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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 12, 2015 - 09:55pm PT
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I was reading Warren Hardings story on the Dolt, and he says that Dolt became disillusioned and started quoting the Bible a lot late 1957. He moved to southern California and started his job at Douglas Aircraft. But as others joined on the Nose route ascent with Harding, Dolt was still on the route as well pushing it to Texas Flake. In the Spring of 1958 Powell came back and the three of them while having gear difficulties drilled the DOLDT hanger ladder from Texas Flake to Boot Flake, where Harding took a big fall while ascending Boot Flake. Dolt went back to quoting the Bible about impending doom and Powell’s ankle was not holding up so that is the last time Dolt and Powell were on the Nose. In Mark Powell’s story on the Dolt, he mentions that Dolt got upset and was screaming to God when a magnesium hanger snapped under the pressure of his body weight. So add magnesium hangers to the FA of the Nose route. Maybe the Magnesium hangers were those longer strap hangers shown in the photo under the Dolt Winch? Harding states that he felt that Dolt was done with this type of climbing. Harding at the end of his Dolt story explains another scene which shows that Dolt’s “pain” was happening as early as 1957. Dolt wasn’t scared of Harding, and it appears like Harding was actually watching over and caring for the Dolt the whole time. Harding writes:
Scene: Camp 4, Yosemite Valley, sometime 1957. Campfire burning low. Dolt and Warren Harding sitting staring into the embers, sipping a last glass of wine (all the others have sacked out - passed out?).
Action - dialogue: Dolt suddenly rises to his feet - his beard bristles - his cold, pale blue eyes flash.
“Warren, I’m going to learn to fly!!”
“Sure Dolt - I know you can do it,”
Warren replies with the uneasy feeling that Dolt isn’t thinking about airplanes…
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA/Boulder, CO
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Jun 12, 2015 - 10:40pm PT
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Rupert Kammerlander used to stamp his hangers RK. I am not sure of his Yosemite climbing experience, but he put up a lot of long free climbs at Pinnacles National Monument(now Park). Hmmm.
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 13, 2015 - 10:12am PT
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Gibralter Rock
My wife liked to take vacations to resorts and relax seeing the town and hitting the spa. Spa day to me meant “road trip to explore a near by crag!” On this trip I headed up to Gibralter Rock. I felt really lost following the map directions up up and up the hill but somehow I found it. I was at Gibralter Rock which is located above the town of Santa Barbara California. Awesome chunk of stone for sure and the parking is conveniently at the top. I first did an easy climb on the South face called Clingon 5.8 which was manageable and gave me great confidence that my day was going to be awesome. Sometimes climbing with the soloist scares the crap out of me especially on lead. So I stepped it up a notch and moved over to the west face to a route called T-Crack 5.10a. I remember that the hand crack crux of the route was awesome but the route seemed short and the excitement of the route ended early.
So to my right was another route which I thought I read in the guidebook was a 5.10+ called Mirror in the Bathroom. I noticed the route having a 3 bolt face alternate 5.11- finish at the top. I needed to set a down/below anchor for soloist but the start of the route was 30’ up a easy broken slab. Overall I didn’t want my rope anchor to be low on the slab because if I fell early on the route the rope stretch alone would deck me onto the top of the slab. So I free soloed up the slab to where the wall got vertical and I used the first bolt of the route as my soloist down anchor (don’t do this and besides my anchor was only a single old bolt). The second bolt looked really close so I just had to get to it and then I would be relatively safe the rest of the way. By the third bolt I already knew that I was on a 5.12 or something because I had already way passed my comfort zone of fear and I was still scared that I may deck on the slab. I was totally gripped but at the same time I was in the zone. I guess I could have grabbed the quickdraw and then bailed, but I figured I was already getting out of the rough since there was a big major sloping rail to my right for my feet.
I was up around bolt 4 or higher when I fell and it felt like the soloist wasn’t grabbing at first. I heard a pop and then the rope caught me and I stopped even with the second bolt. At first I looked around as I was hanging and started laughing from the excitement while I could feel my heart pounding to the max. But when I looked over at my quick draws the adventure wasn’t over. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing and I became as still as I could. The first bolt had ripped away from the wall and shot upward into the second bolts quickdraw. The figure eight knot had passed through the carabiner of the quick draw and the only thing stopping me from hitting the deck, was that the locking carabiner on the anchor got stuck in a perpendicular position within the second quick draws carabiner. I took a quickdraw off of my harness and slowly and gently clipped one carabiner to the draw and one to the locking carabiner as a backup. Then I locked on my ascender to the rope and made the second bolt my new soloist down anchor. If the second draw didn’t catch I still had a third and fourth draw, and after that I would have been toast.
I was thinking at this point of bailing from the route since I already chanced death, and I promised my wife that I would return to the resort unbroken. But for some reason I knew I could do this route. At that time in my life my climbing was peaking around V8 and I could climb 5.12 sport and 5.12 trad cracks, and I had already climbed hundreds of routes with a Soloist and a solo Rescuscender. So I jugged back up to my high point and I continued the lead from there. I stuck the moves and made it to the 3 bolt face variation at the top. I believe at that time there was still fresh drill dust around the three bolts, and if my memory serves me well that upper 3 bolt face is a totally classic thin crimp climbers dream.
From my day of climbing at Gibralter Rock I felt like I was glowing from the excitement. I had a huge smile all the way back to the resort. But first I stopped at the climbing store in Santa Barbara and told a climber that worked there that I broke their Gibralter Rock route. I showed him the old bolt hanger which was instantly my new and most cherished souvenir. The climber was shocked at my story and showed me an updated Gibralter Rock topo which showed that Mirror in the Bathroom was an aid route rated C2 5.10+. Within a realm of total fear I somehow almost sent the route free on lead on a soloist. Good memories for sure!
This hanger looks like a LONGware hanger and was placed in 1954 by Herb Rickert, Rick Knight and John Hestenes. The hanger has no manufacturers stamp. The 1974 SMC hanger also from Mirror In the Bathroom I obtained years later from a different climber.
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pyro
Big Wall climber
Calabasas
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Jun 13, 2015 - 11:00am PT
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Marty glad you survived the Gibralter rock incident!
I love the Santa Barbara sandstone climbing..
my favorite crack climb is the makunamia at cold Spring Dome
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guido
Trad climber
Santa Cruz/New Zealand/South Pacific
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Jun 13, 2015 - 12:02pm PT
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Cool thread there Marty, thank you all the work you have dedicated to chronicling our climbing heritage and the vast repertoire of equipment paraphernalia and the characters associated with such.
If I can locate these I'll see if I can get a sample to you for your collection.
This brought back some old memories of climbing at the St Helena Palisades with some rather sketchy hangers we fabricated and placed!
"I remember doing some routes in the Palisades with Roper in the early 60's. We made up these crazy bolt hangers out of old license plates!
A short lived adventure into making hardware. We borrowed some ginormnous Eucalyptus stumps from the golf range in Tilden Park for our "anvil", and set up shop in Ropers backyard.
Not one of the most intelligent things we ever did. Then again not one of the dumbest."
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 13, 2015 - 04:26pm PT
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Pyro, on that same Santa Barbara vacation I went up the mountain again and bouldered at Lizards Mouth. I had a single piece of paper topo drawing with 30 problems listed on it all surrounding the Lizards Mouth formation. I could not believe how awesome the stone was and how many boulders were in that area that were still unclimbed and unexplored. There are probably 1000 boulder problems there now?
Guido, I saw your awesome license plate hangers on Ed Hartouni's thread. They are beautiful and very scary! I hope none of them broke on you guys as you were climbing on them.
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 13, 2015 - 04:30pm PT
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Baboquivari Peak, Southeast Arete route
Old relics found on Babo. In the 1930s, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) built a ladder up the final pitch of the Forbes Route, and built a heliograph station on the very top of the peak. The heliograph station was a device used to signal from one mountain peak to another. Today only brackets remain in the rock and wood from the structure is scattered around. The nails are from the heliograph station. The drill bit was found in the bushes near where the heliograph station once stood. The large bracket is one of the original ladder brackets placed in the 1930s, and a piece of wood from the original ladder. The LONGware bolt hanger is from the Southeast Arete route pitch six belay, placed in March 1957 by Don Morris, David Ganci, Tom Hale, Joanna McComb and Rick Tidrick. The original bolt used was a 1/4” flat head screw put into a wood plug which was jammed into the rock.
In 1999 my friends and I arrived at Baboquivari Peak to climb the Southeast Arete. We arrived mid day and carried along our sleeping bags to spend the night on Lions Ledge and do the climb the next day. The guidebook says a 45 minute approach and it took us four hours to get there. Darn guidebook authors! Already another party was on Lions Ledge camped at the seep and had ropes strung up a few pitches on the Spring route. The night was calm except for a few baby skunks that kept pestering us and rummaging through our belongings. Not much sleep that night but its morning so lets climb! My friends were excited to get onto the route and I was excited to get on top and get a 1930s ladder bracket for my museum. On me my water was in my Camelbak along with a very big crescent wrench and unassembled hacksaw.
We started up the route and a few pitches up the hacksaw punctured my Camelbak and I was then instantly soaked and out of water. We got to the Pitch six belay where I saw the old LONGware hanger that was placed in 1957, along with a newer Metolius hanger to its right. We had a few pieces of pro in as well as being clipped into the two bolts so I hacksawed off the bolt from the top to free it from the rock. Once the hanger was removed it revealed its scary secret. The bolt hole was drilled and a wood plug was hammered in. Then a flat head 1/4” course thread screw was used to attach the hanger to the rock. I have seen lead plugs before and wood plugs, but all you climbers out there were basically hanging off of nothing. Let me explain: For Pitch 5 the climbers traverse 20’ left around the corner to a small position where a 500 foot vertical drop is now directly below. Clip the bolt and remain in a somewhat hanging belay position. So from 1957 till 1990s climbers were only hanging out on that one LONGware hanger. Yipe!!!
We summited late, signed the register, and still had an hour before we descended back to Lions Ledge. So as my partners were chilling I scampered around the summit to the top of the Forbes route and found my ladder bracket of choice. I chose it because the wood ladder step was still with the bracket. After the hacksaw fight the relic was freed from the rock. Back on the summit I searched around finding a few more items. I believe the original heliograph station was hit by lightning and burned down.
On the way down from the mountain I refilled my water bottle directly from the seep and suffered no problems from tainted water. It actually tasted really fresh. The LONGware hanger from the Southeast Arete route has no manufacturer stamp on it, but the measurements and everything are the exact same when compared to a LONGware hanger.
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA/Boulder, CO
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Jun 13, 2015 - 11:10pm PT
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It might ruin the 'patina' of that old Longware hanger, but I had one from the 60's that was quite rusty. After running it under a wire brush on a grinder for 20-30 seconds I was just able to make out half of the Longware stamp.
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 14, 2015 - 05:08pm PT
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LONGware
It will be nice to lock down the history of LONGware products. What year was the gear first created and then when did Dick Long stop making climbing gear? I have seen through the museums statements that LONGware started in the late 1950s, started in 1960, ended in 1962, ended previous to 1964, and then there is the 1968 Ski Hut catalog showing the whole line of LONGware products available. Hmmmm.
Items in the above photo:
 c1960 - The three aluminum bongs are from Jim Bridwell
c mid 1950s - The three steel bongs are from Wally Vegors
c1964 - 6” T-Pin Piton from Wally Vegors, shown in magazine ad
c1964 - 6 1/2” T-Pin Piton belonged to Bill Sewrey, from Dana Hollister, shown in magazine ad
c late 1950s - painted light blue on red steel bong from Don Lauria
c Nov 1962 - rusted bong from Venus’ Needle. Layton Kor’s bong, from Jim Waugh
c? - 5” U-Form piton, channel piton
c late 1950s 1 1/4” Knife Blade painted light blue on red from Don Lauria. Don mentioned that the LONGware 1” Knife Blade is where Dolt possibly got his idea for his company logo. Same shape but slightly modified. If this was true then that would be circa early 1958, or late 1957 whenever Dolt first created the logo drawing.
c? - Ring Angle pitons 5” and 6”
c? - Blade piton found in the dirt under a picnic table in Camp 4, from Jay Clark
c? - Spoon piton
c? - Swivel pulley, shown in 1966 Holubar catalog.
I have LONGware hangers from the Leaning Tower which was completed October 1961. But Harding was on this route previous to the FA and I am not sure what year that was.
This steel 3 1/2” LONGware bong was used on the third ascent of the Nose. The two extra holes and rounded front tips are modifications by Robert Pinckney
Both 5” and 6” steel bong lengths were available in the 1950s.
1963/64 Holubar catalog lists the bongs in 5” or 6” lengths,
64/65 holubar list bongs only in 5” lengths
Ski hut 68 only in 5”
—The two hangers shown below are from the ASCA from Chris McNamara pulled from somewhere in the Yosemite Valley. These two hangers are the two style hangers that LONGware produced.
If anybody has any history for LONGware products please share. I was always under the impression that the larger bongs were available during the time the Nose route was being ascended. So sometime early 1958? The Yosemite climbers probably didn’t know about them. No internet yet:) But Wally is sure he purchased his set of three in mid 1950s. I also believe that LONGware bongs (late 50s) were available before Chouinard (1960) and then Clog (1962?) and SMC (early 1970s).
The LONGware hangers I thought started in 1957, but the Gibralter rock hanger is dated 1954. On the finishing end of the company history, many catalogs show LONGware products being available strongly through the mid 1960s and ending sometime 1968. Did Dick Long ever create a company catalog or brochure? Does anybody have his contact info?
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 14, 2015 - 11:01pm PT
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drljefe
climber
El Presidio San Augustin del Tucson
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Jun 14, 2015 - 11:17pm PT
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Raps in Mendoza Canyon
So this is a Longwear?
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pyro
Big Wall climber
Calabasas
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Jun 15, 2015 - 08:02am PT
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Marty was up lizards mouth sometime last year.
love the sandstone out there..
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA/Boulder, CO
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Jun 15, 2015 - 08:22am PT
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^^^^^^^^^^^
Looks like a Longware to me.
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 15, 2015 - 09:22am PT
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Gerry Mtn Sports and Salewa hangers were given three main nicknames.
“Pop-Top hangers, Co-Op hangers, and Lever-Out hangers.”
The “Pop-top” nickname for the Gerry and Salewa hangers came from the change in how a beverage can was opened. In 1935 beverages were now available in cans and the can style on the market was either a Cone Top or Flat Top can. The Cone Top cans had the same cap as bottled beverages had and were easy to open. The Flat Top can required a can opener to open them and many cans advertised can openers on the side of the cans. The Flat Top cans were easier to stack on the store shelves but were harder to open. So the Cone Top cans were popular up to the 1950s. In the late 1950s the pull tab top or “Pop-top” was invented and many companies started to have them on their cans. I believe Budweiser advertised their Tab-Top can in 1962.
At that same 1959-1962 time the Gerry Mtn Sports and Salewa Hangers were available through the catalogs. Climbers compared the hangers to be similar to the ring pull on the 1960s and 1970s beverage cans. The problem with the Pop-Top tabs were that people were opening the cans and throwing the pull tabs on the ground causing a big litter problem. The 1970s hippies loved to make necklaces out of strings of pull tabs interwoven together. In the late 1970s the Sta-Tab was invented and that’s the can opening lever that is on beverage cans today.
The Salewa hangers were being brought in and distributed through the climbing co-ops at the time, so the name “Co-Op” hangers were applied to the hangers. Also the design of the hanger being a lever in shape somewhat scared climbers to use these hangers since when the hanger was weighted it would somewhat loosen the rivets causing the hangers to spin.
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 16, 2015 - 08:40am PT
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crunch
Social climber
CO
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Jun 16, 2015 - 10:02am PT
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Hey Marty, you know anything about these hangers? They're sort of strap-type, but different to anything I've ever seen anywhere else.
Placed 1967 by Eric Bjornstad on North Chimney, Echo Tpwer, Fisher Towers, Utah. Still there! Still hold bodyweight (or did as recently as 2007, forty years after the FA)! I asked Eric about this, showed him a photo, he had no recollection.
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Branscomb
Trad climber
Lander, WY
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Jun 16, 2015 - 10:08am PT
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Very interesting study you've compiled. At first I thought, oh geez, what is this?, but then it really got my interest. Nice work!
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 17, 2015 - 08:17am PT
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CRUNCH - Very cool bolts! I have not seen these before. Maybe they are made to hold up conduit in old buildings or something? I wonder if the nail bolt used is attached like a Star Dryvin bolt attaches, with two metal shield halves wrapped on the end by a piece of lead and then the nail is pounded in for a super snug fit. Or it is a nail pounded into just a drilled hole. I am a hardware bracket guy so I am sure I will come across this item now that I know what I am looking for. Telephone poles have mostly bolts and nuts. Plumbing would not require the bracket to be rounded. My guess would be that the bracket was used in a electrical application.
Nice bolt for sure!
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 17, 2015 - 08:25am PT
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karabin museum
Trad climber
phoenix, az
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 17, 2015 - 08:28am PT
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