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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Original Post - Sep 14, 2008 - 09:39pm PT
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America's first lady of alpinism wrote this account of her ascent of the Matterhorn for McClure's magazine, July 1896. An absolutely beautiful and historically rich description of the climb.
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Sep 14, 2008 - 09:47pm PT
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Don't get me wrong. That August morning that I flew from the Sion airfield just as the sun rose bathing the north face in alpenglow with my pack on my lap and our skis laying between us to land on Monta Rosa changed my life.
But it is still the most beautiful choss pile in the Alps:)
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WoodySt
Trad climber
Riverside
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Sep 14, 2008 - 09:52pm PT
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She also made the first ascent of the north peak of Huascaran.
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Daphne
Trad climber
San Rafael, CA
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Sep 14, 2008 - 10:54pm PT
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Thanks so much for posting this wonderful trip report. How especially wonderful to read it in a week where politics and drama have saturated the forum. Yay Annie! And yay Steve!
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Sep 14, 2008 - 10:55pm PT
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Steve
Kudos again for another superb post!
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Sep 14, 2008 - 11:01pm PT
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hey there steve... say... i just LOVE LOVE LOVE seeing the matterhorn..... getting to know more history about it, too, is even greater!....
what a wonderful article for to share... i'm off to go read it now...
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Sep 14, 2008 - 11:48pm PT
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hey there... wow, i loved reading that article... very well done...
learned more about the cemetary there, and the huts up in the mountain... and the sad misfortune of some others...
say, what a term for discribing:
"glisading" (good travel-term in ballet) down the mountain (if one were to fall)...
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 17, 2008 - 10:44am PT
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No love for awesome Annie?!? Amazing.....bump.
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Brunosafari
Boulder climber
Redmond, OR
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Sep 17, 2008 - 12:52pm PT
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I love Annie! Nice helmet, nice stockings! Thanks Steve, that's inspiriational. I liked the old syle of TR, the observations of the graveyard and the bootmakers.
Poetic response, Ron.
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jbar
Mountain climber
The Dirty South
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Sep 19, 2008 - 08:51pm PT
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Thank you. I love the early accounts of mountain climbs. Always before a climb I would try to read as much litterature as I could find about it. FA, etc. Older TR's like Whymper's always seemed very dry but the few women that wrote accounts of their climbs always seemed to be more descriptive. I have a book at home I wish I could remember the name of. It may be the same author. It's a female clmbers account of her climbs throughout the alps. Many of her climbs were in the Dolomites though.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Sep 19, 2008 - 09:07pm PT
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Her gaze is not dissimilar to that of Alex Honnold...
Perhaps the great ones among us share a similar internal terrain.
I'm just saying.
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jbar
Mountain climber
The Dirty South
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Sep 19, 2008 - 09:11pm PT
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Also interesting to note is how she contributes the death of Michael Croz to the incompetence of his partner and warns other climbers to be careful who they climb with. 20 years after the first ascent and the controversy is still fairly warm.
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murcy
climber
San Fran Cisco
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Sep 19, 2008 - 09:20pm PT
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sweet---thanks!
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LuckyPink
climber
the last bivy
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Sep 19, 2008 - 11:16pm PT
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thanks, the gals need to see the heroines.....
sometimes I get tired of the sausagefest
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 20, 2008 - 12:25am PT
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When I was just getting into climbing as a junior high school student I bought a copy of Showell Styles' mountaineering history On Top of the World, 1967. Long narrative but almost surreal in that Annie got the notion to go tackle one of the giants of the Andes at fifty eight years of age! Truly awesome!
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Sep 20, 2008 - 08:37pm PT
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Good stuff!
A few nuggets...
Tobacco card and the cover of her book on her ascent of Huascaran:
Back of the card (from 1914):
Title page:
Summit photo of her "as" on the North Peak of Huascaran (recreated in the studio):
I climbed Huascaran Sur in '86 and it was pretty wild to think of anyone in that neck of the woods back in the early 1900's, much less a much older than average woman climber.
Wasn't she one of the original founding members of the AAC as well? Some wierd politics from back then, to be sure...(her feud with the Workmans for instance)...
Tales not yet fully told, methinks...
-Brian in SLC
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Brian in SLC
Social climber
Salt Lake City, UT
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Sep 20, 2008 - 09:08pm PT
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Some bio stuff from the AAJ...
Interesting to note that she held the altitude record for woman in 1897 (Orizaba in Mexico), ascended the North Peak of Huascaran in her late 50's, and was still climbing 20k+ feet peaks into her early 60's. Didn't really take up the climbing thing until her late 30's.
-Brian in SLC
ANNIE SMITH PECK
(Original member, resigned 1912)
Born at Providence, R. I., October 19th, 1850. Daughter of
George Bacheler and Ann Power (Smith) Peck. A descendant
of Joseph Peck, who settled at Hingham, Mass., in 1638, and,
on her mother’s side, of Roger Williams. Unmarried.
Stockbridge School, Providence. U. of Mich. (A.B., 1878;
A.M., 1881). Studied in Germany, 1884-85, and was the first
woman to study at the American School of Classical Studies,
Athens, 1885-86.
Specialized in Greek and archeology. Taught in various
scl~ools. Professor of Latin, Purdue U. and Smith. Lectured
on South America from the tourist and commercial standpoints.
U. S. delegate to International Congress of Alpinism, Paris,
1900. F. R. G. S. Visited South America, 1915, 1916, 1922,
1925, 1929-30. Received the order of Al Merit0 (Chile) on her
80th birthday.
Author of A Search for the Apex of America, 1911; The South
American Tour, 1914 ; Commercial and Industrial South America,
1922; Flying over South America, 1932.
Home : New York City. Died July 18th, 1935. (Who Was
Who; N. E. A. B. 15 :152, with portrait; Early American Ascents,
79.)
1888. Mt. Shasta.
1895. Breithorn, Wellenkuppe, Matterhorn, Jungfrau.
1900. Zugspitze (Hiillenthal) ; Gross Glockner, Monte Cristallo,
Fiinffingerspitze.
1897. With the backing of the New YorlE World: Popocatepetl,
Orizaba (then the highest elevation attained by a woman).
1903. Peru : El Misti (September).
1904. Bolivia: Mt. Sorata (to 19,000 ft.), August 15th; Mt.
Huascaran (to 19,000 ft. on E. side and 18,000 ft. on W. side),
September 4th.
1906. Exploration at source of the Amazon (Marafion) River,
Peru. To 18,000 ft. on highest peak of Raura Range. Unnamed
16,300 ft. (1st ascent). Made 3d and 4th attempts on Mt. Huascaran,
attaining 17,GOO ft. and 17,500 ft. on W. side.
1908. N. summit of Mt. Huascaran (21,812 ft.; 1st ascent).
This was afterward named Cumbra Ana Peck by the Lima Geographical
Society.
Miss Peck estimated, without instrumental readings above
19,600 ft., that the N. peak (lower summit) of Mt. Huascaran was
probably 24,COO ft. and the highest in South America. Mrs. Workman
(q.v.), believing that Aconcagua held this position, sent a
scientific expedition which determined the elevation of the N.
peak to be 21,812 ft. and that of the S. peak 22,182 ft. (This was
a matter of personal rivalry, since Mrs. Workman, in 1906, had
made a new altitude record for women by the ascent of .Pinnacle
Pk., 23,300 ft., in the Himalayas.)
At the annual meeting of the American Alpine Club, January
2nd, 1909, a committee composed of Profs. Reid, Retch and
Pickering was formed to secure information on Mt. Huascaran,
“concerning which exaggerated reports had been circulated in the
press.” At the meeting of 1910, the committee confirmed the altitudes
as determined by the expedition sent by Mrs. Workman.
1911. (Aet. 61.). Two peaks (ca. 21,250 ft.; 1st ascents) at
the S.E. end of the Coropuna massif (Peru). [Miss Peck’s attention
had been drawn to this mountain by a statement that it was
to be an objective of the Yale Peruvian expedition, led by H. Bingham
(A. A. C., 1914). It was then thought, from Bandelier’s
book, that it might be higher than Aconcagua. She attempted to
be first on the ground, and claimed to have reached the top, but the
Yale expedition’s survey showed that the highest point, 21,703 ft.,
which Bingham ascended, was the cone at the N.W. end of the
massif.]
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 28, 2008 - 01:03pm PT
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Nice posting folks! Lots of history in Annie's wake!
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Nohea
Trad climber
Aiea,Hi
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Sep 30, 2008 - 04:03am PT
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Great post, kinda a 2 for 1, yea climbing!
Aloha,
wil
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