs in the world. While the beauty of Astro Man directed many to the resource of big aid routes that lined the Valley, it was clear that free climbing on the walls demanded an incredible energy: Astro Man had produced twice as many hard pitches as any other route at the time.
While free climbers had attacked various parts of the Nose of El Cap over the years (Jim Bridwell and Jim Stanton had freed the Stovelegs as early as 1968, leaving a climb popular in itself for a few years), it was ripe in 1975 for a team to climb the route with free climbing as a primary objective. John Bachar, Ron Kauk and Dale Bard succeeded in freeing all but 400 feet of the 3,000 foot wall. In efforts ranging over a period of several years, Coloradans Jim Erickson and Art Higbee finally free climbed the classic Northwest Face of Half Dome in 1976.
By 1979, with free climbing being the preferred mode of ascent throughout the continent (Colorado's walls were falling fast to the free climbers), El Cap finally saw a totally free ascent with Bill Price and Ray Jardine's climb of the West Face. This was particularly remarkable in that the free route turned out to be surprisingly moderate compared to the standard of the time.
The North Face of the Rostrum saw much development and several free routes. John Long and various partners freed the classic Chouinard-Herbert route up Sentinel Rock, and John Bachar and Mike Lechlinski free climbed all but six aid moves of the West Face. Max Jones and Mark Hudson were particularly active by the late 70's; the pair completely freed the classic North Face Route on East Quarter Dome, at 5.12, producing Pegasus, and soon after freed all but seven aid moves on the South Face of Mt. Watkins, also at 5.12.
Similar to the Nose as an attractive free prospect, much of the remaining aid on the Salathe Wall had been eliminated over the years, starting with a free connection from the first pitch of the Nose to the Salathe's Half Dollar by Kevin Worrall and Mike Graham, during which Graham showed some audacity and created a controversy by chopping the original Robbins bolt ladder. Later, John Long freed the third-pitch roof and with a gang Stonemaster effort the route was freed to Mammoth Terrace creating the Free Blast. Five years later Max Jones and Mark Hudon continued the theme higher on the wall and except for the Hollow Flake pendulum, pushed the route free all the way to two pitches above El Cap Spire. The trend to free climb on the walls continued with the 1982 free ascent (aside from a short bolt ladder) of the Gold Wall going to Rick Cashner and Werner Braun (the free variation renamed Silent Line), and in 1986 the freeing by Braun and Scott Cosgrove of the Ribbon Falls West Portal and the Northeast Corner of Higher Cathedral Rock.
As the free-climbing revolution developed in the 70's, it became clearer that the potential for difficult new routes was not limited to crack climbs. With some minor exceptions (the Snake Dike and Peanut, among others), face and slab climbing had traditionally been the domain of Glacier Point Apron, where since the 1960's bolts had been placed to protect the wandering slab climbing. The 70's saw incredible development on the Apron, in large part due to the advent of friction shoes. The main participants in the early 70's included Mike Breidenbach, Vern Cleavenger, Tom Harrison, and Rik Reider (who with Rabb Carrington produced in 1972 the most difficult and serious face route for the next seven or eight years - A Mother's Lament). By the late 70's, Bruce Morris and Chris Cantwell were attacking the right side of the Apron, producing many short but worthwhile routes. Unfortunately, many of the leading aficionados of Apron climbing have elected a boldless use of the bolt. In search of another route to the top of Glacier Point, in 1980 Cantwell, Morris, Scott Burke and Dave Austin completed work on a line that accomplished just that. Called the Hall of Mirrors, it involved several bolt ladders that have doubtfully been as free as reported. The 1980's have seen further route development, but with the introduction of the new high-friction shoes, any routes of significance in the future must show far greater boldness.
While face climbing has always been a means to reaching otherwise inaccessible crack routes, the early 70's saw a burgeoning interest in face routes, somewhat a result of so many local climbers with active pasts at Tahquitz and Suicide Rocks, in Southern California. Routes up the slabs of the Royal Arches, while tentatively explored as early as 1958, with the freeing of Arches Terrace, were climbed seriously in 1973 with Shakey Flakes, followed the next year with Greasy But Groovy, by Tahquitz veterans John Long, Rick Accomazzo and Richard Harrison. Other routes have been added subsequently, most notably Friday the 13th, a serious route put up in 1985 by Dmitri Barton and Scott Burke. The early 70's face revolution was fueled in large part by the legacy Frank Sacherer left with his 1960's climbs on the incredibly free climbable Cathedral Rocks: East Buttress, DNB and Sacherer-Fredricks. Ray Jardine and Rik Reider were among the first to see the possibilities with their 1972 route, Paradise Lost. They were followed quickly by a small group that included John Long, George Meyers and Kevin Worrall, who were primarily responsible for major face routes that often had a seriousness not found on the hand crack climbs. Stoner's Highway, Black Primo, Quicksilver, and the freeing of the Bircheff-Williams were products of this time. Ron Kauk and Kevin Worrall teamed up in 1977 to create the excellent and serious Space Babble. The 18-pitch Mother Earth, climbed in 1976, showed the possible quality and length of Middle Rock free climbing, a potential that was realized again in 1984 with the Smith-Crawford. In 1976 enthusiasm for the steep face poured over onto Lower Cathedral Rock, where Richard Harrison, Rick Accomazzo, and John Yablonski established serious routes that ten years later have yet to see second ascents.
Face climbing is found throughout the Valley, and the last ten years have seen short testpieces show up on practically every cliff. Scott Burke, Bruce Morris, Steve Schneider, and others have been active in establishing good face routes. North Dome and, particularly, Half Dome have rewarded many face climbers of the last few years with excellent routes that are long, clean and difficult. Several routes have been done on the face near the classic 1965 Snake Dike. Most impressive is the 12-pitch Autobahn, done by Charles Cole, Rusty Reno and John Middendorf in 1985, and next to it, the Fast Lane. But the most striking of the 1980's face lines is Karma, a 13-pitch route that weaves a difficult course up the broad south face of Half Dome to the right of the Harding/Rowell aid line. First climbed in 1986 by Dave Schultz, Ken Yager, and Jim Campbell, its 74 bolts protect 5.11+ face climbing up a series of steep dikes, connected with only short sections of aid.
As the most difficult new crack lines have gotten thinner, it is perhaps somewhat inevitable that they share many of the characteristics of steep face climbing, but with the more visible line and protection that crack provides. Since on many of the modern testpieces natural protection is supplemented and sometimes completely replaced by bolts, they require an inordinate amount of energy to establish, and the style in which protection is arranged has become the subject of debate.
With many climbers in year-round residence, climbing activity has occurred year round. In 1974 some of the temporary frozen waterfalls saw ascents by those to impoverished to travel. The first to receive an ascent was the upper part of Sentinel Falls, a four pitch, sometimes vertical ice route, climbed by Mark Chapman, Kevin Worrall, and Jim Orey in late 1974. With Worrall's first ice experience behind him, and Chapman's inexperience bettered, the following February they launched up the frozen Widow's Tears, which luckily remained frozen long enough for the 11-pitch ascent. Other ascents of Sentinel Falls have followed off and on over the years, but the Widow's Tears has seen fewer climbers, due as much to the infrequent buildup of ice as tot he seriousness of the route. In 1976, ice build up enough to allow Chapman, Worrall, and Pete Minks an ascent of the Silver Strand, a smooth sheet of ice that occasionally flows around the wall west of the Widow's Tears. Charlie Porter climbed a couple of chutes and gullies in the Valley in 1973, and a few minor routes have been done by others. In 1987 an ascent was made of the lower Sentinel Falls. The 80's now see many parties primed to take advantage of the proper conditions of cold and wetness which can produce incredible possibilities.
The lifestyle and state of the committed resident climber of Yosemite is no better exemplified than by Werner Braun. Braun has repeated many of the harder climbs over and over, refining his technique and flow with a driven furvor. By 1987, he had climbed Astro Man 27 times, the last nine times in an eight-month period. Short routes like Outer Limits, Meat Grinder, Lunatic Fringe, and Five and Dime he has climbed 50 times or more, often times third class, clearly demonstrating in near perfect, efficient motion the closest match of rock and the climbing man. Braun also exemplifies a clean style of climbing that is Yosemite's heritage. He disdains hanging on protection, yet is active in the exploration of hidden gems that seem to be a constant resource of Yosemite. This is a man who simply loves the motion of rock climbing in a beautiful place.
Perhaps no other route demonstrates the progression of Yosemite climbing better than the Steck-Salathe. After the frustrations of numerous parties and finally a 5-day ordeal, Allen Steck and John Salathe earned the summit of Sentinel Rock on a July day in 1950; their climb became a classic. Robbins made the second ascent in three days, and during the course of the 60's the route was whittled down to a totally free, three-hour climb. In 1973 Henry Barber stepped into a new realm of commitment by climbing the Steck-Salathe on sight and unroped (though with the aid of a 25-foot sling a the crux moves). Today, on-sight free-solo ascents of this 5.9 route by committed climbers are not uncommon. Similar episodes echo throughout the Valley on routes like the Northeast Buttress of Higher Cathedral Rock, Yosemite Point Buttress, and the East Buttress of El Cap. The North Face of the Rostrum, first aid climbed over a period of days, next climbed clean, then free climbed at 5.11, was free soloed after rehearsal by Peter Croft in a couple of hours.
Different stages of evolution exist for different routes. There are climbs yet unseen by the climber's eye. Who will free-solo the East Face of Washington Column? Can an all-free way be found up the sweeping South Buttress of El Capitan (the Nose) or Salathe without rock desecration? The West Face of Sentinel was climbed in a day long ago, climbed clean a dozen years ago, yet a segment on the fifth pitch is barred a host of top free climbing talent form an all-free ascent. Aside from simply technical prowess, the best of Yosemite climbing has always involved some degree of audacity and daring; the early explorations of Anderson and Bayley, the 1934 ascents of the Cathedral Spires, Salathe on the Lost Arrow and Sentinel, Harding's vision on the Nose, the adventurous first ascent of the Salathe Wall, and the bold efforts of Pratt and Sacherer. These events were followed by Jim Dunn on Cosmos, Barber alone on the Steck-Salathe, the winter climb of the Widow's Tears, the audacious routefinding of Karma and the remarkable free solos of John Bachar. Will the future development of climbing standards depend on these traditions of stylistic boldness?
Climbers have always accompanied their outreach to higher standards and newer climbs with a bending of the commonly accepted rules of the game. Even as early as the ascent of the Nose, older climbers had disdain for the number of bolts that were used in that ascent. In 1961 Robbins (who had always preached that bolts would or could destroy climbing by overuse or thoughtless use) used 13 bolts on the Salathe Wall. By 1969 he had put up a route two-thirds the size (Tis-sa-ack) with 110 bolts. He justified it by saying that it was a "route worth bolting for" - and one that would eventually be climbed. (If Robbins had been told in 1961 that he would someday do a 20-pitch route with 110 bolts he would surely have denied any such thing.) In the 70's Bridwell and others innovated aid climbing with the use of the chisel and copperhead. Robbins never would have considered this, having once said that he felt that 20 routes on El Cap would be about right. Now, thanks to new, non-"traditional" techniques, there are three times that number. Jardine used extreme hangdogging so he could climb above his ability and accomplish his climbing goals. Bachar began using aid to place bolts on free climbs (in Tuolumne), an unheard-of tactic, that Bob Kamps and Tom Higgins (who themselves had bent earlier rules a bit by their use of bolts) never used, but which opened up much otherwise unprotectable rock. (Bachar now eschewed that technique as too compromised.)
Now we are left to wonder just how far the free climbers of tomorrow will bend the rules to accomplish their goals. In most other areas hangdogging is the most popular means of getting up extreme climbs. More and more bolts are being placed on rappel. How will the Yosemite climber deal with these new ethical dilemmas? Is there a chance that the inevitable evolution will result not only in higher standards of technical difficulty, but in higher standards of boldness and imagination as well, a tradition that has its routes with the earliest Yosemite pioneers?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 05:55pm PT
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Tower of the Cosmic Gods, Windfall,
FA by Mark Chapman and Kevin Worrall, May 1976
Mark confided to me that it in those days (early/mid 70s), doing these harder climbs with hexes, you just were not allowed to get pumped; so before any crux section, one needed to place maybe a couple of good pieces, sack up and run it out, staying in control rather than struggling with protection.
(I was at that time ('76) struggling with nuts on leads up to 5.9 at Joshua Tree & Taquitz -often getting through the crux but pumping out and wipping off near the end of the pitch!)
Yabo exclaimed likewise that leading 5.11 with stoppers & hexes was a flat out effort, sometimes entailing a life or death experience. (Keep in mind this is Yabo who said this; and many people found him to exist in a space beyond normal limits, so to my mind this double qualifies the dramatic assessment).
Topo from Yosemite Climbs: FREE CLIMBS, Don Reid and George Myers, 1994 Chockstone Press.
These pictures are from an ascent in 1982; my partners were Tom Gilje and Mari Gingery.
The second pitch moves over a perfectly horizontal roof,
Sporting an unforgiving exit out into a tight hand crack above:
The third pitch, a superb double overhanging fist crack shown here,
Finishes with a thrilling & vertical tight hand crack, travelling upward through the corner above and out of sight:
The last pitch, a beautiful 5.10 hand crack which traces a sinuous curve to the top of the buttress:
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Aug 23, 2008 - 08:57pm PT
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hey there tarbuster... say, thanks for posting some this stuff about my brother.... i never get to learn much about all the neat stuff he was exploring and tackling, as i was in texas then....
he lives to far away now, and works so very much, that i never get to talk to him about it all....
i had hoped he'd get in here more to share, but he really just does not have the time...
here is the bit that i "took hold of here":
from your post:
While not climbing at the extreme level of Kauk or Bachar, Chapman and Kevin Worrall unearthed a host of obscure yet classic routes, including Windfall and Beggar's Buttress. Many others were also active up through the mid-70's: Vern Cleavenger, Chris Falkenstein, Ed Barry, Werner Braun and Rick Sylvester.
it was the unearthing of a HOST OF OBSCURE yet classic routes that GOT my attention...
that is so VERY MUCH like us all... the whole family... it seems we set out to tackle the obscure---it is so in our nature to seek out neat and differnt things.... i bet he had a wonderful BLAST OF FRESH spiritual charge, as he pressed into the neat stuff that he found...
thanks for the share... it i so very nice, and fun, and interesing to see how mark made his way in the valley... thanks so very much tarbuster for sharing on this "sorting out late 70's valley climbing... thanks you all.... i sure love and miss being able to have enjoyed my brother more... but that was my life then, at least i had four good kids from being away... and i have the precious grandkids now... trusting the good lord, i will get to re-enjoy my mark some day....
edit: say, roger, :) ... thanks for starting this share, here... god bless!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 09:11pm PT
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Chappy salutes the obscure traveller within us all!
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Aug 23, 2008 - 09:14pm PT
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hey there tarbuster... say, thanks... i really like that... :) .... cheers.... and cheers to chappy, my brother, too! ... god bless! thanks again....
edit: ... that's how you find hidden treasure... :)
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Aug 23, 2008 - 09:58pm PT
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From a time long ago,
In a galaxy far far away...
(or some such)
Photos borrowed from Chicken Skinner, once posted in a thread from Supertopo Past...
Dale in the 'Milks:
(Strawberry or Buttermilk Mountain Works chalk bag, leather paneled EB's with something like green dot Tiger's Paw soles)
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Aug 23, 2008 - 10:07pm PT
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those are the FAs for 1986...
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Aug 23, 2008 - 10:22pm PT
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hey there warbler.. say, thanks for the "punch line" history about my brother... and the route, etc....
thanks for the share... say, i had read some of that in an article somewhere, too...
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john hansen
climber
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Aug 23, 2008 - 10:56pm PT
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Just spent an hour reading those two stories.
Thanks Tarbuster.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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I'd say the last couple years of the 70's and the first couple of the 80's featured a discernible lull in the popularity of big wall aid climbing in the Valley. (Maybe Ed could track some FA data to look at that part of it...)
Long free routes were the rage for the common man; as noted upthread, Friends really helped that along. We, or Russ, really, dubbed the West Face of Rixon's the "Poor Man's Astroman".
By the mid 80's however, in no small way attributable to and signified by the ubiquitous Fish Products white vinyl, big wall aid kicked back into vogue.
I'm just sayin'...
From Mountain 79, June 1981,
A pair of uncommon men were popularizing long free routes:
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le_bruce
climber
Oakland: what's not to love?
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Great read. Thanks Tarbuster and Hudon.
How many years later did Piana and Skinner make their attempt?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Skinner & Piana: that was in '88.
My client and I passed Todd & Paul while they were working on the Salathe. Anecdotally, as I topped out, I was confronted with the options for the final anchor, which initially drew one to the base of a large triangular block. I instead chose to anchor to a firmer horizontal crack nearby...
Later we heard the harrowing tell of that block having been unleashed by Skinner & Piana.
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Nutsonthechin, Wisconsin
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I recall being on the Salathe mere minutes (ok.... coupla days) after the Hudon/Jones free attempt. I remember looking at the chalk on the Roof, and thinking, "jeebus! I bet McClenahan could do this".
Ok, the MCClenahan thing was a lie, but the chalk out there was pretty impressive. I do not think they got the roof free at that time. Mark? What's the scoop and what year was that?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Dick Cilley wanted to head up there with porta ledges and work it, around '81.
So, dammit, if I'd jumped on that train, it coulda' shuda' been our chalk too.
(but we couldn't get out of the Ahwahnee Sweet Shop)
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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I'll look later tonight at the statistics...
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Raydog
Trad climber
Boulder Colorado
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how many times do you think the guy
wearing the balaclava wished he'd
taken it off before the pic?
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lars johansen
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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For a period of time in the late 70's and early 80's my old friend and big wall mentor Steve Bosque held the claim for most big wall first ascents. He was soon eclipsed by Charles Cole. Steve's record speaks for itself.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Raydog: "how many times do you think the guy
wearing the balaclava wished he'd
taken it off before the pic?"
given the bondage butt shot he's posing, i bet he's glad it was on.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Bosque is a cool dude with an understated and "normal guy" gameface.
One of the times I was up on Salathe, prolly '81 (might have been the time Russ was chalkin' the holds for Mark & Max, or just after), Bosque & company, which I think included Chuck Clantz (sp) and like 8 guys, in any case the usual suspects for FA nailing at the time, were camped on Mammoth Terrace attacking "Pacemaker" I think it was, during the FA. They were all drunk, at high noon -on a "rest" day.
My partner was Austrian, a loose member of the Swiss contigency (Russ could maybe pull his name out) and had just been on the Zodini with that hard driven kraut dude named Sonny or some such. After his tour with Sonny, he just wanted to relax, refusing to top out anything less than refreshed and well fed, so we took like 6 days, free climbed to maybe 11- here and there (might be fluffing that a tad), stopping around 2 or 3 in the afternoon every day. It was a cush ascent: tons of water, lots of extra food, bag o' weed, Playboy mag (no circle jerking tho, thanks)...I pulled up onto Mammoth, reached into the haul bag, rolled a joint, shared it with the Pacemaker team and played through with the Austrian, heading for some fist jamming in the the double cracks and on toward El Cap Spire.
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Nutsonthechin, Wisconsin
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Shiit man..... that is going back.... I remember Big Sonny.... he was a train conductor in Munich or something. When we picked him up at the airport in Frisco he took us all to a steak house in the Gay part of town...... Anyway.... yeah, Big Sonny...... his partner was or could have been: Martin Scheel, aka the Swiss Bent, since Punk Roy stole his woman, the Swiss Miss.... or maybe Chris, an unassuming looking fellow with a very round head...... or Thom, the owner of the free Oldsmobile I eventually got (long story)...... or maybe Mattias, the guy I did the Lurking Fear with... wild hair and from Germany for sure.... it was not Paolo, the guy who as you described as being "very lips" when he talked..... and not Swiss Michi..... who I'll try to get over here to this thread...... or German Mike, who did acid and decided that he was the strongest man in the World and proved it by doing numerous one arms on the Camp 4 apparatus, and then perhaps tried to kill himself or someone else and then had to be subdued? hmmmmm.... maybe it will come to me.....
Edit: just emailed Michi.... hope he shows!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Ha!
Yer gettin' warm. I think Michi would remember my partner. He had long black hair; might have been "all lips" as you say, but more likely German Mike, because I recall the Acid bit.
Anyhow, jeepers, how 'bout that Sonny character eh? Clantz said, when he went up on lead, he went out there to either succeed or die. Like for the Fatherland & Feurer.
Remember when he went on to Excal, he cut helicopter landing skids into tube chocks??? "We need more materials" he would say. When Walt and I were ramping up for our aborted Tis-Sa-Ak bid, Sonny called me "Tis-Sa-Ak Man" ... shoot I just knew I was a WUSS when he said that. And I was.
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Nutsonthechin, Wisconsin
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Sonny was a hard man..... cut from a coarse and worsted teutonic cloth....
I remember when you guys did that thing with the Playboys.... got a pic of the guy?
and they always called each other with a "d' " before their names... like d'Michi and d'Paolo.... who was an Italian Swiss.... and d'Jody, who I last heard was doing a physics thing at like SLAC (Stanford Linear Accelerator) or Berkeley or something.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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No Pics.
German Mike tho I'm pretty sure.
That was the lackadaisical ascent that prompted Cilley then to figure we should get real and attack the Salathe like a proj, taking the time to work things out. (Alas, my attention span was too short for that line of productive mischief...)
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Here's Swiss Michi from BITD, '81:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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...And You & Matias on Lurking Queer:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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A couple from S Face Watkins, also '81, done with "E" & Ed Kaufer:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Half Dome during the Slabs approach, '83, unsuccesful attempt with Walt "The Bip" Shipely,
The Zebra is the white right facing corner dead center, not far off the ground:
We got some weather:
Talk about cool free climbing potential, a lot of the Zebra is/would be tight hands/rattly fingers:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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http://www.ifi.uzh.ch/arvo/~jody/
Yup, that's D-Jody there Russ.
I like the "How did I become what I am" link...
He got his PHD!!! -Rockin'
...I guess this thread, plus "The Mussy Nebula" is sort of a How We Became What We Are...
I know, sad huh!!
But it was/is sumtimes fun. Ha!
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Nutsonthechin, Wisconsin
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d'Jody was super smart, and talented...... I still have some of his LSD inspired art. Actual talent. PhD is no surprise.
Man...them was some fun times! Where is the 80's Climbing thread or did we already do that? Punk Roy driving the Swiss Mobile down Tioga with no brakes was a hoot.... listening to Nina Hagen and the Talking Heads.... bivouacs at Dead Mans..... Tahoe with Strappo and Pete Minks..... ho-mannnn!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Warbler and some others pushed this thread into the 80's a ways back...
Here's The Zeesh (Eric Ziesche), Swiss Michi, Mike Paul, John Mallory, and that Swiss smuggler (what was it they smuggled, Tampons or sumpin', right?), JT, like '82!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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1981, Glacier Point Apron,
Connie "The Breed" (I dint call her that, fer chrisakes), Tarbuster in drag, Russ, Mike "Watusi" Paul, Dimitri "Da-Meat" Barton:
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Nutsonthechin, Wisconsin
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Wasn't Connie like a third cousin to Cher or something?
"No way Weenis....." one of the best ever!
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WBraun
climber
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That's "Glacier Point" not the apron.
You guys look kinda distorted.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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OK, so I'm a cuple thousand vert off.
It is distorted, because Shawn "The Weenis" Curtis, RIP, liked those near fish eye (no pun) lenses.
"Don't call me the Weenis!!!"
He'd say.
Naturally, when us guys said it, he'd sort of endure it.
You know, affectionate jibe.
But when Connie outed him with it, that was a deal breaker!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Right now I have to bust out with mid 80s pearls.
I know yous guys have seen these before, but hey, cheap entertainment is hard to find...
Kauk, Mussy, Warbler, Deucey:
Bill Russell relaxing on Werner's Le Mans:
Charles Cole bolt testing with Werner's Le Mans:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Deuce, Yabo, Richard Harrison, a guy from Vegas named Wendel, Warbler,
Camp 4 lot:
Tucker Tech: "Werner, go to your room, er van, right now young man!!!"
Werner, Deuce, Schultz (picking his nose):
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Mike Paul, Rudi, Woodward, the REAL Schmutsvink, lodge lot:
Dick Cilley, proud, on his Detroit Steel
YMS Gods:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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The Time Machine (Russ Wallings van) 1981:
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WBraun
climber
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That bolt testing boulder is still there last time I looked.
They turned it upside down to hide the evidence.
WTF were we thinking? But we were all smart guys U know ......
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Very smart asss guys indeed!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Dave "Too Tall" Nielsen on Stoners Highway, 1982:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Nice wide angle snap of El Cap by Shawn:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Middle Cathedral from The Nose, 1987:
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Essential artifact when construing a key valley 80's culture,
(I had nothing to do with it, fer real)
The DLFA:
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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The majority of aid climbs in Yosemite Valley seem to be Grade VI climbs, 169 with 65 Grade V climbs.
grades of climbs
I 6
II 19
III 27
IV 21
V 65
VI 169
The time period for which the climbs were put up is given in the table below, for all climbs as well as Grade V and Grade VI climbs.
time period, all, grade V, grade VI
up to 1940, 4, 0, 0
1941 - 1945, 1, 0, 0
1946 - 1950, 7, 0, 0
1951 - 1955, 6, 0, 0
1956 - 1960, 30, 4, 3
1961 - 1965, 51, 10, 8
1967 - 1970, 39, 15, 6
1971 - 1975, 33, 5, 19
1976 - 1980, 27, 1, 19
1981 - 1985, 42, 9, 22
1986 - 1990, 50, 8, 36
1991 - 1995, 22, 4, 17
1996 - 2000, 24, 3, 19
2001 - 2005, 9, 2, 7
This table is also reproduced in the following graph
The peak year of Grade VI First Ascents was period between 1986 and 1990. The decade of the 70s saw a great increase in Grade VI FAs in the Valley, following the Grade V peak in the period between 1967 and 1970.
There is a fall off of aid route productivity since 1990, though some of this fall off is related to the fact that the Reid Big Wall guide was published in 1996 and only partial reports are available since that time.
Here is the list of climbs:
Sunnyside Bench, Waterfall Route 5.7 A3 FA 1935 Dave Brower William Van Voorhis
Grizzly Peak, South Gully 5.5 A1 II FA 1938 Dave Brower Morgan Harris
Split Pinnacle, Regular Route 5.7 A2 I FA 1938 Jack Reigelhuth Raffi Bedayan Dick Leonard Muir Dawson
Kat Pinnacle via Tyrolean Traverse 5.7 A1 I FA 1940 Devitt Allen Torcom Bedayan Robin Hansen
West Arrowhead Chimney 5.7 A3 III FA 1941 Torcom Bedayan Fritz Lippmann
Lost Arrow Tip 5.8 C2 5.12b FA 1946 Fritz Lippmann Jack Arnold Anton Nelson Robin Hansen FFA 1984 Dave Schultz
Upper Watkins Pinnacle 5.9 A1 II FA 1947 Al Baxter Ulf Ramm-Ericson Rupert Gates FFA 1961 Joe Oliger Wayne Hildebrand Steve Roper
Higher Cathedral Spire, Steck Route 5.9 A1 FA 1948 Allen Steck Fletcher Hoyt Willima Hoyt
Sentinel Rock, Northeast Bowl 5.8 A1 III FA 1948 John Salathe Anton Nelson
Harris' Hangover 5.7 A3 II FA 1949 Oscar Cook Bill Dunmire Bob Swift
Penny Pinnacle; West Face 5.4 A1 I FA 1950
Pulpit Rock, from the Notch 5.7 A1 I 5.10 FA 1950 FFA 1960 Royal Robbins
Eagle Peak - Southeast Face 5.8 A2 III FA 1952 John Lindberg Ron Hayes
El Cap Tree, Regular Route 5.6 A2 III FA 1952 Allen Steck Will Siri Bill Dunmire Bob Swift
John's Other Chimney 5.4 A1 II FA 1953 John Ohrenschall Marry Ann Corthell
El Capitan, East Ledge Traverse 5.6 A1 II FA 1954 Allen Steck Bill Dunmire Jim Wilson
Middle Cathedral Rock, North Face Traverse 5.8 A3 III FA 1954 Dick Long George Mandatory Jack Davis Bob Skinner
Obscurity Traverse 5.6 A2 III FA 1955 Bill Loughman Don Goodrich
Kat Pinnacle, Northwest Corner 5.7 A2 FA 1956 Mark Powell Don Wilson
Liberty Cap, South Face 5.8 A3 IV FA 1956 Mark Powell Royal Robbins Joe Fitschen
Bear Rock, Bolt Route 5.3 A1 I FA 1957 George Sessions Mike Schuler Wayne Simpson Noel Shirley
Ahwiyah Point Northwest Buttress 5.8 A2 III FA 1957 Wayne Merry Warren Harding
East Arrowhead Buttress, Overhang Route 5.8 A2 III FA 1957 Mark Powell Wayne Merry
Liberty Cap, Southern Buttress 5.7 A3 FA 1957 Mike Loughman Dick Armstrong
Lower Watkins Pinnacle A3 II FA 1957 Mark Powell Herb Swedlund Wally Reed George Sessions Merle Alley
Lower Cathedral Rock, North Buttress 5.8 A4 V FA 1957 Mark Powell Bill Feuerer
Half Dome, Regular Northwest Face 5.9 C1 VI 5.12 FA 1957 Royal Robbins Jerry Gallwas Mike Sherrick FFA 1976 Jim Erickson Art Higbee
Lower Brother, Southeast Face 5.8 A1 III FA 1958 Wally Reed Charles Raymond
Split Pinnacle, East Arete 5.8 A1+ 5.10c FA 1958 Chuck Pratt Krehe Ritter
Penny-Nickle Arete 5.7 A2 III FA 1958 Chuck Pratt George Sessions Krehe Ritter
El Capitan, East Ledges, East Side 5.5 A3 II FA 1958 Henry Kendall Gerry Czamanske
Lower Cathedral Rock, Roof, The 5.7 A3 II FA 1958 Tom Frost Henry Kendall
Nose, The 5.9 C2 VI 5.13b FA 1958 Warren Harding Wayne Merry George Whitmore FFA 1993 Lynn Hill
Washington Column, East Face Route 5.10 A2 V FA 1959 Warren Harding Glen Denny Chuck Pratt
Lower Yosemite Falls, West Side 5.5 A3 II FA 1959 Herb Swedlund Errol Bohannon
Merry Old Ledge 5.9 A3 IV FA 1959 Warren Harding Gerry Czamanske
Middle Cathedral Rock, North Face 5.9 A4 V FA 1959 Chuck Pratt Bob Kamps Steve Roper
Sentinel Rock, West Face 5.12b A0 FA 1960 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost
Camp 4 Tree (Dynamo Hum) 5.5 A1 II FA 1960 Mort Hempel Bob Kamps FFA 1975 Tobin Sorenson John Long
Liberty Cap, West Corner 5.8 A2 FA 1960 Dick McCracken Steve Roper
Pulpit Rock, East Face 5.7 A2 5.10c FA 1960 Dave Rearick Tom Frost FFA 1986 Don Reid Ken Yager
Fifi Buttress 5.8 A3 III FA 1960 Dick McCracken Steve Roper
Inconsolable Buttress, The 5.7 A3 III FA 1960 Mark Powell Beverly Powell Dave Rearick
Mt. Broderick, South Face 5.8 A3 IV FA 1960 Bob Kamps Joe Fitschen Chuck Pratt
Kat Pinnacle, Southwest Corner 5.7 A3+ FA 1960 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost
Arches Direct 5.8 A4 VI FA 1960 Royal Robbins Joe Fitschen
Camp 4 Terror 5.8 A4 V FA 1960 Bob Kamps Dave Rearick
Nevada Falls, Left Side 5.6 A4 II FA 1960 Royal Robbins Lin Ephraim
Black Wall 5.9 A1 III FA 1961 Glen Denny Al McDonald
El Capitan, East Ledges, West Side 5.6 A2 II FA 1961 Henry Kendall Bill Pope
Nevada Falls, Center Route 5.5 A2 II FA 1961 Bill Amborn Tom Naylor Steve Roper
Higher Cathedral Spire, North Couloir 5.8 A3 IV FA 1961 Dick Long Jim Wilson Ray D'Arcy Wally Reed
Higher Cathedral Spire, Northwest Face 5.8 A3 V FA 1961 Tom Frost Royal Robbins
Swan Slab 5.6 A3 II FA 1961 Joe Oliger Steve Roper
West Corner 5.8 A3 III FA 1961 Bob Kamps Dave Rearick
Little John, Center 5.10d A3- FA 1961 Tom Frost Harry Daley
El Cap Tree Direct 5.9 A4 IV FA 1961 Glen Denny Frank Sacherer
Lunch Ledge Direct (Space Case) 5.8 A4 IV FA 1961 Yvon Chouinard Wally Reed FFA 1976 Ray Jardine Linda McGinnis
Space Case (Lunch Ledge Direct) 5.8 A4 IV 5.10c FA 1961 Yvon Chouinard Wally Reed FFA 1976 Ray Jardine Linda McGinnis
Salathe Wall 5.9 C2 VI 5.13b FA 1961 Royal Robbins Chuck Pratt Tom Frost FFA 1988 Todd Skinner Paul Piana
Leaning Tower, West Face 5.7 C2F V FA 1961 Warren Harding Glen Denny Al Macdonald
Diving Board - Sunshine Buttress 5.8 A1 III FA 1962 Dick Long Al Macdonald Jim Wilson
Flue, The 5.8 A2 III FA 1962 Warren Harding Bob Kamps FFA 1989 Elliot Robinson
Lower Cathedral Spire, Lower North Face 5.7 A2 IV FA 1962 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz
Quarter Dome; North Face (Pegasus) 5.9 A2 V 5.12 FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost FFA 1980 Max Jones Mark Hudon
Bishop's Balcony 5.5 A3 FA 1962 Frank Sacherer Gary Colliver
Hanging Boulders, The 5.6 A3 III FA 1962 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz Andrzej Ehernfeucht
Lower Cathedral Spire, Upper North Face 5.9 A3 IV FA 1962 Galen Rowell Al Macdonald
Ribbon Falls, West Buttress 5.8 A3 IV FA 1962 Frank Sacherer Bob Kamps
Sentinel Rock, Direct North Face 5.9 A3 V 5.12a FA 1962 Royal Robbins Tom Frost
Dihedral Wall 5.9 A3+ VI FA 1962 Ed Cooper Jim Baldwin Glen Denny
Bear Rock, Southeast Face 5.4 A4 I FA 1962 Jim Harper Tony Qamar
Koko Ledge, Continuation A4 FA 1962 Glenn Denny Frank Sacherer
Misty Wall 5.11d A0 V FA 1963 Dick McCracken Royal Robbins FFA 1991 Walt Shipley Kevin Fosburg
Rixon's Pinnacle, Direct South Face 5.11d A1 FA 1963 Glen Denny Gary Colliver
Rixon's Pinnacle, Far West 5.11 A1 FA 1963 Royal Robbins Dick McCracken
Hidden Chimney 5.7 A2 IV FA 1963 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz Andrzej Ehernfeucht
Lost Brother, Northwest Face 5.7 A2 IV 5.10c FA 1963 Al Macdonald Jeff Dozier Dave French Gary Westernof FFA 1972 Barry Bates Rik Rieder
Lower Cathedral Rock, West Face 5.8 A2 III FA 1963 Frank Sacherer Wally Reed
Slabs, The 5.6 A2 II FA 1963 Wolfgang Heinritz Andrzej Ehrenfeucht Les Wilson
Bridalveil Falls, East Buttress 5.8 A3 III FA 1963 Royal Robbins TM Herbert
Carbon Wall, The 5.7 A3 III FA 1963 Glen Denny Roger Derryberry
Rappel Chimney, The 5.7 A3 III FA 1963 Wolfgang Heinritz Les Wilson Leif Patterson Andrzej Ehrenfeucht
Ribbon Falls, West Portal 5.8 A3 IV FA 1963 Chris Fredericks Steve Roper
Sentinel Rock, Kor-Denny Route 5.9 A3 V FA 1963 Layton Kor Glen Denny
El Capitan, West Buttress 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1963 Layton Kor Steve Roper
Half Dome, Direct Northwest Face 5.10 A3+ VI 5.13c/d FA 1963 Royal Robbins Dick McCracken FFA 1993 Todd Skinner Paul Piana
Perhaps 5.10d A4 FA 1963 Bob Kamps Andy Lichtman
Upper Yosemite Falls, East Side 5.9 A4 VI FA 1963 Dick McCracken Royal Robbins
Mt. Watkins, South Face 5.11d A0 VI 5.13 FA 1964 Warren Harding Yvon Chouinard Chuck Pratt FFA Brooke Sandahl Steve Sutton
North America Wall 5.8 A2 VI FA 1964 Tom Frost Yvon Chouinard Chuck Pratt Royal Robbins
Folly, The, Left Side 5.9 A3 FA 1964 Layton Kor Jim Bridwell
Negative Pinnacle, Left A3 FA 1964 Gary Colliver
Washington Column, South Face 5.8 C1 V FA 1964 Layton Kor Chris Fredericks
Muir Wall 5.9 A2 VI FA 1965 Yvon Chouinard TM Herbert
Flying Buttress Direct 5.9 A3 V FA 1965 Chris Fredericks Layton Kor
Gold Wall 5.10 A3 V FA 1965 Layton Kor Tom Fender
Inspiration Buttress 5.8 A3 IV FA 1965 Joe Faint Mike Borghoff
Yosemite Point, Southeast Face (Min-Ne-Ah) 5.9 A3 V FA 1965 Gordon Webster TM Herbert FFA 1990 Scott Cosgrove Walt Shipley
Nevada Falls, Right Side 5.8 A1 II FA 1966 Al Steck Jim Wilson Dick Long
Direct Assistance Route 5.7 A4 IV FA 1966 Layton Kor John Hudson Dick Williams
Midwall 5.9 A4 V FA 1966 Tom Fender Kim Schmitz
Psychedelic Wall 5.8 A4 V FA 1966 Ken Boche Dennis Hennek
Easter Egg, The 5.7 A1 FA 1967 Rob Foster Greg Schaffer
Will-O'-The-Wisp 5.5 A1 II FA 1967 Jim Chamberlain Bob Grow
South Central 5.10a A2 V FA 1967 Jim Bridwell Joe Faint
Bad Wall 5.8 A4 V FA 1967 Jim Madsen Kim Schmitz
Dinner Ledge Direct 5.7 A4 IV FA 1967 Jim Madsen Kim Schmitz
Great Slab Route 5.8 A4 V FA 1967 Layton Kor Jim Madsen Kim Schmitz
Higher Cathedral Rock, East Face Route 5.10 A4 V FA 1967 Jim Bridwell Chris Fredericks
Shadyside Bench 5.8 A1 II FA 1968 Alan Gillespie Bill Nelson
Nickel Pinnacle, East Face 5.8 A2 III FA 1968 Chuck Kroger Kep Stone
Lost Arrow Spire, Direct 5.11 A3 V FA 1968 Warren Harding Pat Callis
Mosstrum, The 5.8 A3 III FA 1968 Bob Bauman Chuck Pratt Bruce Kumph
Firefall Face 5.8 A4 V FA 1968 Galen Rowell Warren Harding
Higher Cathedral Rock, North Face 5.9 A4 V FA 1968 Chuck Pratt Dennis Hennek Yvon Chouinard Bob Kamps
Symphony, The 5.9 A1 FA 1969 Chuck Ostin Tim Fitzgerald
Nevada Falls, Slot Machine, The 5.5 A2 II FA 1969 Scott Baxter Lee Dexter
Half Dome, Northwest Buttress 5.7 A3 IV FA 1969 Andy Embick Bob Jensen
Liberty Cap, Southwest Face 5.10 A3 VI FA 1969 Galen Rowell Joe Faint Warren Harding
West Quarter Dome, North Face 5.8 A3 IV FA 1969 Phil Koch Dave Goeddel
Gobi Wall 5.8 A4 V FA 1969 Chuck Pratt Ken Boche
La Escuela Direct A4 FA 1969 Eric Beck Steve Williams
Tis-sa-ack 5.10 A4 VI FA 1969 Royal Robbins Don Peterson
Triple Direct 5.8 C2 VI FA 1969 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz
Prow, The 5.6 C2F V FA 1969 Royal Robbins Glen Denny
Teeter Tower 5.7 A1 III FA 1970 Jack Delk Bill Sorenson
Via Sin Aqua 5.10 A2 V FA 1970 Rick Sylvester Bugs McKeith
BHOS Dome 5.8 A3 III FA 1970 Doug Scott TM Herbert Don Lauria Dennis Hennek
Higher Cathedral Rock, Northeast Corner 5.8 A3 V FA 1970 Chuck Pratt Joe Kelsey
Parkline Slab; Direct Route 5.6 A3 III FA 1970 Jerry Anderson Bruce Price John Yates
Renegade, The (Stigma, The) 5.13 A3 FA 1970 Dennis Miller Brian Birmingham FFA 1986 Alan Watts
Stigma, The (The Renegade) 5.13 A3 FA 1970 Dennis Miller Brian Birmingham FFA 1986 Alan Watts
Vain Hope 5.7 A3 V FA 1970 Royal Robbins Kim Schmitz Jim Bridwell
Arcturus 5.7 A4 VI FA 1970 Royal Robbins Dick Dorworth
Half Dome, South Face Route 5.8 A4 VI FA 1970 Warren Harding Galen Rowell
Heart Route, The 5.9 A4 VI FA 1970 Chuck Kroger Scott Davis
In Cold Blood 5.8 A4 V FA 1970 Royal Robbins
Geek Towers, Right Side 5.10a A2 FA 1971 Mark Klemens Jim Bridwell
Eggplant, The 5.10b A3 FA 1971 Kent Stokes John Svenson FFA 1989 Walt Shipley Xavier Bongard
Fight or Flight (Lower Yosemite Falls, Right Side) 5.7 A3 FA 1971 John Svenson Kent Stokes FFA 1989 Kevin Fosburg Walt Shipley
Lower Yosemite Falls, Right Side (Flight or Fight) 5.7 A3 FA 1971 John Svenson Kent Stokes FFA 1989 Kevin Fosburg Walt Shipley
Wall of Early Morning Light 5.7 A3 VI FA 1971 Warren Harding Dean Cadwell
Watermelon Rind 5.9 A3 V FA 1971 John Svenson Sharon Young Kent Stokes Bob Schneider
Heart Woute (Son of Heart) 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1971 Rick Sylvester Claude Wreford-Brown
Aquarian Wall 5.9 A4 VI FA 1971 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz
Route of All Evil 5.9 A4 V FA 1971 Matt Donohoe Cliff Jennings
Fatal Mistake 5.11a A1 IV FA 1972 Charlie Porter Walter Rosenthal FFA 1975 Dale Bard Werner Braun
Zodiac 5.7 A2 VI 5.13d FA 1972 Charlie Porter FFA 2003 Alex Huber Thomas Huber
Abazaba 5.11c A3 FA 1972 Charlie Porter Walter Rosenthal FFA 1986 Scott Cosgrove Walt Shipley
Keel Haul 5.10 A3 VI FA 1972 Charlie Porter Walter Rosenthal
Nashville Skyline 5.8 A3 V FA 1972 Charlie Porter Gary Bocarde
Coffin Nail A3+ FA 1972 Charlie Porter
Cosmos 5.8 A4 VI FA 1972 Jim Dunn
Magic Mushroom 5.10 A4 VI FA 1972 Hugh Burton Steve Sutton
Sheba A4+ FA 1972 Charlie Porter
Shield, The (Salathe Start) 5.7 C4F VI FA 1972 Charlie Porter Gary Bocarde
Tangerine Trip 5.8 A2 VI FA 1973 Charlie Porter John-Paul de St. Croix
Mescalito 5.8 A3 VI FA 1973 Charlie Porter Hugh Burton Steve Sutton Chris Nelson
Comedy of Folly 5.9 A4 V FA 1973 Rik Rieder
Miscreant Wall 5.9 A4 V FA 1973 Bruce Hawkins Keith Nannery
Eagle Roof A1 FA 1974 Dave Diegleman Bill Price Augie Klein
Horse Chute 5.9 A3 VI FA 1974 Charlie Porter Hugh Burton
New Dawn 5.8 A3 VI FA 1974 Charlie Porter Yvon Chouinard Chuck Pratt Dennis Hennick Chris Jones
Grape Race 5.9 A5 VI FA 1974 Charlie Porter Bev Johnson
Excalibur 5.9 A3 VI FA 1975 Charlie Porter Hugh Burton
Pacific Ocean Wall 5.9 A3 VI FA 1975 Jim Bridwell Billy Westbay Jay Fiske Fred East
Lost World 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1975 C. Folsom Dave Anderson Mike Warburton
Electric Ladyland 5.10a A4 VI FA 1975 Gib Lewis Rick Accomazzo Richard Harrison
Mother Earth 5.11c A4 VI FA 1975 George Meyers John Long Kevin Worrall Mark Chapman Ron Kauk
Waterfall Route 5.10b R A4 VI FA 1975 Daryle Teske T. Polk
Eagle's Way 5.8 A3 VI FA 1976 Mark Chapman Mike Graham Jim Orey
Mirage 5.9 A4 VI FA 1976 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz Jim Pettigrew
Lurking Fear 5.7 C2F VI 5.13/A0 FA 1976 Dave Bircheff Jim Pettigrew
Skunk Crack 5.11b A1 FA 1977 Ray Jardine John Lakey
Hockey Night in Canada 5.10 A3 VI FA 1977 Darrell Hatten Bill Stern
Bushido 5.10 A4 VI FA 1977 Jim Bridwell Dale Bard
Dorn Direct (to Shield) 5.9 A4 VI FA 1977 Tony Yaniro Ron Olevsky
New Jersey Turnpike 5.10 A4+ VI FA 1977 Bruce Hawkins Ron Kauk Dale Bard Hugh Burton
Wet Denim Daydream 5.6 C3F V FA 1977 Darrell Hatten Angus Thuermer
Dorn's Crack 5.10c A0 FA 1978 Jack Dorn Jim Beyer Bob Sullivan
Tiger's Paw 5.10a A1 FA 1978 Don Reid Rick Cashner
Yosemite Point Buttress, Czech Route 5.10 A1 VI FA 1978 Jan Porvazik A. Behia
Hook, Line and Sinker 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1978 Mike Munger Angus Thurmer Steve Larson
Bob Locke Memorial Buttress 5.11 A4 VI FA 1978 Jim Bridwell Ron Kauk John Long Kim Schmitz
Iron Hawk 5.9 A4 VI FA 1978 Dale Bard Ron Kauk
Negative Pinnacle, Center A4 FA 1978 Jim Beyer
Never Never Land 5.9 A4 VI FA 1978 Bruce Hawkins Mark Chapman
Sea of Dreams 5.9 A4 VI FA 1978 Jim Bridwell Dale Bard Dave Diegelman
Tribal Rite A4 VI FA 1978 Walter Rosenthal Tom Carter Dale Bard
Zenith 5.8 A4 VI FA 1978 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz
Sunkist 5.9 A5 VI FA 1978 Bill Price Dale Bard
Plume, The A2 FA 1979 Don Reid Chuck Goldmann
Derelict's Diagonal A4 FA 1979 Chuck Goldman Mathew Moore
South Seas 5.8 A4 VI FA 1979 Bill Price Charlie Row Guy Thompson
Born Under A Bad Sign 5.10 A5 VI FA 1979 Bill Price Tim Washick
Jolly Rodger 5.10 A5 VI FA 1979 Charles Cole Steve Grossman
More Balls then Brains A3- FA 1980 Dana Brown
Colony of Slippermen 5.11+ A1 FA 1981 Chris Cantwell Mark Grant
Mad Pilot 5.11b A1 FA 1981 Rob Rohn Peter Croft
Pink Banana 5.10d A1 FA 1981 Chris Cantwell Bruce Morris Mike Hernandez Donald Cantwell FFA 1987 Greg Murphy Nathan Robinson Elliot Robbinson
Sunblast 5.13a A2+ FA 1981 Don Reid Grant Hiskes FFA Dave Schultz
Aurora 5.8 A4 VI FA 1981 Peter Mayfield Greg Child
Bulging Puke 5.9 A4 V FA 1981 Bill Russell Chris Friel
Chinese Water Torture 5.11 A4 VI FA 1981 Karl McConachie Jay Smith
Wings of Steel 5.10+ A4 VI FA 1981 Richard Jensen Mark Smith
Zenyatta Mondatta 5.7 A4 VI FA 1981 Jim Bridwell Peter Mayfield Charlie Row
Pink Pussycat A1 FA 1982 Don Reid Greg Sonagere
Silent Line 5.10c A1 V FA 1982 Rick Cashner Werner Braun
Mischief 5.8 A2 FA 1982 Marshall Ravenscroft Tim Kemple
Higher Aspirations 5.8 A3 V FA 1982 Rik Derrick Steve Bosque
Old A5 A3 FA 1982 Peter Chesko
Unemployment Line 5.9 A3 FA 1982 Alan Bartlett Jim May Steve Gerberding
Squeeze Play 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1982 Mike Corbett Gary Edmondson Rich Albuschkat
Lunar Eclipse 5.7 A4 VI FA 1982 John Barbella Steve Schneider
Pacemaker 5.9 A4 VI FA 1982 Steve Bosque Mike Corbett Murray Barnett Jim Siler
Buried Treasure 5.11a A0 FA 1983 Steve Schneider Rob Oravetz
Rainbow 5.10 A3 V FA 1983 Paul Fida Chris Freel
Die Schweine Von Oben 5.11 A3+ VI FA 1983 Bill Russell Paul Fiola
Arctic Sea 5.10 A4 VI FA 1983 Tom Cosgriff Duane Raleigh
Mideast Crisis 5.8 A4 V FA 1983 Steve Bosque Mike Corbett
Blockbuster 5.11c A1 FA 1984 Don Reid Grant Hiskes Dimitri Barton
Horse Play 5.9 A3 VI FA 1984 Steve Grossman Sue Harrington
Bad to the Bone 5.9+ A4 VI FA 1984 Jay Smith Lidija Painkiher
Queen of Spades 5.9 A4 VI FA 1984 Charles Cole
Real Nose 5.10 A4 VI FA 1984 Charles Cole Steve Grossman
Wyoming Sheep Ranch 5.8 A4 VI FA 1984 Rob Slater John Barbella
Bermuda Dunes 5.11c A4+ VI FA 1984 Steve Schneider John Barbella
Roulette A5 FA 1984 Earl Redfern Tom Bepler
Time Machine A5+ VI FA 1984 Bob Shonerd
Skull Queen 5.8 C2 V FA 1984 Dave Altenburg Chuck Clance Steve Bosque
Liberty Cap, West Buttress 5.10 A3 V FA 1985 Mike Corbett Steve Bosque
Realm of the Flying Monkeys 5.10a A3 VI FA 1985 Steve Bosque Dan McDevitt
Learning to Crawl 5.9 A3+ V FA 1985 Mike Corbett Steve Bosque Fritz Fox
Mr. Midwest 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1985 Bill Russell Doug McDonald
Atlantic Ocean Wall 5.9 A4 VI FA 1985 John Middendorf John Barbella
Disco Strangler 5.10 A4 V FA 1985 Earl Redfern Tom Bepler Eric Brand
Dyslexia 5.10d A4 VI FA 1985 Ellie Hawkins
Lost in America 5.10 A4 VI FA 1985 Randy Leavitt Greg Child
Space 5.10 A4 VI FA 1985 Charles Cole
Karma 5.11d A0 V FA 1986 Dave Schultz Ken Yager Jim Campbell
Local Motion 5.11d A1 FA 1986 Doug McDonald Werner Braun
Yosemite Pointless 5.9 A3 V FA 1986 Bob Ost Norman Boles
Same as it Never Was 5.11b A4 VI FA 1986 Jay Smith Karl McConachie Randy Grandstaff
Heading for Oblivion 5.10 A4+ VI FA 1986 Jim Beyer
On the Waterfront 5.9 A5 VI FA 1986 Steve Bosque Mike Corbett Gwen Schneider
Battlescar 5.11d A1 FA 1987 Ed Barry Doug MacDonald
Floating Lama 5.11c A1 FA 1987 Doug McDonald
Ten Days After 5.8 A3 VI FA 1987 John Barbella Eric Brand
Big Chill, The 5.9 A4 VI FA 1987 Jim Bridwell Peter Mayfield Sean Plunkett Steve Bosque
Luminescent Wall 5.10b A4 VI FA 1987 John Barbella Walt Shipley
Native Son 5.9 A4 VI FA 1987 Walt Shipley Troy Johnson
Heartland 5.10 A4+ VI FA 1987 John Barbella Eric Brand
Scorched Earth 5.11 A5 VI FA 1987 Randy Leavitt Rob Slater
Morality Check 5.10 A0 FA 1988 Tucker Tech Pete Takeda
Escape From Freedom 5.11c A1 VI FA 1988 Urmas Franosch Bruce Morris
Old A2 A2 FA 1988 Dana Brown Jeff Perrin
For Your Eyes Only (Octopussy) 5.9 A3 VI FA 1988 Dan McDevitt Sue McDevitt
Love Without Anger 5.8 A3 V FA 1988 Steve Bosque Rich Albuschkat
Timbuktu Left 5.10 A3 VI FA 1988 Franco Perlotto
Turkey Shoot 5.9 A3 V FA 1988 Ken Yager Steve Bosque
Horney/Johnson 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1988 Jeff Hornibrook Troy Johnson
Via Sin Liquor 5.9 A4 VI FA 1988 Eric Kohl Alan Humphrey
White Room, The 5.10 A4 VI FA 1988 Sean Plunkett Walt Shipley
Bad Seed 5.9 A4+ VI FA 1988 Bill Russell Troy Johnson
Central Scrutinizer 5.11c A4+ VI FA 1988 Steve Grossman Jay Ladin
Bananarama 5.10a A3 V FA 1989 Rich Albuschkat Steve Bosque Murray Barnett
Flashback 5.8 A3 V FA 1989 Steve Bosque Rich Albuschkat
Dante's Inferno 5.9 A3+ VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl
Toxic Waste Dump 5.8 A3+ VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl
Aqua Vulva (Route 66) 5.10 A4 VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl John Middendorf
Genesis 5.11b A4 VI FA 1989 Doug Englekirk Eric Brand
Jet Stream, The 5.9 A4 VI FA 1989 Sean Plunkett Bill Russell
Kali Yuga, The 5.10 A4 VI FA 1989 Walt Shipley John Middendorf
Promised Land, The 5.10 A4 VI FA 1989 Kevin Fosburg Jeff Hornibrook Troy Johnson
Wheel of Torture 5.7 A4 VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl
Reach for the Sky 5.11 A4+ VI FA 1989 Jim Beyer
High Plains Dripper 5.11 A5 VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl Alan Humphrey
Shadows A5 VI FA 1989 Jim Bridwell Cito Kirkpatrick Charlie Row Billy Westbay
Affliction, The 5.11d R A0 V FA 1990 Walt Shipley Scott Cosgrove
Fantasy Island 5.13b A0 FA 1990 Dave Schultz
Ecstacy of Gold, The 5.10 A3 VI FA 1990 Eric Rassmussen Doug Olmstead
Re-Animator 5.8 A3 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl Walt Shipley
Hole World 5.10 A4 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl
Pressure Cooker 5.10 A4 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl
Saddam Hussein 5.9 A4 V FA 1990 Eric Brand Stewart Irving
Shortest Straw, The 5.7 A4 VI FA 1990 Rick Lovelace
Highway to Hell 5.9 A5 VI FA 1990 Garbor Berecz Thomas Tivadar
Ice Age 5.9 A5 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl
Surgeon General 5.9 A5 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl Walt Shipley
Hole in the Sky 5.10b A3 VI FA 1991 Kevin Fosburg Paul Turecki
Solar Power Arete 5.10a A3+ VI FA 1991 Kevin Fosburg Paul Turecki
Crystal Cyclone A4+ VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Reckless Abandon 5.8 A4+ VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Plastic Surgery Disaster 5.8 A5 VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Winds of Change 5.10 A5 VI FA 1991 Richard Jensen
World of Pain 5.8 A5 VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Chief, The 5.11b A1 V FA 1992 Al Swanson Arthur James Foley III Brian Warshow
Southern Man 5.8 A2 V FA 1992 Francis Ross Rich Albushkat
Virginia 5.7 A3 VI FA 1992 Chuck Clance Steve Bosque
Lost Again 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1992 Eric Kohl
Prism, The 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1992 Urmas Franosch Sean Plunkett
Electric Ocean 5.10 A4 VI FA 1992 Eric Kohl
Jesus Built My Hotrod 5.8 A4 V FA 1992 Eric Kohl Eric Rasmussen
Get Wacked 5.10 A5 VI FA 1992 Eric Kohl
Freaks of Nature 5.11c A0 FA 1993 Mike McGrale Cary Hansen Jeff Snedden
Flight of the Albatross 5.8 A3 VI FA 1993 John Middendorf Will Oxx
Ashes to Ashes A4 V FA 1993 Eric Rasmussen Chris Purnell
Kaos 5.7 A4 VI FA 1993 Steve Gerberding Dave Bengston
Adrift 5.11 A3+ VI FA 1995 Steve Quinlan Paul Pritchard
Reticent Wall 5.7 A5 VI FA 1995 Steve Gerberding Scott Stowe Laurie Stowe
When Hell was in Session 5.9 A5 VI FA 1995 Eric Kohl Pete Takeda
Abstract Expressionist A5 VI FA 1996 Eric Kohl
History of the Future A3 III FA 1997 Bryan Law
Sad State of Afairs, A 5.7 A3 V FA 1997 Eric Rasmussen Mike Zawaski
Continental Drift 5.9 A4 VI FA 1997 Steve Gerberding Kevin Thaw Conrad Anker
Hurricane Jingus 5.9 A4 VI FA 1997 Eric Kohl Bryan Law
Lost in Translation 5.6 A4+ V FA 1997 Chris McNamara Chris Ewing
Sargantana 5.9 A5 VI FA 1997 Pep Mesip Silvia Vidal
Sky is Falling 5.10 A? VI FA 1998 Eric Kohl Bryan Law
El Nino 5.13c A0 VI FA 1998 Alex Huber Thomas Huber
Girdle Traverse 5.10 A4 VI FA 1998 Chris McNamara Mark Melvin
Ned's Excellent Adventure A4 VI FA 1998 Warren Hollinger Bryan Law
Nightmare on California St. 5.8 A4+ VI FA 1998 Warren Hollinger Grant Gardner
Disorderly Conduct 5.9 A5 VI FA 1998 Warren Hollinger Miles Smart Bart Groendycke
Heavy Metal and Tinker Toys 5.9 A5 VI FA 1998 Jim Bridwell Tyson Hausdoerffer Boulos Ayad
It's So Awful PDK+ VI FA 1998 Eric Kohl
Passage to Freedom 5.13c A0 VI FA 1999 Leo Houlding Jose Pereyra
Allied Forces 5.9 A3 VI FA 1999 Steve Gerberding Al Swanson Mark Bowling Odd Roar Wilk
Life on the Dark Side 5.6 A3 IV FA 1999 Bryan Law Ammon McNeely
Summerland 5.8 A3 VI FA 1999 Bryan Law Roger Strong
Every Man for Himself A4 VI FA 1999 Steve Gerberding Scott Stowe Mark Bowling
Gulf Stream 5.9 A4 VI FA 1999 Steve Gerberding Jay Smith
Dark Star 5.10 A5 VI FA 1999 Jim Bridwell Giovani Groaz
Cataclysmic Mega Sheer 5.11d A2 VI FA 2000 Eric Kohl Bryan Law
Laughing at the Void 5.9 A3 V FA 2000 Jerry Anderson Sigrid Anderson Lynnea Anderson
Escaoe From Tora Bora A2 VI FA 2002 Eric Kohl
Great Disgrace, The 5.9 A3+ VI FA 2002 Jon Blair Jeff Hornibrook Bryan Kay
Persian Gulf 5.9 A3+ V FA 2002 Jon Blair Mark Garbarini
Tora Bora 5.9 A3+ V FA 2002 Josh Thompson Bryan Kay
Wild Apes 5.9 A3 VI FA 2003 Mark Garbarini Jon Blair Bryan Kay
Jose Memorial Variation 5.7 A3+ VI FA 2003 Ammon McNeely Gabe McNeely Austin McNeely
Quo Vadis 5.9 A4+ VI FA 2003 Jacek Czyz
Reign in Blood PDK VI FA 2003 Eric Kohl
Witching Hour PDK VI FA 2003 Eric Kohl
Express Checkout A? VI FA Eric Kohl
Cookie Continuation A0 FA
Lehamite Buttress 5.6 A2 FA
40 oz of Freedom 5.10 A3 V FA
Gold Ribbon 5.10 A3 VI FA
Lower Cathedral Rock, North Face 5.9 A3 V FA
Round em' up A3 FA
Delectable Pinnacle, Aid Route A3- FA
Joint Adventure, A 5.9 A3+ IV FA
Old A3 A3+ FA
Shack 5.10 A3+ VI FA Sean Plunkett
Blue Shift 5.11b A4 VI FA Jay Smith
Reason Beyond Insanity 5.7 A4 VI FA Sean Easton Dave Sheldon
Ribbon Falls, East Portal 5.9 A4 V FA
Riptide A4 FA
Slacker's Toil 5.8 A4 VI FA
Soul Shakedown 5.11 A4 VI FA Urmas Franosch Sean Plunkett
Tempest A4 VI FA Jeff Hornibrook Brad Jarret
Tenaya's Terror 5.9 A4 VI FA Mike Corbett Steve Bosque
Vodka Putsch, The 5.10 A4 VI FA Bill Russell Pete Takeda
Liberty Cap, Direct Southwest Face 5.10 A5 V FA
Martyr's Brigade 5.11 A5 VI FA Jim Beyer
Ring of Fire A5 VI FA Richard Jensen Mark Smith
In Justice for All PDK VI FA Eric Kohl
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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That'll take some time to fully enjoy!
Nice work Ed.
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Nutsonthechin, Wisconsin
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Great job Ed!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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The bar graph is sweet!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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That whole effort is a sure keeper Ed.
You've smashed one way out of the park this time.
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Wonder
climber
WA
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Damn! look at the names on this one...
Learning to Crawl 5.9 A3+ V FA 1985 Mike Corbett Steve Bosque Fritz Fox
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Raydog
Trad climber
Boulder Colorado
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RE:
"That whole effort is a sure keeper Ed.
You've smashed one way out of the park this time. "
yeah,
that graph makes it so clear,
great work Ed.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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it was interesting, let me put a caveat in here, the database has incomplete information regarding the climb "Grade," further, climbs that originally had aid, were put up initially with aid may not have been represented so in the eventual documentation of the FA. So the early aid climbs in the sub Grade V category may be underrepresented as a historical point.
There is still a residual of this, however, and we can see it in the rapid rise of FAs for "all" aid climbs that occurs in the decade from 1955 to 1965, as clean climbing standards rose, the number of aid climb FAs went down. Probably an interesting plot would be to show the frequency of FFAs, which I would expect to be increasing during this same time.
What surprised me the most was my erroneous historical memory that "Big Wall" climbing ended with the Wall of Early Morning Light in 1971. That couldn't be more wrong. The two decades of the 70s and 80s saw the bulk of Grade VI aid FAs, this is the "Big Wall" era and many of the practitioners of that era post here (some of them have foregone their Big Wall habit and resort to Russian Roulette to get their "rap with the reaper" rush, so I've heard).
While we retain the image of the lone wall rat, at home in the "high lonesome," there was a huge activity and there should be many more stories to be told.
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Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
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always be fully prepared for what you're getting into when you use the word, 'list' around Ed...
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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another interesting conjecture is using Karl's "Peak Oil" argument, that there is really only another 15 years of Grade VI aid climbing left (20-40 climbs) in the Valley, then all that resource would be exhausted...
...get busy all you who want to send!
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Prod
Social climber
Charlevoix, MI
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Awesome thread!
Hey Ed,
Did you end up doing Lost Arrow Direct?
Prod.
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scuffy b
climber
Elmertown
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The aid-then-free aspect is a bit misleading, Ed.
Since Salathe's big climbs are not on the list, we have the first Grade V going up in 1956.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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still in negotiations with my prospective partner... but if we do this year, it will be soon...
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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good catch scuffy! I'll have to look into that and see if I can modify the "mother database" with the correct info... it is not so done in the literature.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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"Probably an interesting plot would be to show the frequency of FFAs, which I would expect to be increasing during this same time."
Yes, that alongside with FA's which were pure free ascents.
...in your spare time, naturally.
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lars johansen
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Note to Tarbuster:
I just got off the phone with Clance and he was not part of the FA party on Pacemaker, at any time. He did the second ascent with an Ozzie under epic conditions. The drinking bout you witnessed probably just included Bosque, Mike Corbett, Jim Siler and Murray [Murkey] Barnett. There's still a lot of bad blood going around about Murkey and some ripoff scheme he pulled.
Note on Pete Weenis: He used to carry a tube of preparation H in his pocket to astound and disgust tourons with impromptu applications on site.
Be Well,
lars
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Gene
climber
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Walleye,
Is that Via Sin Agua - FA 1978 or another line?
GM
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Russ Walling
Social climber
Nutsonthechin, Wisconsin
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Aqua Vulva?
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le_bruce
climber
Oakland: what's not to love?
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From a climbing punter who has a big interest in Yos history: thanks Ed! Wish I could snap my fingers and have a book of write-ups on all of those FA's, most of which I've only heard of in passing, if at all.
As one example:
Dark Star 5.10 A5 VI FA 1999 Jim Bridwell Giovani Groaz
Where/what the hell is this? Who amongst us wouldn't pay good dough to be able to read the lurid details of these ascents.
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jstan
climber
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Sine qua non.
My best route.
Now that I have done it, it can never be repeated.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Thanks for the Pacemaker clarification Lars,
Apologies to Clance for the misreportage; I'm no historian, even if/when I was there, haha. Now I recall it was Corbett who I chatted with as we made our way across Mammoth Terrace. (They were perhaps entertaining only moderate drinking, I embelish hehe.) I was more than likely around when Clance did the second ascent of Pacemaker and clearly blurred the lines with my memory of the different teams. "Weenis" as we refer to, was not Pete (if you mean Chesko), but a guy named Shawn.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Hey Lars,
Maybe Chuck would post up a story about the second ascent of Pacemaker? Sounds like a good one. He's posted here before right?
This thread could use more first hand reportage, as Ed noted. As I think about it, it seems we don't get that much first person tell from early ascents of wall routes done back then.
Cheers,
Roy
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lars johansen
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Roy-
Clance actually got paid to write up the second ascent of Pacemaker in an issue of Climbing magazine. I'm sure he has it framed, I'll find out what issue.
The Weenis I was referring to was Pete[r] Weenis Chesko [sp?] who I understand is a really fine jeweler now. Just goes to show that you really can make diamonds out of coal.
Best
lars
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Yes,
Chesko & I climbed V Notch in the Palisades together way back when. He posted here for a while, so we emailed and caught up a bit.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Hey Mussy,
Tell us a story won't you?
I know you talked about Bad Sign a while back; was that a full blown TR you can link us to?
(early, ...er, 2nd ascent maybe?)
Hook us up man!
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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An update on the aid climbs.
I went back and made the database more consistent in reporting the "FA rating" separate from the "modern rating" (the one that shows up in the most recent guide books) and the "FFA rating." Most of these I extracted from Roper's 1971 guide. However, there are still climbs there that have the "FFA rating" only, and I suspect there was no formal YDS rating of some of these climbs, being done in the time before the uniform ratings were applied. There aren't many of them, though, about 54 climbs, 12% of all documented "Aid Climbs."
I haven't released the newest spread sheet yet (I'll post when I get it ready), I've corrected a few names, etc, and I've added references to the American Alpine Journal (AAJ) as I searched for information on poorly reported climbs (see list below). Some of you could actually help with dates, etc... but I understand memory lapse at old age...
Included here, the new table of frequency of "Graded" aid climbs by 5 year period. And a plot that shows how this is build up.
Not an elegant table, but STForum doesn't allow for horizontal spacing formats (e.g. tabs):
year, all, all "Graded", VI, V, IV, I,II,III, III, II, I
up to 1935, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1936 to 1940, 3, 3, 0, 0, 0, 3, 0, 1, 2
1941 to 1945, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0
1946 to 1950, 10, 8, 0, 1, 1, 6, 3, 1, 2
1951 to1955, 12, 12, 0, 1, 3, 8, 4, 3, 1
1956 to 1960, 42, 35, 3, 5, 8, 19, 11, 6, 2
1961 to 1965, 81, 72, 8, 14, 15, 35, 14, 16, 5
1966 to 1970, 49, 44, 7, 16, 6, 15, 9, 6, 0
1971 to 1975, 33, 25, 19, 5, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0
1976 to 1980, 27, 20, 19, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1981 to 1985, 42, 31, 22, 9, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1986 to 1990, 50, 44, 36, 8, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1991 to 1995, 25, 24, 20, 4, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1996 to 2000, 25, 25, 20, 3, 1, 1, 1, 0, 0
2001 to 2005, 11, 11, 9, 2, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
Of 412 aid climbs, 355 have "Grades", here's a simple table:
all; 413
all "Graded;" 355
VI; 163
V; 69
IV; 35
I, II, III, 88
III; 43
II; 33
I; 12
Not much has changed on the plot, more information (maybe too much) but probably a better time distributed representation. The major conclusions are the same.
climbs used in this accounting:
Sunnyside Bench, Waterfall Route 5.7 A3 FA 1935 Dave Brower William Van Voorhis
Grizzly Peak, South Gully 5.5 A1 II FA 1938 Dave Brower Morgan Harris
Split Pinnacle, Regular Route 5.7 A2 I FA 1938 Jack Reigelhuth Raffi Bedayan Dick Leonard Muir Dawson
Kat Pinnacle via Tyrolean Traverse 5.7 A1 I FA 1940 Devitt Allen Torcom Bedayan Robin Hansen
West Arrowhead Chimney 5.7 A3 III FA 1941 Torcom Bedayan Fritz Lippmann
Lost Arrow Tip 5.8 C2 FA 1946 Fritz Lippmann Jack Arnold Anton Nelson Robin Hansen FFA 5.12b 1984 Dave Schultz
Salathe Route 5.7 A3 IV FA 1946 John Salathe Anton Nelson FFA 5.10b R 1964 Frank Sachere Bob Kamps Andy Lichtman
Lost Arrow Chimney 5.8 A3 V FA 1947 John Salathe Anton Nelson FFA 5.10a 1964 Chuck Pratt Frank Sacherer
Higher Cathedral Spire, Steck Route 5.9 A1 FA 1948 Allen Steck Fletcher Hoyt Willima Hoyt
Rixon's Pinnacle, South Face 5.8 A2 III FA 1948 Chuck Wilts Ellen Wilts FFA 5.11d 1974 Tobin Sorenson John Bachar
Sentinel Rock, Northeast Bowl 5.8 A1 III FA 1948 John Salathe Anton Nelson
Harris' Hangover 5.7 A3 II FA 1949 Oscar Cook Bill Dunmire Bob Swift
Penny Pinnacle; West Face 5.4 A1 I FA 1950
Phantom Pinnacle, Outside Face 5.9 A3 III FA 1950 Bill Dunmire Bob Swift FFA 5.10d 1957 Rich Calderwood Mike Borghoff
Pulpit Rock, from the Notch 5.7 A1 I FA 1950 FFA 5.10 1960 Royal Robbins
Dinner Ledge 5.6 A2 I FA 1952 Don Goodrich Dave Dows FFA 5.10a 1966 John Hudson Chris Fredricks
Eagle Peak - Southeast Face 5.8 A2 III FA 1952 John Lindberg Ron Hayes
El Cap Tree, Regular Route 5.6 A2 III FA 1952 Allen Steck Will Siri Bill Dunmire Bob Swift
Yosemite Point Buttress, Direct Route 5.8 A2 IV FA 1952 Allen Steck Bob Swift FFA 5.9 1964 Frank Sacherer Don Telshaw
El Capitan, East Buttress 5.7 A2 IV FA 1953 Allen Steck Will Siri Willi Unsoeld Bill Long FFA 5.10b 1964 Frank Sacherer Wally Reed
John's Other Chimney 5.4 A1 II FA 1953 John Ohrenschall Marry Ann Corthell
El Capitan, East Ledge Traverse 5.6 A1 II FA 1954 Allen Steck Bill Dunmire Jim Wilson
Middle Cathedral Rock, East Buttress 5.9 A1 IV FA 1954 Warren Harding Jack Davis Bob Swift FFA 5.10c 1965 Frank Sacherer Ed Leeper
Middle Cathedral Rock, North Buttress 5.7 A2 V FA 1954 Warren Harding Frank Tarver Craig Holden John Whitmer FFA 5.10a 1964 Frank Sacherer Jim Bridwell
Middle Cathedral Rock, North Face Traverse 5.8 A3 III FA 1954 Dick Long George Mandatory Jack Davis Bob Skinner
Thirsty Spire A2 II FA 1954 Dick Long Bob Skinner FFA 5.11a 1989 Clint Cummins Joel Ager
Obscurity Traverse 5.6 A2 III FA 1955 Bill Loughman Don Goodrich
East Arrowhead Chimney (Nagasaki My Love) 5.8 A2 III FA 1956 Mark Powell Warren Harding FFA 5.10d 1988 Elliot Robinson Steve Annecone
Kat Pinnacle, Northwest Corner 5.7 A2 FA 1956 Mark Powell Don Wilson
Liberty Cap, South Face 5.8 A3 IV FA 1956 Mark Powell Royal Robbins Joe Fitschen
Lower Cathedral Rock, East Buttress 5.8 A3 IV FA 1956 Mark Powell Jerry Gallwas Don Wilson FFA 5.10c 1965 Steve Thompson Chris Fredricks
Nagasaki My Love (East Arrowhead Chimney) 5.8 A2 III FA 1956 Mark Powell Warren Harding FFA 5.10d 1988 Elliot Robinson Steve Annecone
Ahwiyah Point Northwest Buttress 5.8 A2 III FA 1957 Wayne Merry Warren Harding
Bear Rock, Bolt Route 5.3 A1 I FA 1957 George Sessions Mike Schuler Wayne Simpson Noel Shirley
Bridalveil East 5.8 A2 III FA 1957 Mark Powell Warren Harding FFA 5.10c 1964 Frank Sacherer John Morton
East Arrowhead Buttress, Overhang Route 5.8 A2 III FA 1957 Mark Powell Wayne Merry
Half Dome, Regular Northwest Face 5.9 C1 VI FA 1957 Royal Robbins Jerry Gallwas Mike Sherrick FFA 5.12 1976 Jim Erickson Art Higbee
Liberty Cap, Southern Buttress 5.7 A3 FA 1957 Mike Loughman Dick Armstrong
Lower Cathedral Rock, North Buttress 5.8 A4 V FA 1957 Mark Powell Bill Feuerer
Lower Watkins Pinnacle A3 II FA 1957 Mark Powell Herb Swedlund Wally Reed George Sessions Merle Alley
Powell-Reed 5.7 A3 IV FA 1957 Mark Powell Wally Reed FFA 5.10c 1964 Bob Kamps Tom Higgins
El Capitan, East Ledges, East Side 5.5 A3 II FA 1958 Henry Kendall Gerry Czamanske
Lower Brother, Southeast Face 5.8 A1 III FA 1958 Wally Reed Charles Raymond
Lower Cathedral Rock, Roof, The 5.7 A3 II FA 1958 Tom Frost Henry Kendall
Nose, The 5.9 C2 VI FA 1958 Warren Harding Wayne Merry George Whitmore FFA 5.13b 1993 Lynn Hill
Penny-Nickle Arete 5.7 A2 III FA 1958 Chuck Pratt George Sessions Krehe Ritter
Slack, The, Center Route 5.8 A1 III FA 1958 Charlie Raymond Wally Reed FFA 5.10d 1967 Pat Ament Larry Dalke
Split Pinnacle, East Arete 5.8 A1+ FA 1958 Chuck Pratt Krehe Ritter FFA 5.10c
Ahwahnee Buttress 5.8 A2 IV FA 1959 George Sessions George Whitmore Jerry Dixon Merle Alley FFA 5.10d 1989 Dave Sessions Tucker Tech
Beverly's Tower 5.4 A1 I FA 1959 Gerry Czamanske Waren Harding FFA 5.10a 1973 Roger Breedlove Alan Bard
Higher Cathedral Rock, Northeast Buttress 5.8 A2 IV FA 1959 Dick Long Ray D'Arcy Terry Tarver FFA 5.9 1964 Frank Sacherer Jeff Dozier
Lower Yosemite Falls, West Side 5.5 A3 II FA 1959 Herb Swedlund Errol Bohannon
Merry Old Ledge 5.9 A3 IV FA 1959 Warren Harding Gerry Czamanske
Middle Cathedral Rock, North Face 5.9 A4 V FA 1959 Chuck Pratt Bob Kamps Steve Roper
Rixon's Pinnacle, West Face 5.7 A3 III FA 1959 Tom Frost Bill Feuerer FFA 5.10c 1971 Pat Ament
Rostrum, The, West Base Route 5.8 A3 IV FA 1959 Gerry Czmanske Larry Wood FFA 5.10c 1960 Chuck Pratt John Fiske
Washington Column, East Face (Astroman) 5.9 A3 V FA 1959 Warren Harding Glen Denny Chuck Pratt FFA 5.11c 1975 John Bachar John Long Ron Kauk
Washington Column, East Face Route 5.10 A2 V FA 1959 Warren Harding Glen Denny Chuck Pratt
Arches Direct 5.8 A4 VI FA 1960 Royal Robbins Joe Fitschen
Camp 4 Terror 5.8 A4 V FA 1960 Bob Kamps Dave Rearick
Camp 4 Tree (Dynamo Hum) 5.5 A1 II FA 1960 Mort Hempel Bob Kamps FFA 1975 Tobin Sorenson John Long
Fifi Buttress 5.8 A3 III FA 1960 Dick McCracken Steve Roper
Inconsolable Buttress, The 5.7 A3 III FA 1960 Mark Powell Beverly Powell Dave Rearick
Kat Pinnacle, Southwest Corner 5.7 A3+ FA 1960 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost
Liberty Cap, West Corner 5.8 A2 FA 1960 Dick McCracken Steve Roper
Mt. Broderick, South Face 5.8 A3 IV FA 1960 Bob Kamps Joe Fitschen Chuck Pratt
Nevada Falls, Left Side 5.6 A4 II FA 1960 Royal Robbins Lin Ephraim
Pulpit Rock, East Face 5.7 A2 FA 1960 Dave Rearick Tom Frost FFA 5.10c 1986 Don Reid Ken Yager
Sentinel Rock, West Face 5.12b A0 FA 1960 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost
Aid Route 5.6 A3 II FA 1961 Joe Oliger Steve Roper FFA 5.11b 1967 Lloyd Price
Black Wall 5.9 A1 III FA 1961 Glen Denny Al McDonald
El Cap Tree Direct 5.9 A4 IV FA 1961 Glen Denny Frank Sacherer
El Capitan, East Ledges, West Side 5.6 A2 II FA 1961 Henry Kendall Bill Pope
Fin, The 5.7 A2 II FA 1961 Les Wilson Glen Denny FFA 5.11c 1974 John Long Jay WIlson
Half Dome, North Ridge 5.9 A2 III FA 1961 Chuck Wilts Royal Robbins FFA 5.10d R 1989 Walt Shipley John Harpole
Higher Cathedral Spire, North Couloir 5.8 A3 IV FA 1961 Dick Long Jim Wilson Ray D'Arcy Wally Reed
Higher Cathedral Spire, Northwest Face 5.8 A3 V FA 1961 Tom Frost Royal Robbins
Koko Ledge, Left 5.7 A1 I FA 1961 Bill Amborn Bob Klose FFA 5.10a 1968 Kevin Bein
Leaning Tower, West Face 5.7 C2F V FA 1961 Warren Harding Glen Denny Al Macdonald
Little John, Center 5.10d A3- FA 1961 Tom Frost Harry Daley
Lunch Ledge Direct (Space Case) 5.8 A4 IV FA 1961 Yvon Chouinard Wally Reed FFA 1976 Ray Jardine Linda McGinnis
Nevada Falls, Center Route 5.5 A2 II FA 1961 Bill Amborn Tom Naylor Steve Roper
Salathe Wall 5.9 C2 VI FA 1961 Royal Robbins Chuck Pratt Tom Frost FFA 5.13b 1988 Todd Skinner Paul Piana
Serenity Crack 5.7 A2 II FA 1961 Glen Denny Les Wilson FFA 5.10d 1967 Tom Higgins Chris Jones
Slab Happy Pinnacle, Center 5.9 A4 III FA 1961 Royal Robbins Tom Frost Harry Daley FFA 5.10d 1974 Vern Clevenger George Meyers Tom Carter
Space Case (Lunch Ledge Direct) 5.8 A4 IV FA 1961 Yvon Chouinard Wally Reed FFA 5.10c 1976 Ray Jardine Linda McGinnis
Swan Slab 5.6 A3 II FA 1961 Joe Oliger Steve Roper
Swan Slab Aid Route 5.6 A3 II FA 1961 Joe Oliger Steve Roper FFA 5.11a 1967 Loyd Price
West Corner 5.8 A3 III FA 1961 Bob Kamps Dave Rearick
Bear Rock, Southeast Face 5.4 A4 I FA 1962 Jim Harper Tony Qamar
Bishop's Balcony 5.5 A3 FA 1962 Frank Sacherer Gary Colliver
Chockstone Chimney 5.6 A2 IV FA 1962 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz Andrzej Ehrenfeucht Leif Patterson FFA 5.9 1976 Ray Jardine Mark Moore
Chouinard-Herbert 5.8 A2 V FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard TM Herbert FFA 5.11c 1976 John Long Pete Minks Eric Erickson
Delectable Pinnacle, Center Route 5.3 A3 I FA 1962 Art Gran Eric Beck FFA 5.11c R 1975 Dale Bard
Dihedral Wall 5.9 A3+ VI FA 1962 Ed Cooper Jim Baldwin Glen Denny
Diving Board - Sunshine Buttress 5.8 A1 III FA 1962 Dick Long Al Macdonald Jim Wilson
Flue, The 5.8 A2 III FA 1962 Warren Harding Bob Kamps FFA 1989 Elliot Robinson
Green Strip, The 5.7 A2 II FA 1962 Al Macdonald Les Wilson FFA 5.9 1965 Tom Higgins Mike Dent
Hanging Boulders, The 5.6 A3 III FA 1962 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz Andrzej Ehernfeucht
Hourglass, The, Left Side 5.8 A4 FA 1962 Bob Kamps Joe McKeown FFA 5.11a R 1971 Peter Haan Rick Linkert Mike Farrell
Koko Ledge, Continuation A4 FA 1962 Glenn Denny Frank Sacherer
La Escuela 5.5 A2 II FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard TM Herbert FFA 5.11b 1973 Steve Wunsch Mark Chapman
Limbo Ledge 5.8 A3 II FA 1962 Jim Baldwin Steve Roper FFA 5.10b 1975 Pete Livesey
Lower Cathedral Spire, Lower North Face 5.7 A2 IV FA 1962 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz
Lower Cathedral Spire, Upper North Face 5.9 A3 IV FA 1962 Galen Rowell Al Macdonald
Maxine's Wall 5.7 A3 II FA 1962 Les Wilson Al Macdonald FFA 5.10c 1973 Pete Livesey Andreas Maurer
North Dome, West Face Route 5.7 A2 II FA 1962 Art Gran Steve Roper FFA 5.8 1972 Peter Barton Mark Chapman
Pegasus (East Quarter Dome, North Face) 5.8 A3 V FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost FFA 5.12 1980 Max Jones Mark Hudon
Quarter Dome; North Face (Pegasus) 5.9 A2 V FA 1962 Yvon Chouinard Tom Frost FFA 5.12 1980 Max Jones Mark Hudon
Ribbon Falls, West Buttress 5.8 A3 IV FA 1962 Frank Sacherer Bob Kamps
Rostrum, The, The Regular North Face Route 5.9 A2 V FA 1962 Glen Denny Warren Harding FFA 5.11c 1985 Ron Kauk John Yablonski Kim Carrigan
Sentinel Rock, Direct North Face 5.9 A3 V FA 1962 Royal Robbins Tom Frost FFA 5.12a
Slab Happy Pinnacle, Left 5.8 A3 III FA 1962 Royal Robbins Jack Turner FFA 5.10d 1974 Mark Chapman Art Higbee
Turret, The 5.8 A2 IV FA 1962 Bob Kamps Mark Powell FFA 5.11 1973 Jim Donini John Bragg
Wendy 5.7 A1 II FA 1962 Frank Sacherer Bob Kamps FFA 5.9 1970 Kim Schmitz Marty Martin
Bridalveil Falls, East Buttress 5.8 A3 III FA 1963 Royal Robbins TM Herbert
Calf, The 5.8 A2 II FA 1963 Joe McKeown Jim Harper FFA 5.11c 1974 John Long
Carbon Wall, The 5.7 A3 III FA 1963 Glen Denny Roger Derryberry
El Capitan, West Buttress 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1963 Layton Kor Steve Roper
Half Dome, Direct Northwest Face 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1963 Royal Robbins Dick McCracken FFA 5.13c/d 1993 Todd Skinner Paul Piana
Hidden Chimney 5.7 A2 IV FA 1963 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz Andrzej Ehernfeucht
Lost Brother, Northwest Face 5.7 A2 IV FA 1963 Al Macdonald Jeff Dozier Dave French Gary Westernof FFA 5.10c 1972 Barry Bates Rik Rieder
Lower Cathedral Rock, West Face 5.8 A2 III FA 1963 Frank Sacherer Wally Reed
Misty Wall 5.11d A0 V FA 1963 Dick McCracken Royal Robbins FFA 1991 Walt Shipley Kevin Fosburg
Perhaps 5.10d A4 FA 1963 Bob Kamps Andy Lichtman
Pterodactyl Terrace, Right 5.5 A3 I FA 1963 Glen Denny Eric Beck FFA 5.11b 1975 Vern Clevenger
Rappel Chimney, The 5.7 A3 III FA 1963 Wolfgang Heinritz Les Wilson Leif Patterson Andrzej Ehrenfeucht
Ribbon Falls, West Portal 5.8 A3 IV FA 1963 Chris Fredericks Steve Roper
Rixon's Pinnacle, Direct South Face 5.11d A1 FA 1963 Glen Denny Gary Colliver
Rixon's Pinnacle, Far West 5.11 A1 FA 1963 Royal Robbins Dick McCracken
Sentinel Rock, Kor-Denny Route 5.9 A3 V FA 1963 Layton Kor Glen Denny
Slabs, The 5.6 A2 II FA 1963 Wolfgang Heinritz Andrzej Ehrenfeucht Les Wilson
Upper Yosemite Falls, East Side 5.9 A4 VI FA 1963 Dick McCracken Royal Robbins
Folly, The, Left Side 5.9 A3 FA 1964 Layton Kor Jim Bridwell
High Arc, The (Positively Intoxicated) A3 I FA 1964 Tom Cochrane FFA 5.11d 1981 Peter Mayfield Augie Klein
Mt. Watkins, South Face 5.8 A4 VI FA 1964 Warren Harding Yvon Chouinard Chuck Pratt FFA 5.13 Brooke Sandahl Steve Sutton
Negative Pinnacle, Left A3 FA 1964 Gary Colliver
North America Wall 5.8 A2 VI FA 1964 Tom Frost Yvon Chouinard Chuck Pratt Royal Robbins
Washington Column, South Face 5.8 C1 V FA 1964 Layton Kor Chris Fredericks
Bacchigaloupe Wall 5.9 A2 III FA 1965 Pete Spoecker Steve Herrero FFA 5.9 1981 Don Reid Greg Sonagere Alan Bartlett
Book of Revelations 5.9 A2 II FA 1965 Gordon Webster Chuck Ostin FFA 5.11a 1974 Bob Finn Chris Falkenstein
Flying Buttress Direct 5.9 A3 V FA 1965 Chris Fredericks Layton Kor
Gold Wall 5.10 A3 V FA 1965 Layton Kor Tom Fender
Inspiration Buttress 5.8 A3 IV FA 1965 Joe Faint Mike Borghoff
Min-Ne-Ah (Yosemite Point Southeast Face) 5.9 A3 V FA 1965 Gordon Webster TM Herbert FFA 5.11d 1990 Scott Cosgrove Walt Shipley
Muir Wall 5.9 A2 VI FA 1965 Yvon Chouinard TM Herbert
Rattlesnake Buttress 5.8 A2 III FA 1965 Layton Kor Fred Beckey FFA 5.11a 1982 Werner Braun Rick Cashner
Salami Ledge 5.7 A2 IV FA 1965 Les Wilson Wolfgang Heinritz FFA 5.10 1989 Tucker Tech
Yellow Corner (Turning Yellow) 5.7 A4 IV FA 1965 Layton Kor Tom Fender FFA 5.12a R 1992 Walt Shipley Tucker Tech
Yosemite Point, Southeast Face (Min-Ne-Ah) 5.9 A3 V FA 1965 Gordon Webster TM Herbert FFA 1990 Scott Cosgrove Walt Shipley
Cobra, The 5.9 A2 IV FA 1966 Mark Powell Bob Kamps FFA 5.11a R 1975 Tobin Sorenson Tim Sorenson
Direct Assistance Route 5.7 A4 IV FA 1966 Layton Kor John Hudson Dick Williams
Midwall 5.9 A4 V FA 1966 Tom Fender Kim Schmitz
Nevada Falls, Right Side 5.8 A1 II FA 1966 Al Steck Jim Wilson Dick Long
Psychedelic Wall 5.8 A4 V FA 1966 Ken Boche Dennis Hennek
Bad Wall 5.8 A4 V FA 1967 Jim Madsen Kim Schmitz
Crack-a-Go-Go 5.8 A2 II FA 1967 Harvey Carter Pete Pederson FFA 5.11c 1974 Pete Livesey Ron Fawcett
Dinner Ledge Direct 5.7 A4 IV FA 1967 Jim Madsen Kim Schmitz
Easter Egg, The 5.7 A1 FA 1967 Rob Foster Greg Schaffer
El Capitan, West Face 5.9 A4 VI FA 1967 TM Herbert Royal Robbins FFA 5.11c 1979 Ray Jardine Bill Price
Great Slab Route 5.8 A4 V FA 1967 Layton Kor Jim Madsen Kim Schmitz
Higher Cathedral Rock, East Face Route 5.10 A4 V FA 1967 Jim Bridwell Chris Fredericks
South Central 5.10a A2 V FA 1967 Jim Bridwell Joe Faint
Will-O'-The-Wisp 5.5 A1 II FA 1967 Jim Chamberlain Bob Grow
Firefall Face 5.8 A4 V FA 1968 Galen Rowell Warren Harding
Good Book, The (Right Side of the Folly) 5.8 A3 IV FA 1968 Warren Harding Tom Fender FFA 5.10d 1973 Dale Bard Jim Bridwell Kevin Worrall Ron Kauk
Higher Cathedral Rock, North Face 5.9 A4 V FA 1968 Chuck Pratt Dennis Hennek Yvon Chouinard Bob Kamps
Lost Arrow Spire, Direct 5.11 A3 V FA 1968 Warren Harding Pat Callis
Mosstrum, The 5.8 A3 III FA 1968 Bob Bauman Chuck Pratt Bruce Kumph
Nickel Pinnacle, East Face 5.8 A2 III FA 1968 Chuck Kroger Kep Stone
Shadyside Bench 5.8 A1 II FA 1968 Alan Gillespie Bill Nelson
Bircheff-Williams 5.8 A2 V FA 1969 Phil Bircheff Steve Williams FFA 5.11b 1973 Kevin Worrall George Meyers
Gobi Wall 5.8 A4 V FA 1969 Chuck Pratt Ken Boche
Half Dome, Northwest Buttress 5.7 A3 IV FA 1969 Andy Embick Bob Jensen
La Escuela Direct A4 FA 1969 Eric Beck Steve Williams
Liberty Cap, Southwest Face 5.10 A3 VI FA 1969 Galen Rowell Joe Faint Warren Harding
Moratorium, The 5.8 A2 III FA 1969 Bruce Price Bill Griffin Bob Edwards FFA 5.11b 1975 Pete Livesey Trevor Jones
Mud Flats 5.8 A3 II FA 1969 Kim Schmitz Don Peterson FFA 5.11d R 1984 Roger Greatrick Carl Jonasson
Nevada Falls, Slot Machine, The 5.5 A2 II FA 1969 Scott Baxter Lee Dexter
Prow, The 5.6 C2F V FA 1969 Royal Robbins Glen Denny
Symphony, The 5.9 A1 FA 1969 Chuck Ostin Tim Fitzgerald
Tis-sa-ack 5.10 A4 VI FA 1969 Royal Robbins Don Peterson
Triple Direct 5.8 C2 VI FA 1969 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz
West Quarter Dome, North Face 5.8 A3 IV FA 1969 Phil Koch Dave Goeddel
Arcturus 5.7 A4 VI FA 1970 Royal Robbins Dick Dorworth
BHOS Dome 5.8 A3 III FA 1970 Doug Scott TM Herbert Don Lauria Dennis Hennek
Galloping Consumption 5.9 A1 III FA 1970 Chuck Pratt Steve Roper FFA 5.11a 1987 Don Reid Alan Roberts
Half Dome, South Face Route 5.8 A4 VI FA 1970 Warren Harding Galen Rowell
Heart Route, The 5.9 A4 VI FA 1970 Chuck Kroger Scott Davis
Higher Cathedral Rock, Northeast Corner 5.8 A3 V FA 1970 Chuck Pratt Joe Kelsey
Higher Cathedral Spire, Southeast Side, Southeast Face 5.8 A3 III FA 1970 Keith Edwards Fred Cady FFA 5.10d 1989 Keith Reynolds Alvino Pon
In Cold Blood 5.8 A4 V FA 1970 Royal Robbins
New Dimensions 5.11 A1 III FA 1970 Mark Klemens Jim Bridwell FFA 5.11a 1972 Barry Bates Steve Wunsch
Parkline Slab; Direct Route 5.6 A3 III FA 1970 Jerry Anderson Bruce Price John Yates
Renegade, The (Stigma, The) 5.13 A3 FA 1970 Dennis Miller Brian Birmingham FFA 1986 Alan Watts
Stigma, The (The Renegade) 5.13 A3 FA 1970 Dennis Miller Brian Birmingham FFA 1986 Alan Watts
Teeter Tower 5.7 A1 III FA 1970 Jack Delk Bill Sorenson
Vain Hope 5.7 A3 V FA 1970 Royal Robbins Kim Schmitz Jim Bridwell
Via Sin Aqua 5.10 A2 V FA 1970 Rick Sylvester Bugs McKeith
Aquarian Wall 5.9 A4 VI FA 1971 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz
Eggplant, The A3 FA 1971 Kent Stokes John Svenson FFA 5.10b 1989 Walt Shipley Xavier Bongard
Fight or Flight (Lower Yosemite Falls, Right Side) 5.7 A3 FA 1971 John Svenson Kent Stokes FFA 1989 Kevin Fosburg Walt Shipley
Geek Towers, Right Side 5.10a A2 FA 1971 Mark Klemens Jim Bridwell
Heart Woute (Son of Heart) 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1971 Rick Sylvester Claude Wreford-Brown
Lower Yosemite Falls, Right Side (Flight or Fight) 5.7 A3 FA 1971 John Svenson Kent Stokes FFA 1989 Kevin Fosburg Walt Shipley
Route of All Evil 5.9 A4 V FA 1971 Matt Donohoe Cliff Jennings
Wall of Early Morning Light 5.7 A3 VI FA 1971 Warren Harding Dean Cadwell
Watermelon Rind 5.9 A3 V FA 1971 John Svenson Sharon Young Kent Stokes Bob Schneider
Abazaba 5.11c A3 FA 1972 Charlie Porter Walter Rosenthal FFA 1986 Scott Cosgrove Walt Shipley
Coffin Nail A3+ FA 1972 Charlie Porter
Cosmos 5.8 A4 VI FA 1972 Jim Dunn
Fatal Mistake 5.11a A1 IV FA 1972 Charlie Porter Walter Rosenthal FFA 1975 Dale Bard Werner Braun
Keel Haul 5.10 A3 VI FA 1972 Charlie Porter Walter Rosenthal
Magic Mushroom 5.10 A4 VI FA 1972 Hugh Burton Steve Sutton
Nashville Skyline 5.8 A3 V FA 1972 Charlie Porter Gary Bocarde
Sheba A4+ FA 1972 Charlie Porter
Shield, The (Salathe Start) 5.7 C4F VI FA 1972 Charlie Porter Gary Bocarde
Zodiac 5.7 A2 VI FA 1972 Charlie Porter FFA 5.13d 2003 Alex Huber Thomas Huber
Comedy of Folly 5.9 A4 V FA 1973 Rik Rieder
Mescalito 5.8 A3 VI FA 1973 Charlie Porter Hugh Burton Steve Sutton Chris Nelson
Miscreant Wall 5.9 A4 V FA 1973 Bruce Hawkins Keith Nannery
Tangerine Trip 5.8 A2 VI FA 1973 Charlie Porter John-Paul de St. Croix
Eagle Roof A1 FA 1974 Dave Diegleman Bill Price Augie Klein
Grape Race 5.9 A5 VI FA 1974 Charlie Porter Bev Johnson
Horse Chute 5.9 A3 VI FA 1974 Charlie Porter Hugh Burton
New Dawn 5.8 A3 VI FA 1974 Charlie Porter Yvon Chouinard Chuck Pratt Dennis Hennick Chris Jones
Electric Ladyland 5.10a A4 VI FA 1975 Gib Lewis Rick Accomazzo Richard Harrison
Excalibur 5.9 A3 VI FA 1975 Charlie Porter Hugh Burton
Lost World 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1975 C. Folsom Dave Anderson Mike Warburton
Mother Earth 5.11c A4 VI FA 1975 George Meyers John Long Kevin Worrall Mark Chapman Ron Kauk
Pacific Ocean Wall 5.9 A3 VI FA 1975 Jim Bridwell Billy Westbay Jay Fiske Fred East
Waterfall Route 5.10b A4 VI FA 1975 Daryle Teske T. Polk
Eagle's Way 5.8 A3 VI FA 1976 Mark Chapman Mike Graham Jim Orey
Lurking Fear 5.7 C2F VI FA 1976 Dave Bircheff Jim Pettigrew FFA 5.13/A0
Mirage 5.9 A4 VI FA 1976 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz Jim Pettigrew
Bushido 5.10 A4 VI FA 1977 Jim Bridwell Dale Bard
Dorn Direct (to Shield) 5.9 A4 VI FA 1977 Tony Yaniro Ron Olevsky
Hockey Night in Canada 5.10 A3 VI FA 1977 Darrell Hatten Bill Stern
New Jersey Turnpike 5.10 A4+ VI FA 1977 Bruce Hawkins Ron Kauk Dale Bard Hugh Burton
Skunk Crack 5.11b A1 FA 1977 Ray Jardine John Lakey
Wet Denim Daydream 5.6 C3F V FA 1977 Darrell Hatten Angus Thuermer
Bob Locke Memorial Buttress 5.11 A4 VI FA 1978 Jim Bridwell Ron Kauk John Long Kim Schmitz
Dorn's Crack 5.10c A0 FA 1978 Jack Dorn Jim Beyer Bob Sullivan
Hook, Line and Sinker 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1978 Mike Munger Angus Thurmer Steve Larson
Iron Hawk 5.9 A4 VI FA 1978 Dale Bard Ron Kauk
Negative Pinnacle, Center A4 FA 1978 Jim Beyer
Never Never Land 5.9 A4 VI FA 1978 Bruce Hawkins Mark Chapman
Sea of Dreams 5.9 A4 VI FA 1978 Jim Bridwell Dale Bard Dave Diegelman
Sunkist 5.9 A5 VI FA 1978 Bill Price Dale Bard
Tiger's Paw 5.10a A1 FA 1978 Don Reid Rick Cashner
Tribal Rite A4 VI FA 1978 Walter Rosenthal Tom Carter Dale Bard
Yosemite Point Buttress, Czech Route 5.10 A1 VI FA 1978 Jan Porvazik A. Behia
Zenith 5.8 A4 VI FA 1978 Jim Bridwell Kim Schmitz
Born Under A Bad Sign 5.10 A5 VI FA 1979 Bill Price Tim Washick
Derelict's Diagonal A4 FA 1979 Chuck Goldman Mathew Moore
Jolly Rodger 5.10 A5 VI FA 1979 Charles Cole Steve Grossman
Plume, The A2 FA 1979 Don Reid Chuck Goldmann
South Seas 5.8 A4 VI FA 1979 Bill Price Charlie Row Guy Thompson
More Balls then Brains A3- FA 1980 Dana Brown
Aurora 5.8 A4 VI FA 1981 Peter Mayfield Greg Child
Bulging Puke 5.9 A4 V FA 1981 Bill Russell Chris Friel
Chinese Water Torture 5.11 A4 VI FA 1981 Karl McConachie Jay Smith
Colony of Slippermen 5.11+ A1 FA 1981 Chris Cantwell Mark Grant
Mad Pilot 5.11b A1 FA 1981 Rob Rohn Peter Croft
Pink Banana 5.10d A1 FA 1981 Chris Cantwell Bruce Morris Mike Hernandez Donald Cantwell FFA 1987 Greg Murphy Nathan Robinson Elliot Robbinson
Sunblast 5.13a A2+ FA 1981 Don Reid Grant Hiskes FFA Dave Schultz
Wings of Steel 5.10+ A4 VI FA 1981 Richard Jensen Mark Smith
Zenyatta Mondatta 5.7 A4 VI FA 1981 Jim Bridwell Peter Mayfield Charlie Row
Higher Aspirations 5.8 A3 V FA 1982 Rik Derrick Steve Bosque
Lunar Eclipse 5.7 A4 VI FA 1982 John Barbella Steve Schneider
Mischief 5.8 A2 FA 1982 Marshall Ravenscroft Tim Kemple
Old A5 A3 FA 1982 Peter Chesko
Pacemaker 5.9 A4 VI FA 1982 Steve Bosque Mike Corbett Murray Barnett Jim Siler
Pink Pussycat A1 FA 1982 Don Reid Greg Sonagere
Silent Line 5.10c A1 V FA 1982 Rick Cashner Werner Braun
Squeeze Play 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1982 Mike Corbett Gary Edmondson Rich Albuschkat
Unemployment Line 5.9 A3 FA 1982 Alan Bartlett Jim May Steve Gerberding
Arctic Sea 5.10 A4 VI FA 1983 Tom Cosgriff Duane Raleigh
Buried Treasure 5.11a A0 FA 1983 Steve Schneider Rob Oravetz
Die Schweine Von Oben 5.11 A3+ VI FA 1983 Bill Russell Paul Fiola
Mideast Crisis 5.8 A4 V FA 1983 Steve Bosque Mike Corbett
Rainbow 5.10 A3 V FA 1983 Paul Fiola Chris Freel
Bad to the Bone 5.9+ A4 VI FA 1984 Jay Smith Lidija Painkiher
Bermuda Dunes 5.11c A4+ VI FA 1984 Steve Schneider John Barbella
Blockbuster 5.11c A1 FA 1984 Don Reid Grant Hiskes Dimitri Barton
Horse Play 5.9 A3 VI FA 1984 Steve Grossman Sue Harrington
Queen of Spades 5.9 A4 VI FA 1984 Charles Cole
Real Nose 5.10 A4 VI FA 1984 Charles Cole Steve Grossman
Roulette A5 FA 1984 Earl Redfern Tom Bepler
Skull Queen 5.8 C2 V FA 1984 Dave Altenburg Chuck Clance Steve Bosque
Time Machine A5+ VI FA 1984 Bob Shonerd
Wyoming Sheep Ranch 5.8 A4 VI FA 1984 Rob Slater John Barbella
Atlantic Ocean Wall 5.9 A4 VI FA 1985 John Middendorf John Barbella
Disco Strangler 5.10 A4 V FA 1985 Earl Redfern Tom Bepler Eric Brand
Dyslexia 5.10d A4 VI FA 1985 Ellie Hawkins
Learning to Crawl 5.9 A3+ V FA 1985 Mike Corbett Steve Bosque Fritz Fox
Liberty Cap, West Buttress 5.10 A3 V FA 1985 Mike Corbett Steve Bosque
Lost in America 5.10 A4 VI FA 1985 Randy Leavitt Greg Child
Mr. Midwest 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1985 Bill Russell Doug McDonald
Realm of the Flying Monkeys 5.10a A3 VI FA 1985 Steve Bosque Dan McDevitt
Space 5.10 A4 VI FA 1985 Charles Cole
Heading for Oblivion 5.10 A4+ VI FA 1986 Jim Beyer
Karma 5.11d A0 V FA 1986 Dave Schultz Ken Yager Jim Campbell
Local Motion 5.11d A1 FA 1986 Doug McDonald Werner Braun
On the Waterfront 5.9 A5 VI FA 1986 Steve Bosque Mike Corbett Gwen Schneider
Same as it Never Was 5.11b A4 VI FA 1986 Jay Smith Karl McConachie Randy Grandstaff
Yosemite Pointless 5.9 A3 V FA 1986 Bob Ost Norman Boles
Battlescar 5.11d A1 FA 1987 Ed Barry Doug MacDonald
Big Chill, The 5.9 A4 VI FA 1987 Jim Bridwell Peter Mayfield Sean Plunkett Steve Bosque
Floating Lama 5.11c A1 FA 1987 Doug McDonald
Heartland 5.10 A4+ VI FA 1987 John Barbella Eric Brand
Luminescent Wall 5.10b A4 VI FA 1987 John Barbella Walt Shipley
Native Son 5.9 A4 VI FA 1987 Walt Shipley Troy Johnson
Scorched Earth 5.11 A5 VI FA 1987 Randy Leavitt Rob Slater
Ten Days After 5.8 A3 VI FA 1987 John Barbella Eric Brand
Bad Seed 5.9 A4+ VI FA 1988 Bill Russell Troy Johnson
Central Scrutinizer 5.11c A4+ VI FA 1988 Steve Grossman Jay Ladin
Escape From Freedom 5.11c A1 VI FA 1988 Urmas Franosch Bruce Morris
For Your Eyes Only (Octopussy) 5.9 A3 VI FA 1988 Dan McDevitt Sue McDevitt
Horney/Johnson 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1988 Jeff Hornibrook Troy Johnson
Love Without Anger 5.8 A3 V FA 1988 Steve Bosque Rich Albuschkat
Morality Check 5.10 A0 FA 1988 Tucker Tech Pete Takeda
Old A2 A2 FA 1988 Dana Brown Jeff Perrin
Timbuktu Left 5.10 A3 VI FA 1988 Franco Perlotto
Turkey Shoot 5.9 A3 V FA 1988 Ken Yager Steve Bosque
Via Sin Liquor 5.9 A4 VI FA 1988 Eric Kohl Alan Humphrey
White Room, The 5.10 A4 VI FA 1988 Sean Plunkett Walt Shipley
Aqua Vulva (Route 66) 5.10 A4 VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl John Middendorf
Bananarama 5.10a A3 V FA 1989 Rich Albuschkat Steve Bosque Murray Barnett
Dante's Inferno 5.9 A3+ VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl
Flashback 5.8 A3 V FA 1989 Steve Bosque Rich Albuschkat
Genesis 5.11b A4 VI FA 1989 Doug Englekirk Eric Brand
High Plains Dripper 5.11 A5 VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl Alan Humphrey
Jet Stream, The 5.9 A4 VI FA 1989 Sean Plunkett Bill Russell
Kali Yuga, The 5.10 A4 VI FA 1989 Walt Shipley John Middendorf
Promised Land, The 5.10 A4 VI FA 1989 Kevin Fosburg Jeff Hornibrook Troy Johnson
Reach for the Sky 5.11 A4+ VI FA 1989 Jim Beyer
Shadows A5 VI FA 1989 Jim Bridwell Cito Kirkpatrick Charlie Row Billy Westbay
Toxic Waste Dump 5.8 A3+ VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl
Wheel of Torture 5.7 A4 VI FA 1989 Eric Kohl
Affliction, The 5.11d A0 V FA 1990 Walt Shipley Scott Cosgrove
Ecstacy of Gold, The 5.10 A3 VI FA 1990 Eric Rassmussen Doug Olmstead
Fantasy Island 5.13b A0 FA 1990 Dave Schultz
Highway to Hell 5.9 A5 VI FA 1990 Garbor Berecz Thomas Tivadar
Hole World 5.10 A4 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl
Ice Age 5.9 A5 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl
Pressure Cooker 5.10 A4 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl
Re-Animator 5.8 A3 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl Walt Shipley
Saddam Hussein 5.9 A4 V FA 1990 Eric Brand Stewart Irving
Shortest Straw, The 5.7 A4 VI FA 1990 Rick Lovelace
Surgeon General 5.9 A5 VI FA 1990 Eric Kohl Walt Shipley
Crystal Cyclone A4+ VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Hole in the Sky 5.10b A3 VI FA 1991 Kevin Fosburg Paul Turecki
Plastic Surgery Disaster 5.8 A5 VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Reckless Abandon 5.8 A4+ VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Solar Power Arete 5.10a A3+ VI FA 1991 Kevin Fosburg Paul Turecki
Winds of Change 5.10 A5 VI FA 1991 Richard Jensen
World of Pain 5.8 A5 VI FA 1991 Eric Kohl
Chief, The 5.11b A1 V FA 1992 Al Swanson Arthur James Foley III Brian Warshow
Electric Ocean 5.10 A4 VI FA 1992 Eric Kohl
Get Wacked 5.10 A5 VI FA 1992 Eric Kohl
Jesus Built My Hotrod 5.8 A4 V FA 1992 Eric Kohl Eric Rasmussen
Lost Again 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1992 Eric Kohl
Prism, The 5.10 A3+ VI FA 1992 Urmas Franosch Sean Plunkett
Southern Man 5.8 A2 V FA 1992 Francis Ross Rich Albushkat
Virginia 5.7 A3 VI FA 1992 Chuck Clance Steve Bosque
Ashes to Ashes A4 V FA 1993 Eric Rasmussen Chris Purnell
Flight of the Albatross 5.8 A3 VI FA 1993 John Middendorf Will Oxx
Freaks of Nature 5.11c A0 FA 1993 Mike McGrale Cary Hansen Jeff Snedden
Kaos 5.7 A4 VI FA 1993 Steve Gerberding Dave Bengston
Express Checkout 5.8 A5 VI FA 1993 Eric Kohl
Tempest A4 VI FA 1993 Jeff Hornibrook Brad Jarret Price Lloyd
Adrift 5.11 A3+ VI FA 1995 Steve Quinlan Paul Pritchard
Reticent Wall 5.7 A5 VI FA 1995 Steve Gerberding Scott Stowe Laurie Stowe
When Hell was in Session 5.9 A5 VI FA 1995 Eric Kohl Pete Takeda
Reason Beyond Insanity 5.7 A4 VI FA 1995 Sean Easton Dave Sheldon
Abstract Expressionist A5 VI FA 1996 Eric Kohl
Continental Drift 5.9 A4 VI FA 1997 Steve Gerberding Kevin Thaw Conrad Anker
History of the Future A3 III FA 1997 Bryan Law
Hurricane Jingus 5.9 A4 VI FA 1997 Eric Kohl Bryan Law
Lost in Translation 5.6 A4+ V FA 1997 Chris McNamara Chris Ewing
Sad State of Afairs, A 5.7 A3 V FA 1997 Eric Rasmussen Mike Zawaski
Sargantana 5.9 A5 VI FA 1997 Pep Mesip Silvia Vidal
Blue Shift 5.11b A4 VI FA 1997 Jay Smith Karl McConachie
Disorderly Conduct 5.9 A5 VI FA 1998 Warren Hollinger Miles Smart Bart Groendycke
El Nino 5.13c A0 VI FA 1998 Alex Huber Thomas Huber
Girdle Traverse 5.10 A4 VI FA 1998 Chris McNamara Mark Melvin
Heavy Metal and Tinker Toys 5.9 A5 VI FA 1998 Jim Bridwell Tyson Hausdoerffer Boulos Ayad
It's So Awful PDK+ VI FA 1998 Eric Kohl
Ned's Excellent Adventure A4 VI FA 1998 Warren Hollinger Bryan Law
Nightmare on California St. 5.8 A4+ VI FA 1998 Warren Hollinger Grant Gardner
Sky is Falling 5.10 A? VI FA 1998 Eric Kohl Bryan Law
Allied Forces 5.9 A3 VI FA 1999 Steve Gerberding Al Swanson Mark Bowling Odd Roar Wilk
Dark Star 5.10 A5 VI FA 1999 Jim Bridwell Giovani Groaz
Every Man for Himself A4 VI FA 1999 Steve Gerberding Scott Stowe Mark Bowling
Gulf Stream 5.9 A4 VI FA 1999 Steve Gerberding Jay Smith
Life on the Dark Side 5.6 A3 IV FA 1999 Bryan Law Ammon McNeely
Passage to Freedom 5.13c A0 VI FA 1999 Leo Houlding Jose Pereyra
Summerland 5.8 A3 VI FA 1999 Bryan Law Roger Strong
Cataclysmic Mega Sheer 5.11d A2 VI FA 2000 Eric Kohl Bryan Law
Laughing at the Void 5.9 A3 V FA 2000 Jerry Anderson Sigrid Anderson Lynnea Anderson
Slacker's Toil 5.8 A4 VI FA 2001 Jim Beyer
Escaoe From Tora Bora A2 VI FA 2002 Eric Kohl
Great Disgrace, The 5.9 A3+ VI FA 2002 Jon Blair Jeff Hornibrook Bryan Kay
Persian Gulf 5.9 A3+ V FA 2002 Jon Blair Mark Garbarini
Tora Bora 5.9 A3+ V FA 2002 Josh Thompson Bryan Kay
Martyr's Brigade 5.11 A5 VI FA 2002 Jim Beyer
Jose Memorial Variation 5.7 A3+ VI FA 2003 Ammon McNeely Gabe McNeely Austin McNeely
Quo Vadis 5.9 A4+ VI FA 2003 Jacek Czyz
Reign in Blood PDK VI FA 2003 Eric Kohl
Wild Apes 5.9 A3 VI FA 2003 Mark Garbarini Jon Blair Bryan Kay
Witching Hour PDK VI FA 2003 Eric Kohl
climbs not used:
40 oz of Freedom 5.10 A3 V FA
Cookie Continuation A0 FA
Delectable Pinnacle, Aid Route A3- FA
Gold Ribbon 5.10 A3 VI FA
In Justice for All PDK VI FA Eric Kohl
Joint Adventure, A 5.9 A3+ IV FA
Lehamite Buttress 5.6 A2 FA
Liberty Cap, Direct Southwest Face 5.10 A5 V FA Rick Cashner Werner Braun
Lower Cathedral Rock, North Face 5.9 A3 V FA
Notch Route 5.7 A1 I FA FFA 5.10b R 1966 Royal Robbins
Old A3 A3+ FA
Ribbon Falls, East Portal 5.9 A4 V FA
Ring of Fire A5 VI FA Richard Jensen Mark Smith
Riptide A4 FA
Round em' up A3 FA
Shack 5.10 A3+ VI FA Sean Plunkett
Soul Shakedown 5.11 A4 VI FA Urmas Franosch Sean Plunkett
Tenaya's Terror 5.9 A4 VI FA Mike Corbett Steve Bosque
Vodka Putsch, The 5.10 A4 VI FA Bill Russell Pete Takeda
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lars johansen
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Roy et al-
Chuck Clance has an article in Climbing #260 October '07 describing his epic on the second ascent of Pacemaker. Bad weather no food the works. Not quite the epic that Bosque, Middendorf, and Corbett had on the South Face of Half Dome, but entertaining nonetheless.
Best
lars
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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my winter project will be going through AAJ and adding route information from that source...
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steelmnkey
climber
Vision man...ya gotta have vision...
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Ed - let me know if you want some help with the project. Have a pretty vast library to draw from. Maybe I could help with route references from climbing mags? Will help however you can use it, just let me know.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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steelmnky,
the AAJ is online, so I can actually access that... but I don't have a complete set of Climbing, or Rock & Ice or Mountain, or Summit. If I had those references I'd add them in a "Journals" column in the database.
Also, some of the missing route info, and actually missing routes, are in the rags, so that information would add to the database.
I wouldn't ask you to do it, I become obsessed beyond reason when I am in that mode, but if you provided the information I'd add it to the spread sheet!
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steelmnkey
climber
Vision man...ya gotta have vision...
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Ed I hear ya. Totally your project. Just offering whatever I can help with. It's a huge job. I have most of the mags including Climbing, R&I, Mountain, Summit and Off Belay.
If you get me the latest spreadsheet (add the appropriate column), we can go from there. Maybe think about a format you want to use (eg. Magazine, Issue #, Page # ) or something so it will be right when I put it in.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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steelmnky - no problem with everyone working on it! I don't consider it "my" project as it is the work of a lot of people, the climbers, the guidebook writers, you all looking at it and sending comments in...
...I just wouldn't wish on you the same sort of mania that visits me when I'm working on it!
Here are two plots. The number of climbs per decade in four categories: All, Aid FAs, FFAs, and FAs that were initially "free".
the decade of the 70s was the first one where the majority of the FAs were put up free with no aid.
EDIT: note that the "decade" labels mark the upper end of the decade...
Here's another way of looking at it, the fraction of the three catagories ("all" is removed, but I could put "unknown" there...)
The rise and fall of Aid FA's is evident, the decade of the 60s being the largest aid FA decade so far.
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steelmnkey
climber
Vision man...ya gotta have vision...
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Hey Ed, I'm the same way, so lemme know... sooner the better. I'm kind of in between my own maniac projects right now.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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This is getting richer by the moment...
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Hey Steelmnkey,
Per Kevin's suggestion on the freeclimbing evolution, perhaps you'd be interested in scanning a couple articles to extend the big wall free trajectory beyond what I posted about Hudon & Jones from Mountain Magazine?
Maybe check these for some pertinent articles:
(not sure if feature articles complemented the cover shots)
The first: Climbing #88, Skinner Piana/Salathe
The second: Climbing #110, Huber Bros on Salathe
Also, the Clance/Pacemaker item noted by Lars would be suave...
I had these issues, but tossed them prior to my Supertopo tenure...
(I've been scanning at 700 wide and about 225KB per page, to get good print read)
cover pics from:
http://www.climbing.com/photo-video/gallery/coverarchive/
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Warbler - I'll see what I can do, the graphs get complicated quickly but I have some ideas... but tomorrow I'm in Tuolumne Meadows...
here's the routes per year stuff we talked about earlier
Yosemite Valley FA's per year
and one on grades in the Valley
5.14 does NOT exist"
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Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
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The graphs kind of look like the oil reserve stats. Maybe we're past "peak rock!"
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Well done SteelMonk!!!
Now we have the trifecta of Salathe free articles well in hand.
('Can't believe I tossed those two key issues, um I mean... recycled them...what a Weenis)
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B-Dog
Trad climber
LOUISIANA
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Get some real climbing on the front page...bump! Props to the old school hardmen!
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hobo_dan
Social climber
Minnesota
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Total history lesson complete with nerd graphs!
I was in Hood River a few years back and i made it a point to look up Mark Hudon and tell him how great and inspirational those articles were: State of the Art Art of the States and Long Hard and Free
It may have been the only (the last time)time i was able to say I was proud to be an American
murf
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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bump another good climbing thread.
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TrundleBum
Trad climber
Las Vegas
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Oct 31, 2013 - 02:30pm PT
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Bump
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Larry Nelson
Social climber
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Nov 16, 2013 - 07:33am PT
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BBST: The best stories, photos and links. Thanks guys.
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Feb 16, 2014 - 06:37pm PT
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Bump
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Feb 21, 2014 - 03:04pm PT
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Bumping this again.
Coz, I hear you're looking for climbing threads?
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Mar 31, 2014 - 03:21am PT
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Bump!!!
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wstmrnclmr
Trad climber
Bolinas, CA
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What a great thread! Be great to catch the history of Valley climbing back up to the present from where this left off seeing as how climbers like Caldwell and Honnold have brought the focus back. Thoughts like how free soloing has become front and center and the differences between where/how sport climbing (which focused a lot more on bringing the physical)has been adapted to allow a more mental (i.e. free soloing at a higher physical level)approach to a higher level. And the explosion of bouldering and where that has taken climbing as well. It's interesting that the hardest physical climbs are not in the valley but that free soloing has brought the focus back to the valley. The how's and why's would be very interesting to hash out.
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gern
Boulder climber
santa cruz
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was just gandering at some posts a saw that pigs in space was thought to not have a second. wrong i guess. i did it with tracy and jay back in hell i guess 89ish. good route. lots of history on that route and that others like kohl and harding ventured that way. at least tracy thought so. hard to ask him tho. who knows where he may be. jay is 6 feet under and dorton god help him is somewhere better. jt
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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BBST, baby.
Get yer mind off yer loser football team, heh.
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Gnome Ofthe Diabase
climber
Out Of Bed
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AWE COME ON I DID NOT EVEN GET TO READ THE POST PLEASE, RE post the article or a Link,
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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The article was the 80s not 70s
Sorry
Rolling Stone Magazine
April 28, 1983
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Gnome Ofthe Diabase
climber
Out Of Bed
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wow!
THANK YOU I NEVER SAW The Rolling Stone Article BEFORE
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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"Hobohemian."
+1, SLR.
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ß Î Ø T Ç H
Boulder climber
ne'er–do–well
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Nov 26, 2016 - 11:40pm PT
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bump
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Nov 28, 2016 - 07:00am PT
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Crucial historic bump!
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