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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Original Post - Nov 2, 2009 - 06:24pm PT
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The recent re-posting of the thread on one of my all-time favorite crags--Poko-Moonshine--and the new post on Paul Preuss have spurred me to start a thread on another one of the perhaps little-known, or at least under-appreciated, "great ones". John Turner was a man who was well ahead of his time in the difficulty of the routes he established, the style in which he established them, and in his attitude towards climbing and training. During a brief period from the mid-1950s into the early '60s Turner established a series of routes primarily in eastern Canada and the northeast US, many of which remain as well-respected classics today.Turner was a doctor who lived in eastern Canada roughly from 1956-62. He reportedly moved there to avoid having to do National Service (the draft) back in the U.K. Previously,he had climbed at Oxford, and was reportedly one of the first to repeat some of the classic routes put up by Joe Brown and Don Whillans and their compatriots in the Rock and Ice Club. Once established in North America, he began an amazing new routeing spree.On many crags he would establish routes that were several full grades harder than any of the previously established routes(not that routes in this area were graded by any system recognizable today), while on others (such as Poko)he would be the first to put up any routes. During this period most climbers in this part of the continent approached climbing in a very conservative manner, but Turner was famous (infamous to some)for his bold, often run-out climbs and spectacular (sometimes limb-breaking)falls. Many of his routes achieved a fearsome reputation in subsequent years, a few lasting about a decade until they were finally repeated. Routes such as The Joke(5.9) and Sweet Dreams(5.8) (Bon Echo, Ontario);Bloody Mary(5.9),Positive Thinking(5.9) The Cooler(5.8+, R)(Poko); Partition (5.9 but originally graded 5.7)(Giant's Washbowl, also in the 'Dacks); Recompense(5.9), Remission(5.8 but really 5.9R), and Repentence (5.9+ or 5.10c--depending on which guidebook)(Cathedral Ledge,N.H.) are just some of his still highly regarded first ascents. The latter(FA, 1958) is a candidate for the "first 5.10"--though classic New England undergrading (beware 5.9+s!!!!)has kept it out of the limelight. Perhaps Turner's best known route to the general climbing population is the 50 Classic NE Ridge of Bugaboo Spire, though far from his hardest climb. He was equally famous for his very thick eyeglasses(it is reported that some of his most difficult FAs were the result of his getting lost because of his poor eyesight, but since most take obvious lines this is unlikely) and intenseive training--primarily weightlifting. Turner moved back to the UK in 1962 and largely gave up climbing (though he was involved in several recorded FAs on the Cornish seacliffs)taking up The Hunt instead. But he left behind an amazing lagacy of climbs done in a pure, bold style that set a standard for future generations of climbers. I know that many of us who began climbing in the northeast in the'60s and '70s had it as a goal to climb the Turner routes on any of the crags we visited--a quest undetaken with not a little bit of trepidation.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Gotta go with you on this one Al. That guy was quietly putting up sandbag routes at about the same time the "Golden Age" Yosemite crowd was taking credit for the first 5.9 and 5.10 climbs. Some of Turner's 5.9s are a wee bit harder than the "Open Book."
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MH2
climber
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The first name I remember hearing associated with the grim epithet, "unrepeated."
Also, later, I heard that many succeeding generations brought forward occasional unwary specimens who failed to understand the implications of calling a climb, "The Joke."
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Nice. google yields an article in a 2007 newsletter of the Alpine Club of Canada - Toronto Section: "John Turner: Life and Climbs" by Kit Moore:
http://www.climbers.org/files/newsletter_2007-04.pdf
Here's the article text and one of the photos:
John Turner leading on UK gritstone
(Valkyrie at Froggat Edge - 1953) Photo: John Peacock
John Turner : Life and Climbs, by Kit Moore
For many years, I’ve been impressed - and terrified - by any routes put up by John Turner.
Turner spent seven years climbing in North America during the 1950s and 1960s,
and had a knack of finding lines that look impossible, seem impossible while you’re climbing them,
and yet are possible for mere mortals like myself.
In his short stay here, Turner accomplished more than most of us do in a lifetime of climbing.
Laura and Guy Waterman, in their excellent book, Yankee Rock & Ice, described Turner as,
“an isolated comet flashing across northeastern skies and then disappearing”.
The Watermans credited Turner with the best rockclimb (Recompense, in New Hampshire),
hardest single climb (Repentance, also in New Hampshire)
and boldest lead (Bloody Mary, at Pok-omoonshine),
and considered him the most important climber in the northeastern US during the 1950s.
A few years ago, I wrote an article on a favourite Turner climb, Sweet Dreams at Bon Echo, in which I asked where John Turner was,
and ended by saying “Thank you, John Turner, wherever you are.”
A year later I was surprised to hear from Turner, who confirmed that he was indeed alive,
but that he had “retired from riding to hounds . . . and his revels now are ended”.
While he was sad to hear that Sweet Dreams’ crux piton had been replaced by a vaguely immoral bolt,
he was glad to know that we still enjoy his route, which remains one of his favourites from the past.
My efforts to reply to his email were unsuccessful, so we decided to put the full text of his email in the Bon Echo guidebook,
and hoped to hear from him again.
More time went by, then I received this email, “Hi Kit: Have been trying to contact you for some three years . . .
If you would like some notes on the first ascent of Sweet Dreams, and a photograph, let me know. Yours, John Turner”.
This time we made contact, and I learned more about the Turner era in North America.
In our correspondence, John began by sending me a Sweet Dreams first ascent photo, showing the third of five climbers who made the first ascent in 1960 - our best guess is that this man is Alf Muehlbauer.
The other three following John Turner were Brian Rothery, Erwin Hodgson and Dick Strachan.
As for the route name, “Erwin effectively named the climb. It took until Dick arrived for him to recover his breath, exclaiming ‘That was a bloody nightmare!’
He was out-voted four to one.” Thus the name Sweet Dreams.
Other route names came to light during our correspondence.
One of the Dacks’ best routes, Bloody Mary, earned its name in a more ominous way.
On the first attempt, says Turner, “we abseiled off . . . and were met by Mary, who had retreated from Neurosis with a scalp wound from a falling stone, which left her covered in blood”.
Another Dacks climb, FM, got its name when Turner’s partner finished the climb and said, “All I can say is f--- me!”
When I asked John about the Gunks, he credited his second’s girlfriend for naming Glypnod.
She was reading Anglo-Saxon at Radcliffe/Harvard and assured him the name meant ‘Frightened’.
Turner started climbing almost by accident on a 1951 field trip studying geology, his extra subject at University.
He noticed that half the party were climbers, who made a point of collecting rock samples at the highest levels possible, so he tagged along.
Once he got the climbing bug, he worked out in the gym at night, and climbed ancient buildings after dark, eventually graduating to Derbyshire gritstone.
In John’s words, “If you could climb on gritstone, with its sloping holds and ferocious cracks, you could climb anywhere: possibly true!”
Turner was strongly influenced by Geoff Sutton, a climber who impressed
him with a deep love of rock and mountains, and an appreciation of style and quality, rather than difficulty.
Geoff also introduced him to his role models - two impoverished plumbers
from Manchester, who also happened to become two of the all-time top climbers in the world - Joe Brown and Don Whillans.
Turner was impressed that between them they pushed up British standards, had an amazing eye for a good line, and went on to many important first ascents.
He managed to do second ascents of some of their routes, and the resulting buzz made him realize how exciting a high quality, first ascent must be.
Is it any wonder that John Turner brought those same qualities to North America, and made such a startling impact here?
When I asked John how he managed to find so many exceptional lines, he mentioned his mentors and also his research background, where his prime motivation was to venture where no one has been and to discover the unknown.
As he says, “this desire to innovate was perhaps a personality trait, and certainly carried over to climbing, which provided the additional stimulus of fear and excitement”.
Anyone who has climbed a Turner route will be familiar with those feelings of fear and excitement, and will know exactly what he means.
What drove an apparently sedate academic, a Phd chemist, to take the risks
he took on these extraordinary first ascents?
Well, he was no sedate academic.
In Pushing the Limits, author Chic Scott says Turner was the exact opposite, “a non-conformist, noted for his hair-raising driving escapades and other impetuous acts”.
This view was confirmed by a mutual friend, Louise Trancynger, who now lives in the shadow of High Exposure in the Gunks.
In her younger and crazier years, when she was married to John’s friend, Jim Andress, she remembers clearly racing with Turner around the Gunks’ winding roadways,
she on her motorcycle, and Turner passing her on blind turns in his old Studebaker.
Wisely, she conceded defeat before anything tragic took place.
Turner continued his love of extremes after his climbing career ended, when he was riding to hounds back in the U.K.,
and earned the nickname of Dr. Death, as he and his equally exuberant horse, CJ, took jumps at up to 40 mph.
Somehow, Turner managed to survive these high risk activities while climbing, driving, riding, and in other areas of his life,
and in fact had very few serious accidents during his climbing career.
My own opinion, after reading about him and corresponding with him, is that he owed his survival to four important elements of his life:
his remarkable upper body strength, which he maintained by lifting weights;
his natural ability, helped by a phenomenal sense of balance and weight distribution;
his ability to visualize a new route, and to assess and take on the risks involved;
and a certain amount of good luck.
John Turner spent an exciting seven years putting up new routes and becoming an important part of climbing communities in Quebec, Ontario, and the northeastern U.S., and earned recognition in other areas of North
America;
for example, as Chic Scott notes, “In 1958, the classic northeast ridge of Bugaboo Spire was climbed in only five hours . . . only the second route on the mountain in 42 years . . . only a dozen pegs were driven for belays or runners”.
Today we enjoy John Turner’s creations, and can appreciate the tremendous effort and risks that he and his partners took in putting up these routes.
In a future newsletter, I intend to reproduce a list of Turner first ascents given to me during my correspondence with John Turner,
along with comments from some of his many climbing fans and followers.
Once again, thank you, John Turner, not just for Sweet Dreams, but for all
your exciting first ascents you left here for us to enjoy through the years.
May we all continue climbing them for many years to come!
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C. Small wall climber.
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Interestingly, one of Turner's acolytes, Dick Willmott, made his way to Squamish in the early 1960s, and put up two significant routes, namely Snake and Clean Corner.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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I get sweaty hands thinking about John Turner routes.
As rock climbing parvenus, my parter John Kaandorp and I feared Turner's mighty route The Joke at Bon Echo, which you approach by boat. "Fall off the crux first pitch," claimed our mentor Chas Yonge, "and your rope is sure to get sliced on the outside edge of the ramp." Runout sandbag 5.9, for sure.
The route is well-named. If I recall correctly, John Turner broke his leg on his first attempt. And on his second, the boat sank! The second pitch is only 5.6, but to compensate, there is a poison ivy vine on it which has grown to the size of a small tree.
We felt like 'eroes when we knocked that one off.
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Morgan
Trad climber
East Coast
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RIght on Al,
I think anyone who has done a Turner route finds it memorable in some way. I hear people are still taking the whip on some of the Turner routes I have heard of: Recompense, The Joke, Turner's Flake. Someday, I look forward to doing Bloody Mary on Pok-O.
Chad
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divad
Trad climber
wmass
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Thanks Al, it's always a good feeling to complete a Turner route, even with the technical advantages that we have today that he didn't back then.
Have a nice time in Florida. :)
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MH2
climber
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Thanks Clint! We don't need to know everything about everyone, of course, but that vignette on Turner's career is quite good.
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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From Clint's informative post (by Kit Moore),
Laura and Guy Waterman, in their excellent book, Yankee Rock & Ice, described Turner as,
“an isolated comet flashing across northeastern skies and then disappearing”.
The Watermans credited Turner with the best rockclimb (Recompense, in New Hampshire)....
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lucander
Trad climber
New England
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Great picture of Cowpoke on Recompense. Turner definitely plucked the plum of Cathedral with that one, it's probably the best line on the cliff because it follows a prominent natural weakness straight through that diminutive but proud cliff's most distinguished feature.
I first climbed Recompense four or five years ago. Knowing of his "Tumbledown John" reputation, I approached this climb with great trepidation. Doing it at that point in my climbing career made it all the more memorable and satisfying.
Also of note on Bloody Mary at Poke-O, which I just climbed last month. Earlier that day I did Menace to Sobriety (.10b/c) and both pitches of Cirrhosis (.9+). We wrapped up the day with Turner's Bloody Mary (.9+), on which I surprisingly slipped off of the roof move and fell. I like to think that it was John's specter reminding me that humility and respect for accomplishments of older, bolder, and less equipped climbers is part of what this game is about.
DL
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 3, 2009 - 09:06am PT
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Hi Clint, Thanks for locating and posting that article. It helps fill in a few "blanks". Alan
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Great picture of Cowpoke on Recompense
Hah, that sure looks like a Cowpoke, but in fact it's a Tarbuster!
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Bump for a great thread!!!!
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Seamstress
Trad climber
Yacolt, WA
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Recompense is one of my favorite climbs of all time - especially the Beast Flake variation. The variety of climbing and the exposure are fantastic. It also holds the distinction of the route where I have witnesses the most whippers.
When I get home, I'll have to revisit the guidebooks and see what other classic Turner routes I have done - or wished I had done. The man knew how to pick a challenge. Every spring, we would make our first pilgrimage to North Conway and jump on Recompense. That told you exactly what kind of mental and physical shape you were in!!
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Fantastic post Meastro Rubin! It just goes to show us all that numbers and difficulty are not really one and the same. Eddys and rivulets of real importance always exist outside the mainstream of climbing history. Thanks for highlighting this one!
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schwortz
Social climber
davis, ca
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if i'm not mistaken i believe at least two gunks classics - yellow belly (5.8) and thin slabs direct (5.7+) - are turner routes....
and both are pretty bold (and fun) lines
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Derek
climber
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I probably climb Recompense and Bloody Mary at least a few times every season. At some point during each and every ascent, I stop and think in absolute amazement (and considerable humility) about John putting those routes up in the late 50s. Simply incredible.
It seems all Turner routes share a few characteristics:
*Aesthetic, uncompromising natural line
*Remarkable boldness (when one considers them in historical context)
*Hard climbing for the grade
Hats of to Mr. Turner. One of the unsung greats, IMO.
-Derek
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slabbo
Trad climber
fort garland, colo
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Turner's routes are so fearsome, I still have yet to do all of Recompense after climbing at Cathedral MANY years.(though not quite as many as you Al)
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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hey there say all... wow, just indeed ... very great reading stuff here... say, i will be back to soak more it in... am cleaning house right now... :O
oh my.... seems i'm reading a lot of "stuff" in the crack of the walls of this ol' living space... ;)
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Yeah for Turner, and way to go Alan for bringing this up.
Still, the Elbsandstein had 5.9 in 1906 and 5.10 in 1910, so the U.S. was just a bit behind on the learning curve. Goodro's Crack in the Wasatch range is 5.10 and was done by Harold Goodrow in 1949. So when Robbins freed the Open Book at Tahquitz at barely 5.9 in 1952, one could be pardoned for viewing this, at least in retrospect, as bursting through doors already long open.
Returning to the narrower chauvinistic perspective, Turner had to be among the best climbers in North America in 1959, although his exploits up in the Northeastern Boonies never penetrated the Californicentric vision of U.S. climbing at the time.
The Turner routes Recompense and Bloody Mary are, in my opinion, much harder than the Open Book. Bloody Mary especially is in a different class altogether in terms of boldness and committment, and probably would have been 5.10 if it had been at Tahquitz at the time. But since Turner's routes were done in 1959, seven years after the Open Book, and at the dawn of 5.10 in this country rather than the dawn of 5.9, perhaps it is not fair to make comparisons.
On a related topic, anyone with a historical bent want to post an appreciation of Pete Cleveland? His incredibly bold lead of Superpin in the Needles (SD) has never been repeated, and Henry Barber's easier variation has been desecrated with at least one and, I think in fact, two bolts for the delectation of the masses. Cleveland's 1969 toprope of Bagatelle at Devil's Lake stood at the threshold of 5.13 at a time when the rest of the U.S. was busy breaking into 5.11.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 4, 2009 - 04:28pm PT
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Thanks Rich, I was hoping that you (and Stannard) would chime in on this. Since you guys were among the first (if not THE first) to repeat some of Turner's more intimidating climbs. I'd love to hear any stories from those ascents, as I'm sure would other Topians who posted on this thread. As to the "first 5.10", it surely is a nit-pickingly academic topic---but a fun one none-the-less. Clearly they were climbing routes of 5.9 and 5.10 much earlier in the Elbesandstein, various areas in the UK, and probably a few other areas as well--who really knows how hard the actual free climbing on some of the routes in the Eastern Alps in those years actually was, since later ascents tended to aid sections that originally had been done free. However, since US climbing pretty much evolved independently of that overseas such "local" milestones are still significant. Goodro's Crack is a fine and difficult climb, though it seemed to me to be easier than Bloody Mary, Recompense, etc, let alone Repentence, though, of course, it was done a decade earlier. I've also had the impression that there remains some uncertainty as to whether it was led free at that time. I imagine that Mr. Ament can provide some insight from his research. Anyway, it is a fine climb.Northcutt's start to the Bastille Crack is from the same late '50s era as Turner's routes and technically harder than any of them, at least in my opinion, though not as sustained or committing. And then there are plenty of Gill's routes of that vintage at Devil's Lake and elsewhere that are harder still. The latter leads nicely into your suggestion of a Peter Cleveland Appreciation, which is surely well deserved. However, expanding on that, what we really should see posted is a Devil's Lake Appreciation thread, because the routes that first Gill, then yourself, Derenzo and others, then Cleveland, Erickson etc. did there in the early/mid '60s surely represented the most concentrated hard free climbing in the country at the time. As an observer of those developments such a thread has been on my mind for some time--maybe someday....
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C. Small wall climber.
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Al's ideas are good ones - though, as with all volunteer environments, my working principle is that those who have good ideas, and express them aloud, are taken to have volunteered to do something about them. :-)
The history of climbing is more nuanced than is often appreciated, and developing context and perspective can be a challenge. The devil is often in the details.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Rich and Al-Thanks again for sharing your respective wealth of historical knowledge and insights.
If John Gill has read this thread, I hope that he might throw aside his usual modesty and offer some comparative assessment of his own early roped testpieces.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Al, I believe that I was actually involved in the second ascent of Bloody Mary, sometime in the mid-sixties, along with McCarthy and Mick Burke. The route had gone unrepeated for six or seven years by then, and had an imposing reputation as being both hard and dangerous. But we also knew that Turner had failed on MF, so was not made of superhuman stuff.
McCarthy led it and paused right in the middle of the hardest moves to place a bong (McCarthy was as strong a laybacker as I've ever encountered). Of course, Turner had nothing close to that level of protection, but on the other hand one had to admire McCarthy's coolness and endurance.
I posted the following picture in the Poke-O-Moonshine thread. My position in the shot is almost exactly where McCarthy stopped to place a bong.
At the time, we were certainly climbing a full grade harder (or more) and so Bloody Mary, although impressive, did not seem to be a test piece. I did it fairly recently (I think maybe two years ago) and was far more impressed with the difficulty and boldness, but this is partially because I was not exactly the same climber at, ahem, 64 as I was at 24.
John Gill's roped climbs would be an interesting topic. Apparently, his seconds were so frightened that there has never been any account from them, and only Gill knows what he did out there on the South side of Disappointment Peak---at least one of those leads convinced him to henceforth devote all his energies bouldering. It is a great historical misfortune that Gill went looking for difficulties and so continually veered from the natural and obvious line. The real climbing on his routes is not on his routes, and no one really knows how to find it.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 4, 2009 - 05:50pm PT
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I , too, did Bloody Mary again 2 years ago, after a 3 decade gap since my previous ascents and had similar impressions. I first did it in '71 or '72 with Rocky Keeler and Bob Harding. We knew you guys and some others had done it, but you were all much stronger climbers than we were and it still had quite a reputation. We made what we considered to be the first "mortal" ascent and were pleasantly suprised to find it relatively reasonable; i.e.,we didn't die!!! It felt about the same when I did it with Al Long a couple of years later. Sure did feel much harder in '07---must have been the rock !!!!!
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jstan
climber
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Trundlebum just emailed me about this thread so maybe I can add a little.
At Facelift I was cheering myself up with a four pack in Camp 4 after the Great Tarvia Expedition when a fellow walking by mentioned the Toronto Section of the ACC. I, as would anyone, immediately started talking about Dr. Turner. He, Kit Moore would you believe, said, "Yes! I know John Turner. Would you like me to send him your email address?"
A little while ago I got a very nice note from John. I can't go into any specifics but suffice it to say John is still interested in what is happening today in climbing and continues to be interested in the people. I have to run now and forward to him the link to this thread. Kit has probably already done so but, the more the merrier.
At Facelift you quite simply get one miracle after another.
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MH2
climber
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Amen
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TrundleBum
Trad climber
Las Vegas
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I think Recompense was my first 5.9 lead.
A couple of N.H .9+'s later I made my first trip to the Valley.
My first 5.10 lead was Maxine's Wall...
Which lead me to wonder:
"If the Y.D.S system came from Yosemite, then way are the grades so soft?"
Then I went and did Reed's and Midterm, putting that internal dialog to rest.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The morning of the (Lynne's) Bachar memorial I was introduced to John Stannard by Gene.
As I was off climbing for the day I kept thinking "Stannard, Stannard, Stannard, known for...?"
That eve during Lynne's opening for the J.B memorial I look over to see Mr. Stannard standing next to me. I looked at him with a tentative smile and said "Mr. Stannard, did you ever climb at Cathedral Ledge in N.H?" He said he had once or twice but that he mainly climbed in the Gunks. Upon hearing 'Gunks' My brain finally engaged and I looked at Mr. Stannard and said "Ahhh yesss Foops, how silly of me!" Mr. Stannard questioned the term "Silly" ? I explained that when I tried to think of what gem he (Mr. Stannard) was responsible for I kept thinking of Recompense on Cathedral. Mr. Stannard said "Oh no, that was John Turner". I mentioned what an eternal classic and ever so bold a lead for it's day.
Now I don't remember what Mr Stannard said verbatim, so I can't quote it, but it was something to the tune of...
"Turner, now there was one heck of a gifted climber, I could only wish to be a climber of his caliber."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
What an evening that was for me, I tell you...
1. I got to meet a bunch of Taco'eads and pay tribute to J.B in the finess'a kin.
2. Had a very pleasant chat with R.R and got him to autograph my Blue Suede shoes.
3. I got to stand along side John Stannard during the start of the J.B trib and...
Ta boot, hear Stannard essentially pay (albeit brief) homage to Turner.
For me the third was akin to getting to stand abreast of Michael Jordan verbally admiring the talents of Wilt Chamberlain!
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Al,
Thanks for bringing up the name John Turner -- a real
master of rock, a true pioneer. Some of these names
generally unknown in the west were in fact made of
solid stone and were the best, as good as anyone in their day.
My friend Barry Bates told me a week ago the first
time he saw a one-arm pull-up was in about 1967 or maybe '68
when Rich Goldstone was in the Valley and showed off his
really solid one-arm. Those guys in the east, of course,
were among the first to become acquainted with the great Gill,
and individuals such as Turner, McCarthy, and Goldstone
set very high standards at the Gunks, Devil's Lake,
and other areas. Of course John Stannard,
one of the best of the very best is often underplayed in
the histories. In Boulder when I was the most serious free
climber, during the mid-later 1960's, I was fully aware
of all these guys. What a joy it was when each of them, except
John Turner, visited me and climbed with me in Eldorado. Pete
Cleveland, who also would become my friend, came from that
same community...
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slabbo
Trad climber
fort garland, colo
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Yo Trundle- That's 'cause Maxines is about Gloucester 5.7 ! Stannard was WAY good, yet he took 160 ! (rumored)tries for Persistent in the Gunks.First I see a post from 'Rubes, now you HA Ha Ha !
JS
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GBrown
Trad climber
North Hollywood, California
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Hey Al, it was great having lunch with you in Northampton. And Rich, thanks again for getting me off the ground at the Gunks. (By the way, those weren't really falls . . . I was just checking to see if you were really holding the rope.) Boy, this thread brings back the Poko memories. JStan and I were there twice in the late 60s and Bloody Mary was my intro to John Turner. The climb is an aesthetic marvel and I always wanted to be able to say "thank you" to him.
John and I put in a cool climb that started left of a HUGE "Nose" that hung out over the cliff away off to the right (I think) of Bloody Mary. Some nice corner climbing off the ground, aid out ceiling and up a bit to the steep 5.9 off-with jam crack; traversed right to the nostril of the "Nose," got over the nostril momentarily but we couldn't hang on and then access the front of the nose and get into the gorgeous crack that led dramatically up to the bridge -- had to ascend unaesthetic cracks up the side of the Nose instead. We called it the "Nose Route" because we were so creative. Does anybody know if anyone ever completed what would have been a dramatic route if completed like we had wanted? John, any feedback?
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jstan
climber
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Gary:
Me? I can't even tell you what I did yesterday.
Actually it's getting so I like it that way.
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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It's not as stout as Recompense or Bloody Marry, but Turner's Flake on Cathedral
deserves mention for quality. Long before the days of 4" cams, I wonder if Turner
could protect this long layback at all.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Gary, what falls?
The day was fun. Hope we can manage another one before father time has his way with us.
Your Nose Route with John hasn't made the record books. The route you did is now the combination of two routes. One of them is called Summer Break, which climbs the roof you guys aided at 5.12a. Or some facsimile of the roof you aided, because eleven years ago the entire left side of the offwidth you did just above the roof fell off, perhaps also changing the nature of the roof below.
The "nice corner climbing" you mentioned up to the roof is considered to be 5.9 and is often done as a single pitch, called Raindance,
Summer Break continues straight up in a line parallel to the Nose, following an erstwhile Jimmy Dunn classic, Summer Solstice, that included the now departed offwidth. But Summer Solstice climbed the roof you guys aided further right, and now another route, called Wild Blue, climbs the Summer Solstice roof at 5.11a (Dunn graded it 5.10+++) and continues up the left side of the Nose, no doubt substantially following the route you traversed over to, eventually moving right into an overhanging 5.10b offwidth.
Jim Lawyer and Jeremy Haas recently wrote a fantastic guidebook to the Adirondacks, Adirondack Rock, which is the source of the information I just recorded. Jim made extensive efforts to get as much of the history right as he could, but there is no mention of you guys and the credit for the various portions of the route you did goes to others, almost certainly after you did them, since the earliest date mentioned is 1977. And so it is that your heroic early efforts are doomed to languish in obscurity (unless of course Jim publishes a second edition). Such is life on the rock.
Larry, cool picture! I'm pretty certain Turner would have had at most a ring angle, equivalent (in size but not in strength) to a 3/4" angle or, in modern terms, a yellow Alien. If the crack was bigger than that he was running it out.
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GBrown
Trad climber
North Hollywood, California
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John, the important things are that we know the people we like, have a viewpoint from which the present is pretty well understandable and what we do now is generally helpful. I'd say you're doing well! A few weeks ago I got to climb 2 days at the Gunks. Day one with Dick Williams, Claude Suhl and Elaine Matthews. Claude, Elaine and I had been climbing together 40 years and about 4 months earlier on Moby Dick in Yosemite. Day two with Rich was a gas!
Rich, it makes me feel remarkably endurable to know that "The Nose Route" that John and I did has fallen apart while we are still ongoing. The second time we did the route, the corner climbing off the ground was quite squishy wet (I think the Nose was running) and after each giving it a try we got apathetic and abandoned it in favor of a couple other routes. However, our apathy wouldn't let us get off the ground on the other difficult possibilities. I finally got up to being pissed off and we went back to "TNR" where I kicked the squish out of it and we had dry rock after that. Too bad about that crack cracking off, it was a treat. Maybe a guidebook could be put out for routes that no longer exist. "A Picnicers Guide to Non-Existent Rock Climbs." Instead of packing gear you pack food, find where the route was and have a picnic there. I'll talk to Williams about it. :)
I'll be talking at you guys. Thanks again Rich.
Gary
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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rgold:
Larry, cool picture! I'm pretty certain Turner would have had at most a ring angle, equivalent (in size but not in strength) to a 3/4" angle or, in modern terms, a yellow Alien. If the crack was bigger than that he was running it out.
On Turner's Flake (5.8), I imagine an old piton could give good protection for the
technical finish, at the top part of my photo. Not much chance on the wide, initially
overhanging layback flake that forms the first half of the pitch, though.
On that part (below Leslie in the photo), self confidence would be your only pro.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Gary, we are, by and large, doing a lot better than the rock. Poko has had a number of rockfalls, the biggest of which involved the upper pitches of Positive Thinking, yet another burly Turner route. I actually climbed those pitches in the mid-sixties with Roman Laba, and remember them as among my most frightening experiences.
There were huge blocks stacked upon blocks with little evidence that anything was much more than just balanced there. (The fact that it eventually all fell down certainly confirms those original impressions.) It was before nuts, and I was terrified to drive pitons, after the first pin I placed caused ominous clunking and shifting tones as well as provoking the telltale sounds of previously trapped pebbles rattling down newly expanded cracks.
My mind filled with feverish representations of engineering free-body diagrams of the blocks, their actions and reactions, and somewhere, perhaps a hundred yards away, a tell-tale but catastrophic unbalanced load sending the whole mess, like a freight train derailed on a trestle, over the edge with Roman and I as a most unlucky set of hitchhikers. For the rest of the pitch I hand-placed pitons in horizontal cracks without hammering them, hoping that perhaps they might stop a fall simply by virtue of their mechanical configuration and, of course, counting on the giant detached blocks they were placed on top of to stay in place under the loads of a leader fall which, thankfully, never happened.
Although not relevant to the issue of whether we or the rock are more decrepit, that particular ascent of Positive Thinking had another charming aspect. We did the route in the Spring before the leaves were out, and the first pitch had a 5.9 jam crack that had some vines or bushes in it in one or two spots. I had my entire forearm in the crack with the sleeve rolled up and got quite scratched passing those vines. What I didn't realize was that the vines were poison ivy vines, without the leaves as yet, but, as it turned out, packed with plenty of urishol, which by virtue of the scratching process had been subcutaneously injected into my forearm. I guess the best way I can convey what happened is to say that when I took off my shirt in the dermatologist's office a few days later, he let out an involuntary gasp and, instantly summoning his command of appropriate medical terminology, exclaimed "Oh, yuk!"
Returning to the celebration of living longer than rock, I direct your attention, back in the Gunks, to Pink Laurel, which suffered a major rearrangement in 1971, Chimango, whose second-pitch crux fell off in a major rockfall in 2008, and a number of substantial rockfalls in the Near Trapps. We may think of the talus field as a record of prehistoric events, but in fact our crags are also falling apart in a very contemporary time frame.
Pink Laurel went from 5.6 to 5.9 after a giant flake one could sit on at what is now the new crux yielded to gravity's Newtonian imperative. McCathy and I made perhaps the first ascent after the flake fell out, in the late winter or early spring, intending to enjoy a pleasant early-season warm-up. For some reason, we failed to notice the absence of a giant feature, and came away astonished and depressed at the deterioration of our physical and technical skills over the winter hiatus.
Of course, the last word in human vs. rock endurance is probably about how we've outlived the Old Man of the Mountain on Cannon, which came crashing down in 2003, making instant mockery of New Hampshire's license plates and adding a fresh perspective to the accompanying "Live Free or Die" motto inscribed on those plates next to the newly defunct profile.
So let's raise a glass to old climbers and crumbling crags. May we continue to crumble at a slower rate than those rocks of ages.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Hear! Hear! No loose flakes are you gentlemen!
"Fall down mountains, just don't fall on me!" - Voodoo Child
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Jim Lawyer
climber
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Researching the history of climbing in the Adirondacks, I had the pleasure of conversing with Turner himself, both through email and on the phone. We had delightful exchanges, although, memories being what they are, exact details often escaped his recollection.
Regarding Poke-O, the cliff was virtually unrealized until Turner and the Quebec crew began their explorations in 1957. Their best work included Gamesmanship (a very popular full-length 5.8), The FM (a popular full-length 5.7), Garter and SRT (fun traverse routes), Psychosis (rated 5.9 A2 by Turner, later freed by McCarthy and Goldstone at 5.9), Bloody Mary (major sand bag, named for a woman that was hit by a stone), Positive Thinking (known more for an ice climb), Body Snatcher (5.8 A2, later freed by Stannard at 5.9), The Cooler (today a jungle-fest), Neurosis (also known more as an ice route), Paralysis (popular 5.8 route with a super exposed 2-pitch traverse), and Catharsis (arguably one of the most popular 5.6's in the park). Even today Bloody Mary and Psychosis are two of the "most feared 5.9s" on the cliff due to their sustained difficulties and intimidating appearances. Being the authority on Poke-O allowed Turner to write the first mini-guide to the cliff, published in Appalachia in 1961.
In those days, as Turner described, it was the custom to climb to the top. Times change, and today many of these routes are climbed only for one or two pitches. Another interesting tidbit was that he thought bolts were immoral and removed those he came across.
Regarding the discussion of the "Nose" feature, in the guide published in 1961, Turner describes the "Nose Traverse", climbed by himself and Hugh Tanton, although it goes up the right side of the nose, not the left. I'd be interested in more details of early climbing up the left side.
Outside of Poke-O, but also within the Adirondack Park, Turner added routes to the Upper Washbowl (Hesitation and Partition) and Deer Leap (Guermantes and Meseglise, two unknown chossy routes on Lake George). I'm pretty sure he also had a hand in the routes at Chapel Pond Slab, although he doesn't recall such details.
From my correspondence with Turner, he described his introduction to climbing and various other recollections, which I make available here with his permission.
"I started climbing (almost by accident) near the end of my second year at the University. In Eastern England we were 100 miles from the nearest rock, and being ‘in statu pupillari’ we were forbidden from keeping a car ‘within 25 miles of Great St. Mary’s church’. Hence we worked out in the gym during the day and climbed on ancient buildings after dark. I had located some climbers around my home town of Ashby de la Zouche with whom I climbed on Derbyshire gritstone (it was said that because of its sloping holds and ferocious cracks, if you could climb on gritstone, you could climb anywhere: possibly true!)"
"Life was so primitive in 1951 that for a brief period we used hemp rope guaranteed to break if a leader-fall exceeded ten feet, and in wet weather we wore naileboots. Thereafter I climbed in Wales and the Lakes with the University club, which included George Band who later did the first ascent of Kanchenjunga. Sadly, although I knew them well and saw them as role models, I never got to climb with the two impoverished plumbers from Manchester, Joe Brown and Don Whillans, who between them pushed up British standards by four decimal points, had an amazing eye for a good line and went on to many first ascents in the Alps, the Himalayas and the Andes. I also knew Chris Bonington, but since he would not share the lead, we never climbed together."
"When starting my post-doctoral year at MIT, I was told by their Outings Club that they could not offer serious rock climbing; they introduced me to Ray Darcy, then sent me to the firm down the road, the Harvard Mountaineering Club. Here I struck instant rapport with the President, Craig Merrihue, and we climbed together at the Quincy quarries, Joe English, North Conway, and the Gunks. At the time the AMC was dominant at the Gunks, and appeared more concerned with regulating climbing than with doing it. Craig was a natural rebel and perhaps because like their ruling elite, he was a WASP and a Preppie, they turned a blind eye on our not having been through their laborious procedures of tests and certifications; but the old order was crumbling, and I believe collapsed finally with the advent of the Vulgarians shortly afterwards. The leading figures at the Gunks were Hans Kraus and Jim McCarthy: Jim and I never hit it off, despite climbing to a similar standard; he seemed always to be competing with his fellow humans, whereas I was competing with the rock, or perhaps even with myself. Other Gunk characters who I met and climbed with later were the irreverent Dave Craft and ‘Super-Jew’ Art Gran. I got on particularly well with Art, and we spent many rewarding days together, the most memorable being the first ascent of Repentance."
"In retrospect, first impressions of North America were two-fold. There was a vast amount of high-quality virgin rock awaiting routes to be put on it; secondly, I had exchanged the UK environment in which protective pitons were almost prohibited for the US where they were almost compulsory."
"When the MIT year was up, for complex reasons I moved to Canada, and found the Canadian Mountain Club in the phone book. This (I discovered later) had been founded by a Frenchman who had climbed mostly in the Pyranees, who had left France in a hurry in 1945, and had been denied membership of the ACC because of his status as a Nazi collaborator. He was no longer active, and the club consisted of a couple of immigrants, and half a dozen Quebecois, including Ben Poisson, Frank Garneau and Pierre Garneau, all climbing enthusiastically in the Laurentians. At the time ACC activities were centered on their summer camp in the West, and to keep partially fit for this they trotted up existing routes from time to time, but did not innovate (they were also somewhat Francophobic)."
"Their chairman was an elderly and very civilised Swiss, John Brett, who was with me on The Snake at Poko, and later arranged a couple of occasions when I climbed with Fritz Wiessner."
"As the Mountain Club went further afield, putting up more new routes, it attracted more new members, both native and immigrant. The former included Claude Lavallee, Dick Wilmott Erwin Hodgson, Bob O’Brian and Mary ?; an Irish group Brian Rothery, Phil Gribbin, Doug Sloan, and Keith Millar; Scots Stan Patterson and Gerge Tate; German Wilfred Twelker; Hungarian Ferenc ?; and Englishman Dick Strachan. We ventured North in the Laurentians to Weir, Southeast to Smugglers Notch, Cannon and North Conway; South to Chapel Pond and the Gunks (our speeding fines became a major source of revenue to Northern New York State)."
"The two major breakthroughs were the first ascent of The FM at Poko, and Brian Rothery’s Vertiginous at Bon Echo. These confirmed that face climbs on two cliffs previously deemed impregnable were in fact possible. A wealth of new opportunities opened up. There was so much to do, and so little time in which to do it!"
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C. Small wall climber.
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Willmott ventured as far afield as Squamish, where in 1962 he did the classics Clean Corner (with Strachan) and Snake, both stout 5.9 routes by modern standards.
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GBrown
Trad climber
North Hollywood, California
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Rich, This makes me feel better and better. And your description of Positive Thinking makes me realize that it must have been a positively sarcastic naming ceremony considering all the negative thinking it inspired.
Gary Hutchinson wrote a wonderful hai ku poem I committed to memory (no problem being so short):
Don't be a mountaineer
Be a mountain
And shrug off a few with avalanches
I add:
Whether a mountaineer
Or a mountain
It's the ability to shrug that counts
Anybody want to add to this in hai ku?
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markmuehlbauer
Social climber
Enumclaw, WA
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Reply for Clint Cummins on the post you did.
I can confirm this is Alf Muehlbauer. I recognize my Dad's picture anywhere.
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dickcilley
Social climber
Wisteria Ln.
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Don't forget .Those first 5.9s and 10s in Elbsandstein were put up by an American Oliver Perry Smith.Americans weren't late comers to hard rockclimbing.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - May 3, 2011 - 05:51pm PT
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True, Oliver Perry-Smith was climbing in Dresden in the first years of the 20th century at levels not reached in the US for 40 or more years after. However his climbing accomplishments were, to all intents and purposes, unknown to American climbers (except Fritz Weissner!!!!) until J. Monroe Thorington's profile of him in the 1964 American Alpine Journal. And even then it really took the visits of climbers such as Steve Roper (who wrote a wonderful article about his trip in the 1972(?) issue of Ascent)and,a few years later, Henry Barber, Steve Wunsch, et al for true extent of his climbing accomplishments to become recognized by the American climbing community.So Perry-Smith's climbs really contributed nothing to the progess of American climbing during the following decades. It is significant to recognize that while mountaineering was being developed in North America during the years that Perry-Smith was active in Europe, rock climbing as an activity was not yet being pursued over here. While there was some climbing on the Boulder Flatirons, some isolated "engineered ascents" such as Half Dome and Devil's Tower, and a few other eccentric individuals scrambling about this was all limited and very localized activity. Rock climbing as such really didn't get started on this Continent until the time of the First World War, and, more significantly, during the mid-1920s.I think what is particularly fascinating about the early accomplishments of Perry-Smith and the other Dresden climbers is that it illustrates the role of "peer influence" in climbing development, since it wasn't just one or two individuals climbing at such a level in the Dresden area, but many. However since they were a relatively isolated community, far from the mainstream, this level of climbing was not replicated by their contemporaries elsewhere (though many of those contemporaries such as Preuss and Dulfer were still climbing at quite a respectable level themselves but still not at the level of the Dresden climbers--at least as far as we can tell today).
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Some real Americans, the Anasazi, were probably knocking off 5.10 a thousand years ago.
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steveA
Trad climber
bedford,massachusetts
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When I first started climbing at Cathedral Ledge, John Turner was already a legend. I still remember the wood wedge he placed at the crux on Recompence. It is in private hands and ought to be in a museum.
I have done many of his classic climbs and they were bold, aesthetic lines.
The guy was one tough SOB, with a great eye.
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jstan
climber
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A year or two ago when communicating with Dr. Turner I told him of ST and as I remember sent him a link. Just like so many of our correspondents, he could have added immense value.
Nothing beats talking to the source.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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what is particularly fascinating about the early accomplishments of Perry-Smith and the other Dresden climbers is that it illustrates the role of "peer influence" in climbing development, since it wasn't just one or two individuals climbing at such a level in the Dresden area, but many. However since they were a relatively isolated community, far from the mainstream, this level of climbing was not replicated by their contemporaries elsewhere (though many of those contemporaries such as Preuss and Dulfer were still climbing at quite a respectable level themselves but still not at the level of the Dresden climbers--at least as far as we can tell today).
Yes, the milieu is everything. OPS was part of a circle of climbers, and his most famous partner, Rudolf Fehrmann, did more difficult climbs than he did. For Germans, OPS is just one of Fehrmann's early climbing partners.
Dresden was one of Europe's major capitols at the time, so it's not surprising that hte nearest climbing area was on the cutting edge. But it was just one of a variety of different centers. The best climbs in the Lake District were pretty close to the Dresden climbs in technical difficulty. And the best climbs in Fontainebleau were on par, although much shorter, as were the short climbs at the Munich and Innsbruck bouldering areas.
Tough to measure those Dresden climbs against the stuff folks like Preuss did in the Alps, because the Alps were, well, alpine.
One of the unusual things about Elbsandstein was that it offered middle-scale crag climbing close to a major urban center.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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jstan- If at first you don't succeed...dog 'em!
I almost hooked Wunsch but his time management skills are too formidable. LOL
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Trad climber
Will know soon
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Alan Rubin, what a great topic for a Thread made into Golden by all who contributed.
What a pleasure to spend my evening reading and enjoying....Cheers, lynne
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Jan 23, 2012 - 08:41pm PT
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Turner History Bump...
How many areas in Canada did John establish routes? My guidebook selection is slim north of the border in the northeast.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 21, 2012 - 12:52pm PT
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I am involved in a group conversation with John at present and will share the results here as it progresses.
Dear Steve,
Good to hear from you again: I thought you might have given up. Yes, your choice of font is excellent.
I shall be happy to fill in the background to my climbing career, although slightly worried that we elderly people can be prone to rewrite history quite unconsciously. But here goes!
No, my parents were not outdoors people, although my father played tennis at a high level, having earlier been a high school jock in cricket and football: my inadequacy with any kind of ball was a big disappointment to him, so I suppose it was some kind of compensation for me to be at ease on a rock face whilst he suffered vertigo on a stepladder. But perhaps I am getting too Freudian.
When I went up to Cambridge University aged 18, I discovered that I had to read a fourth subject for the first two years, and chose geology as a soft option. Near the end of the course we had a two-week field trip to the Isle of Skye, famous for the Cuillin hills, constructed of black gabbro. Several of the party were members of the University mountaineering club, and I spontaneously tagged along as they made sure they collected their samples from the highest points they could find. I realised that I got immense pleasure using small holds in exposed situations, and joined the club myself on return to Cambridge, and started leading almost immediately
Initially we climbed partly during day trips to Derbyshire gritstone and very extensively after dark on the university buildings. The latter were of course prohibited, but so extensively utilised that they had a virtual guidebook entitled' The Night Climbers of Cambridge' published under the pseudonym of Whipplesnaith. Sadly, the famous chapel of King's College had been structurally modified to prevent the previously frequent appearance of chamber pots on its four pinnacles. (Sorry if this sounds like an extract from Brideshead Revisited, but that is the way it was around 1950) A group of us was climbing at around the 5.6 level, and the most influential for me was Geoff Sutton, who placed greater value on the aesthetics of a climb rather than its absolute difficulty.
Times were changing, as was apparent on gritstone but more so on the larger cliffs of Snowdonia and the Lake District. Up until 1945 UK climbing had been dominated by the universities and the army, but for 10 years thereafter most new routes were created by the 'Rock and Ice', a working class group from Manchester led by Joe Brown and Don Whillans. Almost overnight they pushed up standards to 5.9 and beyond, opening up many attractive natural lines, which previously had been deemed impossible. By the end of my sixth year at Cambridge we were beginning to repeat some of these routes. Most regretfully I had to decline an invitation to climb with Don. However, he gave me some invaluable advice: stay relaxed and conserve energy no matter how extenuating the circumstances.
In 1955 I moved to the other Cambridge for a postdoctoral year at MIT. No one at MIT seemed interested in climbing, so I joined the Harvard club, where I climbed mostly with a fellow Englishman,Al Alvarez and the club president Craig Merrihew (sadly killed a few years later, winter climbing on Mount Washington). The Harvard club climbed mainly at the Shawangunks, but brief trips to New Hampshire and the Adirondacks opened my eyes to their extent of beautiful rock, almost untouched by human hand. Some of this I was able to rectify during my six years near Montréal, from 1956. Preferred companions during this period were Dick Willmot, Dick Strachan, and Art Gran: but there were several others.
Favourite climbs by others: Brown's 'Cenotaph Corner', Whillan's 'Cemetery Gates', both on Dinas Cromlech, and Birtwistle's exquisitely delicate 'Diagonal' on Dinas Mot. Favourite climbs of my own include 'Recompense' and 'Repentance' at Cathedral Ledge, and 'Sweet Dreams' at Bon Echo. I also have a love – hate relationship with 'The Joke', also at Bon Echo, whose fourth and last pitch took four attempts and a fracture. It received its second ascent only this year by two Canadians: they rated it 5.10 A1, although Dick and I had used no aid on the first ascent.
By 1962 I had come to realise that an eccentric Englishman would never be promoted in the Canadian chemical industry, and as a ticket home took a job that was at the very limit of my capabilities: there was absolutely no time for climbing, and when I briefly tried to resume eight years later, I found I had lost the edge. So, I took up riding to hounds instead: a more dangerous pursuit
Well Steve, this probably tells you much more than you wish to know, but help yourself to anything that might be useful.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 21, 2012 - 03:19pm PT
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Great Steve. Thanks for having your "conversation" with Turner and posting the results here. Keep it up. The last line of Turner's response appears to confirm one of the "Turner legends"---the he was one of the first non-Rock and Ice climbers to repeat the Brown/Whillans routes in the UK, particularly Cenotaph Corner. He mentions both Cenotaph and neighboring Cemetary Gates as being amongst his favorite climbs put up by others. Given that he moved to North America in 1955, remained here for a number of years and largely quit climbing after he returned to the UK in the early '60s, it is likely that he climbed these routes prior to his '55 departure from the UK.The Gates was put up in 1951 and Cenotaph the following year and both routes had an enormous reputation in the ensuing years that scared off most other climbers for almost a decade (sort of what later happened with Turner's hardest routes in the northeast). So Turner's ascents of those routes, which were (and are) virtually unknown in the UK, were considerable breakthroughs and effectively made him one of the top climbers in the country at the time. It is probably because he moved over here soon after those climbs that he never achieved the recognition in his home climbing community that his ability deserved---and because most of his hardest climbs on this side of the Atlantic were in the northeast US or in eastern Canada his contributions over here are similarly not as widely recognized as they would have been if he'd been based in Colorado or California. This all may seem trivial to some on here, but I do believe that it is valuable and appropriate to recognize those who have contributed much to the history of our sport/passion.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 23, 2012 - 03:42pm PT
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John added a bit more to his first response that posted above.
Favourite climbs by others: Brown's 'Cenotaph Corner', Whillan's 'Cemetery Gates', both on Dinas Cromlech, and Birtwistle's exquisitely delicate 'Diagonal' on Dinas Mot. Favourite climbs of my own include 'Recompense' and 'Repentance' at Cathedral Ledge, and 'Sweet Dreams' at Bon Echo. I also have a love – hate relationship with 'The Joke', also at Bon Echo, whose fourth and last pitch took four attempts and a fracture. It received its second ascent only this year by two Canadians: they rated it 5.10 A1, although Dick and I had used no aid on the first ascent.
By 1962 I had come to realise that an eccentric Englishman would never be promoted in the Canadian chemical industry, and as a ticket home took a job that was at the very limit of my capabilities: there was absolutely no time for climbing, and when I briefly tried to resume eight years later, I found I had lost the edge. So, I took up riding to hounds instead: a more dangerous pursuit.
Well Steve, this probably tells you much more than you wish to know, but help yourself to anything that might be useful.
Solid 5.10 in the early 1960s, THAT'S THE STUFF folks!
"Climbing is a jealous sport. If you don't do it you get sloppy." Bonnie Prudden
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 23, 2012 - 03:51pm PT
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The next installment...
What brought you to Montreal and how did you connect with the climbing community once there?
Describe your initial explorations for rock and ice routes in the Montreal area. Which routes stand out in your memory now looking back?
Thanks for digging around in your past with us.
Cheers,
Steve Grossman
Had I returned to the UK after my year at MIT, I should have been faced with two years of National Service. Had I stayed in the US I should have been eligible for the Draft. Like most dodgers, I had seemingly valid reasons for avoiding each of these. Canada was the best option, so I drove to the border and talked my way in. Within days I was taken on in the central research labs of C I L, 20 miles east of Montréal. Searching the phone book, I found an entry for Club de Montaingne Canadien. This group initially was mostly French-Canadian, and was much more active on the rocks than was the Montréal section of the ACC. Like myself, and other birds of passage, immigrants from Europe seemed to flock to it, and in due course English Canadians also. On my first weekend in Canada I climbed with them at Val David in the Laurentians, and before winter set in we had put up half a dozen new routes on Mt Saint Hilaire. In 1957 we started exploring the Adirondacks and the White Mountains, but I don't think we heard about Bon Echo until 1958. The most memorable climb of this period was the FM, which refuted the supposed invincibility of Pokomoonshine.
Yes we did do ice climbing, but nothing dramatic: mostly we went skiing.
Hope this plugs most of the gaps in previous narrative.
Kind regards,
John
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Nov 23, 2012 - 05:58pm PT
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Turner was definetly on the forefront of hard free climbing in the 50's and 60's and his visibility suffered from plying his trade on the East Coast. Had he gone to Stanford instead of MIT he would be a household name in climbing history. It's amazing how many people think that the Open Book on Tahquitz Rock was the first 5.9 climbed in America.
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steveA
Trad climber
bedford,massachusetts
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Nov 23, 2012 - 06:16pm PT
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+1 Jim!
I had the chance, more than once, to snag the wooden wedge Turner placed on
Recompence BITD. A friend of mine has it.
I told him that it ought to be in a museum.
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slabbo
Trad climber
fort garland, colo
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Nov 24, 2012 - 05:57pm PT
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I think, Alan correct me, that an old Ed Webster article shows the wedge on Recompense during an ascent around '74 ???
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 25, 2012 - 03:03pm PT
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Third installment...
John,
How did you discover Poke-O-Moonshine as a climbing spot and what was the scene there at the time, if any?
What do you recall about establishing FM? What were you wearing for climbing boots at that point?
Once you picked the plum did you come back to Poke-O for smaller routes?
Cheers,
Steve Grossman
Hi Steve!
At Val David I had met John Brett, the then president of the ACC. He told me of a large cliff near the road south of Plattsburgh, which his friend Fritz Viesner (Wiessner) had carefully looked at, and pronounced unclimable. Such a challenge was impossible to resist, so probably in the spring of 1957 fellow Englishman Hugh Tanton and I went there to take a look. The FM was an obvious line from the top which seemed to peter out about 20 feet above the ground. To access this line from the right, we carelessly overlooked an obvious foothold and took aid from a sling using our right hands. The first free ascent was by Claude Lavalee and Michael Ward. Mike later went on to do the first ascent of Ama Dablam, which had previously killed one of my Cambridge companions, George Fraser.
Footwear varied. Back in the UK, Joe and Don had climbed mostly in old tennis shoes: on the FM Hugh was wearing light leather boots with a thin Vibram sole, whereas I wore PA' s . These I had bought in the shop of their designer, Pierre Alain in Rue St Sulpice, Paris. Pierre as you may recall lead the eponymous 'Fissure Alain' during the first ascent of the Walker Spur. His PA's were short, very tight, partially reinforced canvas, whose thin smooth rubber soles were bevelled at the edges, proceeding half an inch into the uppers. They enabled one to stand on the tiniest of holds, and jammed well in cracks up to 6 inches in width. It is hard to imagine they could be improved upon except possibly for a similar design showing more mercy to the toes. They were soon afterwards imported to Canada, and practically everyone adopted them.
We had a detached attitude towards protection, using pitons in moderation and thread runners where possible. Bolts were considered immoral, and the Montréal group never inserted one during my time. This
Yes, following the success on FM we added Poko to our agenda, along with its slabs which had obviously been overlooked in Wiesner's reconnaissance. Until about 1960 we were the only group active there: the extension of the Thruway has made it more accessible, but some of its charm has been lost in the process.
Thanks to Anders, I am looking forward to meeting Richard Strachan and his wife on Tuesday for the first time in 50 years.
Yours,
John
Late Edit:Jim lawyer wrote to remind me that several great routes were done by Turner and company most of which went to the top of the main wall.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Nov 25, 2012 - 08:06pm PT
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Mostly serendipity, plus modern communications and transportation and a bit of luck. I saw that Steve had been in touch with John, and thought to forward some information about his old friends who'd been mentioned.
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Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
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Nov 25, 2012 - 10:13pm PT
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Turner loomed in the distant past to those of us looking in fear at his Poko and Cathedral routes in the early and mid 1970s. Other routes went up sections of cliff that seemed reasonable as we got better and moved up our standards; but Turner routes challenged the steeper and biggest sections.
Imagine a team of Sacherer and Turner...
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Dec 28, 2013 - 08:14pm PT
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Bump for a dangling conversation...
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Ed Webster
climber
beautiful Maine
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Mar 31, 2014 - 10:11pm PT
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I thought everyone should know that this kind and legendary man, John Turner, passed away of natural causes yesterday at his home in England. sincerely, Ed Webster
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guido
Trad climber
Santa Cruz/New Zealand/South Pacific
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Mar 31, 2014 - 10:46pm PT
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RIP John Turner, an inspiration to all.
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MH2
climber
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Mar 31, 2014 - 11:26pm PT
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Memorable, and remembered. Already legend in the East in '68. Glad to hear he lived so long.
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lucander
Trad climber
Shawangunks, New York
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I like to think that old Tumbledown John never fell until March 30 of this year. I fell the first time I tried climbing Recompense.
Never knew the man, but I've respected him since the minute I learned what it meant to tie in.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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This thread stands as a fine memorial; hopefully it will be bumped periodically.
John, those of us who grew up in the shadow of your accomplishments salute you. R.I.P.
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Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
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We climb on the efforts of our elders...
... thanks for finding adventures on the rock and leaving legacies for us to chase.
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Blakey
Trad climber
Sierra Vista
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This stands as a fine obituary.
I'd never heard of John Turner's activities in the UK, but climbing histories often seem to forget about those who move away.
It's great that through the contact with folks from ST, he will have realised there was considerable interest in his adventures and routes.
Quite right too!
Chapeu John Turner!
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Dave Hough
climber
Keene, NY
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As a Poko climber, this man gave me boat loads of anxiety as I scratched away at his routes. Thank you sir for the most memorable outings. John now joins Geoff Smith, Poko's other giant, on much bigger walls.
Dave
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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what a great story
there are a lot of these floating in the STForum database... but they eventually disappear only to reappear at some very much later date.
one wonders how they might have a little bit more buoyancy
I'll appreciate it for the moment, don't have to remind most of you that these stories will be lost if they're not told, so tell your stories! it doesn't matter if you think they're important or not. John Turner, I'm sure, didn't think that anything he did was particularly noteworthy, yet he had a tremendous influence on NE climbing.
And don't forget to tell those who have been such important influences how much you appreciate they're contributions, we are all here for only the briefest of moments.
Raise a toast to John Turner! think of him the next time you're having a beer around a fire after climbing... we are all eventually ghosts in the shadows of the flames... remembered by those who can still be warmed by them.
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Gunkie
Trad climber
East Coast US
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A climber's climber.
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steveA
Trad climber
Wolfeboro, NH
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I am so sorry to hear this news.
John Turner was a person I admired growing up. He was way ahead of his time
and even today, I would be be willing to bet, most strong climbers would be
terrified leading a few of his routes, with the protection he had BITD.
Repentance, on Cathedral Ledge comes to mind, a 5.10 off-width, coated with moss. A route rarely done today.
A life well lived!!
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slabbo
Trad climber
colo south
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JT did routes over 50 years ago that people still struggle on...
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steveA
Trad climber
Wolfeboro, NH
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Bump for an important historical thread.
Having done the majority of Turner's routes, I feel that Repentance was perhaps the hardest route in this country when put in. The piton, which was stepped on, was way down below the actual off-width crux move, and the upper chockstone moves were no gimme either. Hats off to Mr. Turner!
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jstan
climber
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Years ago when I talked to Turner he described how he was trying to follow the rule of no more than two pins per pitch. He said he took a couple of bad falls as a result. I sensed those falls were still bothering him.
You know we all can think of very deep people we wish had shared more with us before they moved on. Frank Sacherer, Chuck Pratt, John Turner come to mind.
SteveA:
Definitely try to get a photo of the wedge John Turner used.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 26, 2015 - 12:18pm PT
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I give thanks for John Turner.
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Chris Jones
Social climber
Glen Ellen, CA
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Nov 29, 2015 - 09:30pm PT
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John Turner's son, George, recently sent copies of letters John had written over the years to various guide writers, historians and so on. My original of the one addressed to me had gone up in smoke many years ago, and I was delighted to see it again. In the letter John's quirky sense of humor comes through. I had written John with a draft of his times and exploits, reminding him that Dick Dorling and I had run into him at the Bob Downes Hut in England's Peak District in 1963. Turner had returned to the UK in 1962, while Dorling and I were to leave the UK for North America in 1964 and 1965 respectively. At that time he was a bit of a legend in the UK for having made early repeats of Joe Brown/Don Willans routes - we knew nothing of his exploits in the Northeast. In fact we did not know about climbing in the Northeast. John Turner stayed with us through the years: Dorling became a leading climber at Bon Echo, while I was to write about his climbs.
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steveA
Trad climber
Wolfeboro, NH
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Nov 30, 2015 - 04:31am PT
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Chris,
Thanks so much for posting that letter.
Having done many Turner routes; including Bloody Mary and Repentance, I always had great respect for the man, and wished that I had met him.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Nov 30, 2015 - 06:05am PT
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Turner is little known in the UK. When he died, I posted a note about him in ukclimbing.com (http://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/t.php?t=583071);. There were just five responses, and no one who did respond had heard of him. Although he made early repeats of Brown and Whillans routes in the UK, it is clear that his main accomplishments were in North America, and even here he has gone unrecognized because of the locales of his activities.
So I think it is fitting and---to the extent anything we do in the climbing world matters---important for climbers in the land of his major achievements to celebrate his contributions. One can only hope that this thread bubbles up to the top periodically, as it has done now, to remind us all about those who went before us...
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 30, 2015 - 08:30pm PT
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I try my best to bump the good stuff like this thread so folks will have a chance to learn about these amazing climbers. I wish that John had not become self conscious about the veracity of his recollections once I had him engaged in conversation. Truly a deep and lasting disappointment for a historian...
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rbob
climber
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Nov 30, 2015 - 09:53pm PT
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John Turner is a legend in the Adirondacks and throughout the Northeast - at many points in my climbing career I leafed through the various guidebooks looking for his name and visionary routes (rock + ice).
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Gritter
Trad climber
Hudson, Quebec
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Correction:
Actually, John Turner almost NEVER took significant leader falls.
People (now deceased) whom I have spoken to personally, and who climbed with John out of Montreal during the late 50s and early 60s said that he had incredible endurance and that he was cool as a cucumber in difficult situations. Completely unflappable.
This was back when climbing at Poke-O-Moonshine [Poko], Cathedral, Val David and Bon Echo was in its very early phases of development.
Ed Webster wrote a superb but all too brief obituary for John on 15 May 2014, entitled "The Life, Times and Scary Climbs of John Turner (1931-2014)".
Check out Ed's obituary at:
http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web14s/wfeature-john-michael-turner-obituary
Ed Webster had interviewed John at his home in the English Midlands just a year earlier, in 2013.
Quoting Ed from this interview in 2013, here below is some clarification about Turner's utterly unfounded reputation for falling frequently.
Quote from the Webster obituary at:
http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web14s/wfeature-john-michael-turner-obituary
* quote begins below
It was at Ontario's Bon Echo cliffs in 1960, on one of his four attempts to make the first ascent of a route he named The Joke (5.10), that Turner took a 60-foot leader fall and fractured a bone in his foot. When I interviewed John at his home in the English midlands in 2013, he declared quite specifically, "In my entire climbing career, I only had two major leader falls. On a Joe Brown route, Hangover in Llanberis Pass in 1955, and on The Joke at Bon Echo. It was later that I developed a reputation for falling off climbs, but that was just a rumor."
* end of quote **
From:
True Gryte in Montreal [aka the Great White North]
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Missed this the first couple of times. What a guy!
And the meek shall inherit the Earth.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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“And the meek shall inherit the earth”....that particular passage was the one that first made me question the Book. I was only a teenager but I certainly hadn't seen any evidence supporting that particular fable.
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