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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 28, 2009 - 09:57pm PT
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And the third biggest surge of Temple Crag FAs was by Clyde from 1926 to 1931.
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drljefe
climber
Old Pueblo, AZ
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Mar 28, 2009 - 09:59pm PT
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Thanks for all this DR, and the routes too!
This is perfect kindling for the fire under my ass!
Cannot wait for some fall Sierra.
Shall we go.....
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 28, 2009 - 10:02pm PT
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...Through the transitive nightfall of diamonds
Now my 15-year-old is listening to The Dead. How cool is that? We've got Tix for the Shorline show on his birthday, right after we ski down off a new variation of the Sierra High Route in May.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Mar 28, 2009 - 11:00pm PT
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One man gathers what another man spills........Thanks for the details, Doug!
That old Dead especially the Skullf*#k album (Live Dead) is timeless stuff.
A couple of mood shots from around then....
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 28, 2009 - 11:42pm PT
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The old neighborhood. I lived 3 blocks from the Dead the winter of 68-69. Right off the Panhandle of Golden Gate Park. Sunday afternoons they would pull a flatbed out into the panhandle, plug into someone's apartment and people would come out to dance.
In the fall of '66 one of their first gigs as the Dead was playing for the opening of The North Face. It started out as just one store, in North Beach between two strip clubs. Kool Aid was served. I spent the evening leaning on Pig Pen's organ watching him play. Miss the bluesy funk he added to the mix -- he was the first one to go.
Good mornin' little schoolgirl...
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drljefe
climber
Old Pueblo, AZ
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Mar 28, 2009 - 11:44pm PT
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If ever there was a worthy thread drift...
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 29, 2009 - 01:22am PT
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One man's worthy...
I agree, of course. But it's equally likely that everyone else drifted off to parts of the party where they can relate, leaving you and Steve and me in the corner humming along to One more Saturday nite...which it happens to be.
I was thinking about this drift too, actually, but from a slightly different angle. Ready? Catch my drift...
I just finished putting together a presentation to take to Mammoth next week. It's about my ski tour of the John Muir Trail in the spring of 1970. Thirty-nine years ago tonight I would have been camped around Glen Pass, right by a bit of open water under Fin Dome.
This comes back around, really. See, I'm going there to talk to a bunch of academic historians of skiing. From all over the world they're coming to Mammoth to talk ski history, so I'm going to give em a little backcountry. No idea if they even care, really. The subjects of their own talks don't run that direction. But someone thought it would be cool to bring in locals, so I'm going there to be history.
Token old fart -- who knows? It's part of the intrigue. But it all got me to thinking like a historian. What really influenced me as a skier? And what as a person, that led to my switchbacking up from Whitney Portal into the wild snow when I was 25? It was the best expedition of my life, the next 36 days.
So remember upthread that I mentioned Don's 3-foot skis with permanent skins? He was hardly an influence, but Norman Clyde was. Little-known fact: Orland Bartholomew, who soloed the first ski tour along the Muir Trail in 1928-29, invited Clyde along. Norman didn't think he was a good enough skier. Yet. But it wasn't long before he admitted that his quiver contained not only six-foot skis, but also a five-foot pair "for doing christiania swings down the steep gullies."
Think for a moment about those climbs in August 1931 we've been talking about. Dawson and Eichorn were the hot Valley boys, but just kids. I'm sure Clyde was mentoring them, just as I'm sure he was setting the agenda of climbs for the group. Well those city kids turned out to be tight partners with the Berkeley group, the Cragmont Climbing Club that became the nucleus of the Sierra Club RCS. There were only about eight of them, including David Brower, Richard Leonard, and Alex Hildebrand. All of whom, as the Thirties progressed, became California's leading ski mountaineers.
 Stop to pour myself a drink. One more Saturday night --
This gets to be fun talking to you guys about this, and not because of any kind of Deadhead Brah thing, but because unlike my historians I know you actually care about where our California climbing -- and BC skiing -- thing came from, and are actually tracking the players. This next jump is a good one.
WW II came along, and those CA climbers and ski mountaineers became the core of the 10th Mountain Division, teaching the instructors, designing the gear -- and writing the military operations manual. Conveniently, in 1942 they had already published the Sierra Club's Manual of Ski Mountaineering, which they flipped into an Army Operations Manual.
The Manual of Ski Mountaineering was my first climbing textbook. And BC skiing too, since I took up both at the same time early in my teens. For my presentation I copied out all the inspiring b+w photos from it including the Palisades and especially Rock Creek Canyon.
So without ever meeting them, I was indirectly mentored by David Brower and that whole Berkeley crew. I did meet Clyde, and got direct transmission as from a Zen Master. After being raised on those photos of Rock Creek, Clyde personally recommended it as the finest ski canyon on the Eastside, and by the time of Terrapin Station I was living up there winters. (My summer canyon was still the Palisades, of course.)
Then I thought I'd have a little fun with the academics. So I expanded to cultural influences. Kerouac and On the Road and Neal Cassady who was Kerouac's model for Dean Moriarity and I think the pivotal person of the whole Beat era. Now I'm on a roll, and out comes Gary Snyder, who worked trail crew in the Valley and the high country and became the hero of Kerouac's The Dharma Bums.
Next I throw in the Dead, a portrait of Albert Hoffman, the chemist who synthesized LSD, and a blow-up of a fat bud.
I mean truly, all those things followed me out of the Haight and had as much influence as Clyde and Brower on the guy who found himself switchbacking up out of Whitney Portal on that nice March day in 1970.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Mar 29, 2009 - 02:18am PT
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Wherever you go....there you are!
I defintely groove on the turns that you are linking.......
Brower was grooving on that mountain blend of grand alpinism and that book with all the enticing imagery sure made me want to get on the bus!
A pipe-full of the Brower blend....
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 29, 2009 - 02:34am PT
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Mar 29, 2009 - 02:51am PT
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Goin where the wind don't blow so strange,
Maybe off on some high cold mountain chain.....
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guido
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Mar 29, 2009 - 02:53am PT
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You boys are burning the midnight oil tonight.
Doug the Scanner Man, circa 1973?
Keep then rolling Doug. Or should I say keep rolling them?
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Mar 29, 2009 - 02:59am PT
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A fascinating thread - thanks!
The thread on Albert Hofmann is at http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.html?topic_id=585940 DR might be interested to know that I've been to Øverbø, the birthplace of Sondre Norheim in Telemark. I'll try to find, scan and post a photo tomorrow.
I wonder if anyone from my corner of the world will be at the ski history conference? Lots of backcountry history to be found hereabouts.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Mar 29, 2009 - 03:13am PT
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Any Don Jensen stories, Guido?
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johntp
Trad climber
socal
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Mar 29, 2009 - 09:09pm PT
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Back to page one. Thanks to all for this.
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 29, 2009 - 09:36pm PT
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Anders,
I passed right by Telemark without a moment to go to the museum, which I hear is really good. Kids and schedules... I can't complain though, cuz we were coming from a week in the Lofoten Islands. Perfect weather, no less.
I'll scan the ski history event for your countrymen and report back. Is "Jackrabbit" still the secret password?
Truth be told I'm slightly afraid that their historical interest may stop at the ski area's out-of-bounds ropes, so I have structured my presentation to tweak any preconceptions that run toward the lifts. Should be interesting, and they are staging longboard races!
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Mar 29, 2009 - 10:14pm PT
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Doug,
You could easily tie Sierra adventure skiing and its traditions to European terrain and travel skiing. The ski mountaineering game started there and I would hope interest in the non-competitive aspects of skiing and the mountains ala Messner remain strong.
Audacious outings like Maysho's ultralight trans-Sierra solo dovetail right in with the technical backcountry chute skiing. It has been a traditional four season range with reasonably benevolent weather. Muir ,Brower, Clyde and yourself have made the effort to live in hoarfrost, wind and storm in order to get another fresh perspective. The more elemental side of the pursuit.
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 29, 2009 - 10:30pm PT
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the more elemental side...
I like that.
Maysho, check. He loaned me a nice photo. Dude rips on his skating skis.
Muir -- He barely got on skis once, that I can find, at Tahoe in later years. I'm guessing it was just to humor some high rollers and not really his thing. Worth a mention, tho, so he's in there.
Clyde, check. See above rant, one of them.
Brower, check. Also see above.
Marty Hornick, check. He worked for years shaving down his own record from Rock Creek to Mammoth. Totally non-competitive. I don't think anyone else ever joined him or bid against him. I guided it once in 6 days. Marty -- 8:34
And of course the usual steep stuff: Landry skiing Mendel Right at a measured 55 degrees. (I used to carry a clinometer -- measured all those gullies. Bottom of the U-Notch is only 38 degrees, but the top rolls up to 50.)
Personally I love the old Euro boys who first began adapting the literally "Nordic" skiing from Scandinavia to the Alps = "Alpine" skiing. I like showing slides of Mattias Zdharsky all proper in white shirt, tie and sports coat demo-ing a stem turn. But I left all that out this time. I suspect the history guys are somewhat familiar with that progression, and I'm zeroed in on what happened in the Sierra. I only have 20 minutes...
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Mar 29, 2009 - 10:33pm PT
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I just finished putting together a presentation to take to Mammoth next week. It's about my ski tour of the John Muir Trail in the spring of 1970.
Just what is it that I need to do to get you to come to Boulder to deliver this pearl?
Gary Neptune loves ski mountaineering stuff.
His customers will snuggle right up to it I can assure you...
Perhaps the long version?
We can conspire via e-mail.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Mar 29, 2009 - 10:37pm PT
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I mentioned Muir more in the spirit of winter mountaineering than skiing. He had to have used snowshoes!
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 29, 2009 - 10:43pm PT
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I'd love to do that, Tar. Thank you for asking. I did a show there once, I forget what. Oh -- it was my book tour. Nice venue, good audience, Gary is a prince.
And then there's his museum. "You will be issued a drool cup at the door..."
But be careful what you wish for. I once did a ski show that took three trays of slides... Longboard racing alone took half a tray.
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