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Jerry Dodrill
climber
Sebastopol, CA
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Topic Author's Original Post - Oct 8, 2008 - 04:54pm PT
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Last night at Glen Denny's slideshow he showed an image of Chris Jones and Gary Colliver looking at an early hand drawn topo of the Salathé Wall. The picture was taken in 1969. He said that up until that era, route information was largely relayed in an oral tradition, one climber to the next. It got me thinking about the origin of the modern topo and that it must have gone through an evolution over the years, in which many people participated.
So I ask... Is there a point in time, a place, a route, or a person from whom, or at which, this language was conceived? Was it from guides in Europe? When, and pertaining to what, was the very first climbing guide book published? And finally, do we have any copies or record of the earliest Yosemite topos?
Intrigued,
-Jerry
link to photo: http://www.glendenny.com/Portfolios/068.html
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crøtch
climber
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Good question, and a great photo.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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I saw that at the FaceLift (and perhaps in his book?) and what struck me was how modern it seemed, that is, I could read and understand it without any problem.
The original Meyers select Topo's refers to the need to be able to communicate the routes to non-English speaking climbers coming to the Valley.
Roper's guide has a legend of topo symbols in it... I'll scan it later... apparently recommended by the european climbing authority...
Topos are mentioned in this Tejada-Flores piece appearing in Ascent in 1974
The Guidebook Problem
suspect they existed prior to that time period...
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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They are actually comparing two topos of the Salathe' Wall in that photo. (nowadays we compare the Meyers/Reid and Supertopo versions!)
Royal Robbins also mentioned the existence of topos in Advanced Rockcraft.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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here's an interesting problem...
I suspect that the topos that were drawn for Meyers' "Green Guide" were a composite of the best topos drawn by the community at that time... these topos survive into the "Yellow Guide" and the Meyers/Reid "Blue/Green Guide" (I can't tell those colors apart in that shade) and finally the Reid guide... there are enhancements as time goes on, but Falcon Press now "owns" the topos, topos that were generated by the community.
The dilemma is that Falcon Press needs to have ownership in order to be able to make at least cost for publishing the guide. They wouldn't touch common domain stuff with a 10 foot pole...
...on the other hand, they aren't anxious to change much, or even publish a new guide, and no one else can either, at least not using those topos and pictures...
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Ed,
It's my understanding that Don Reid has the rights to the material in the guidebook, including topos, and he is free to use a new publisher if he chooses. My friend Brad looked over the contract and said this was the case.
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looking sketchy there...
Social climber
Latitute 33
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Europeans were using topos for routes long before they became popular in the US (notably Yosemite). The first Topo guide to the Valley was not Meyer's guide (though George's book was certainly the progenitor of the modern topo guide).
In 1974 (two years before the first Meyers guide), three Brits: Dave Nicol, Pete Livesey and Keith Nannery published Rock Climbs in Yosemite, Topographic Drawings of Selected Routes.
And these topos were largely "drawn" from those informally circulating around Camp 4 (for many years). You can see the influence of existing "notational" styles commonly used by the English and Europeans when looking at the 1974 guide. The 1974 guide also is fairly error prone. The fact that was a "foriegn" guidebook to the valley is fairly evident in this and other ways. [The topo notations commonly used in the Valley differed and you can see these difference in the 1976 Meyers guide.]
Meyers, on the other hand, drew, gathered and redrew topos in the format commonly used by Valley regulars and brought a much higher level of accuracy to the project. When his 1976 loose leaf guide was redone and expanded 1982, the production quality and usefulness was greatly enhanced. Both the 1976 and 1982 Meyer's guides had a profound affect on guidebook design and production for years.
As far as "owning" any topos, the only thing a copyright of a topo can cover is the actual artwork, drawing and specific design of that particular topo. Since the topo only attempts to describe natural features that independently exist apart from the topo itself, anyone is free to draw and publish their own topo. Facts cannot be copyrighted, even if the discoverer of the "facts" is the only person with independent knowledge of these "facts."
Which, in plain English means, that once you publish a topo, route name, etc., anyone is free to use that name (FA info) and draw their own topo based upon your work. What is prohibited is merely reproducing someone else’s work directly.
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Flashlight
climber
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They did not evolve. They were created.
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Nate D
climber
San Francisco
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This is a good topic. Ken will post up, I hope. He's posted some fairly old Valley topos in the past...
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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This is a good question and the answer is not entirely clear-- there seem to have been multiple "first" topos. The oldest one I am familiar with is George Flagg's 1910 topo of the ascent of Huntington Ravine, reproduced in the Watermans' Yankee Rock and Ice. It is a line drawing, not that unlike the sort of topos Glenn Denny did in the 1960s.
I've also seen a few from the 1920s and 1930s for smaller English and French crags.
Lines traced over photographs became common pretty early in the 20th century.
So far as Yosemite is concerned, Jay Taylor puts the start of topographic sketches in the 1950s which seems plausible. His article "Mapping Adventure," is recommended, for those who have institutional subscriptions to the Journal of HIstorical Geography:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WJN-4HPK90H-1&_user=4420&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=4420&md5=ef6b42c6c2cf19052b6d7dd78fdbf5be
If you don't have research library access or a personal sub to JHG (and who would?), you can wait for his book to come out..
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jody,
> They did not evolve. They were created.
:-)
They were created, and then they evolved from that point!
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Topos were both created and evolved.
Roper's 1970 Yosemite guide included nearly six pages on the "UIAA system" for describing climbs: "the information has been supplied by the UIAA and is printed verbatim." It includes a page of standard symbols for topos.
This suggests that detailed topos were well established in at least some of Europe by then, and there was enough interaction between U.S. and European climbers that they couldn't have been a new concept.
His comments: "Topos are highly detailed schematic route descriptions. Designed to supplement or even replace the written description, topos are controversial in that they tend to make climbing a bit easier on the brain. Routefinding problems are simplified; one know just where to expect a fixed piton or an off-route arch. They encourage climbers onto difficult routes because of their unshakable belief in the topo. Some topos have listed the actual pitons used per pitch. Topos assure speed records; they also lessen responsibility. No more querulous statements such as, 'I'll just look around this corner,' only, 'Here we are and where the hell's the belay bolt.' In other words, part of the adventure of climbing is removed. Topos are not used in this guidebook for the reasons mentioned above and also because this size book is impractical for them (topos are usually drawn on large sheets of paper)."
There seems to be something of a despairing element in what Roper says; the topo cuckoo may have been comfortably ensconced in many climbers' nests by then, if not earlier. Certainly the 1976 Meyers topo guide was well received, and I don't rememember anyone objecting to topos then on principle.
I couldn't find anything obvious in Basic Rockcraft or Advanced Rockcraft about topos.
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tolman_paul
Trad climber
Anchorage, AK
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All I know is they're a great improvement over the text guides. I recall my old pinnacles guide book, and the epics following "faint animal trails". Those were the days.
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Gene
climber
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I have an old tourist map of Yosemite circa 1920s. It has a bird’s eye view of the Valley with features labeled. I have also seen old maps of hiking trails – specifically one of Yosemite Falls Trail, from maybe the 1930s – that is for all intent and purposes a hiker’s topo. Climbing topos are a natural progression, differing from bird’s eye views and such only in scope and purpose.
RGM
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Jerry Dodrill
climber
Sebastopol, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 8, 2008 - 08:14pm PT
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I just looked in a coffee table book by Stefano Ardito called "Mont Blanc, Discovery and Conquest of the Giant of the Alps." In it are engravings of the Mont Blanc Chain, showing routes up the mountains from the 1846 edition of Travellers in Switzerland and the Alps of Savoy and Piedmont.
"The first complete guide to Mont Blanc, published in 1863, was written by John Ball, President of the Alpine Club." The image is more of an overview that shows the glaciers and ridges of the range than an individual route topo.
A few pages later is an image of the cover of "A Guide to Chamonix and the Range of Mont Blanc, by Ed. Whymper." "Whymper, an excellent draftsman, demonstrated his skill and his detailed knowledge of the massif in the illustrations to his Guide to Chamonix and the Range of Mont Blanc, published in 1896." It shows one of the illustrations mentioned, a dotted line route overlay depicting the glacier terrain and camps. It akin to a photo overlay more than a rock climbing topo. So it looks like what Gene described above, but for mountaineering.
I'd be curious to see the other illustrations in this book.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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jerry-- thanks for scanning the ardito.
the ball guides covered the entire range of the alps and were the ac club standards. most of them included line drawings on engravings or (later) photographs.
the 1910 huntington ravine drawings are interesting because they label the cruxes. (they also included action drawings of particular sections), but no one seems to have used them much.
the topos that come later are more abstract-- there's a lot less attempt to offer a straightforward representation of the geology. it's an interesting transition.
work is bad this week, but if things calm down later ill try to get some scans up.
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Nate D
climber
San Francisco
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Cool information all. Thanks for the article link, klk!
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Jerry Dodrill
climber
Sebastopol, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 9, 2008 - 01:45pm PT
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KLK, that mapping adventure article looks great. But $31.50 for a pdf? Yikes!
I'd love to see the original topo for the Nose. That would be rather interesting in this context.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Nov 20, 2008 - 12:37am PT
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came across this topo in Robbins' account of the FA of NA Wall [url="http://www.americanalpineclub.org/AAJO/pdfs/1965/331_Robbins_NorthAmericaWall_aaj1965.pdf#search=%22Yosemite%22"]AAJ 1965 p331[/url]
You could certainly use the Roper topo legend to decipher this...
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jcques
Trad climber
quebec canada
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Nov 20, 2008 - 12:06pm PT
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I think that to find the first topo whe most go back in the twenty when Welzenbach defined a rating system for climbing. Before that, one can imagine that the topo was just a line on paper. Whit that topo,the climber just have to follow his nose to go to the summit. In that way, the climb was alway a first ascent. I think that, with the popularity of climbing, people want to notify there first ascent and want to have the credit for hit. So, anybody else can't say that he made the first ascent of the route. On that topo, I can imagine that they just put the minimum information, as more difficult is the route better climber he was. At the other hand, other people just want to go to the summit and have good time. They ask for more and more information on the topo to avoid any stress of not knowing what is going after. In a climb, we met guy who always critics the topo for his bad routefinding. They ask at their teacher more information to be "safe"
I think that the modern topo is made by the influence of these two ethics in climbing: adventure, to face the unknow, and sport, to follow bolts.
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SuperTopo on the Web
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Let us know!