L'Equipement de l'Alpiniste 1900

Showing the patina of its age this lovely Charlet Moser hammer probably dates from just after WWII and belonged to Ian Leigh, who for many years was the Commandant of the Joint Services Mountain Training Centre at Fort George in Scotland and a retired Army major. Along with Simond, Charlet Moser were and still are in 2010, long established gear manufacturers in the Chamonix Valley beneath Mont Blanc.

The Scottish Mountain Heritage Collection: http://www.smhc.co.uk/objects_item.asp?item_id=31718

Bhend ice axes earned their first great success in 1938, when German climbers Anderl Heckmair and Ludwig Vorg, and Austrian climbers Heinrich Harrer and Fritz Kasparek, completed the first ascent of the North Face of the Eiger, a climb which repelled numerous other parties, and lead to several widely-reported tragedies, including the deaths of German climbers Max Sedlmayr and Karl Mehringer, in 1935, who froze during a storm, and the death of German climber Toni Kurz, in 1936, who hung lifeless on a rope before the eyes of would-be rescuers. These tragedies contributed to the myth of the Eiger, which became known as the Morwand, or Wall of Death, a play on the common name, Norwand, or north face.

Following World War Two, the British Everest expedition, lead by Colonel John Hunt, contracted with Alfred to supply crampons, ice axes and ice hammers, and New Zealand climber Edmund Hillary, and Nepalese climber Tenzing Norgay, carried Bhend ice axes on the first ascent of Everest, in 1953. A photograph taken by Hillary shows Norgay standing on the summit, cloaked in an insulated jacket and overboots, holding a Bhend ice axe triumphantly over his head. Bhend ice axes were also used by the Swiss expedition of 1956, lead by Dolf Reist, which succeeded in making the second and third ascents of Everest, and the first ascent of Lhotse.

When I visited Bhend Metallbau, Ruedi showed me two ice axes, an old ice axe, made in 1880, and a new ice axe, made in 2010. The old ice axe was over one meter long, with a shaft of dark, rough-grained wood. The pick was chipped, and the head was dull gray, although the characteristic engraving was still visible: K. Bhend, Grindelwald. It was strange to hold an ice axe more than one hundred years old, and it was hard for me to imagine how the tool would have been used. I reasoned that the long shaft was held like a staff, and the spike was important for balance. The pick was straight, with small teeth on the underside, and the adze was flat and angular. Perhaps the pick was anchored in the ice, and climbers pulled themselves along the shaft, like a handrail, while the adze was used to hack platforms.

The new ice axe, in contrast, was about seventy centimeters long, and felt much like a modern ice axe. The shaft was made of blond, fine-grained wood, and the swing was light and balanced. Compared to the old ice axe, the head was smooth and polished, a graceful form, pleasing to hold in a variety of positions: pick forward, pick backward and so on.

The most striking feature of the new ice axe was the lack of teeth on the underside of the pick. Indeed, there seemed little to secure the pick in ice. This can be explained by the fact that a Bhend ice axe is, above all, a tool for cutting steps. There are several other features, in addition to the lack of teeth, which make the ice axe suitable for step-cutting. These include the smooth curve along the top of the head, the wide rounded blade of the adze, and the tip of the pick, which is flattened into a small horizontal blade.

Ende der Dreissigerjahre entwickelte Alfred Bhend (Vater) ein Leichtsteigeisen. Zu Beginn der Siebzigerjahre wurde die Herstellung eingestellt. Die industrielle Produktion von Steigeisen aller Art rechtfertigte die aufwendige Einzelherstellung nicht mehr.