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Gene
climber
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Sep 10, 2007 - 11:20am PT
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My business partner went to high school with Bob Locke. They were rivals for top seed on the tennis team. Anybody have any good BL tales to share? He should be remembered for more than his tragic demise.
GM
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elcap-pics
climber
Crestline CA
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Sep 10, 2007 - 12:50pm PT
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Thanks for the posts... very moving... if you are around climbing long enough, as I have been, you will have your heart broken many times and perhaps that great saddness is one of the things that make the really good days so special...
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John Vawter
Social climber
San Diego
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Sep 10, 2007 - 01:50pm PT
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Excellent, spare, moving account Rick. Off hand I can't think of a published piece that illustrates the climber's dichotomy so simply, and so well. Your account belongs in an anthology.
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Jan 25, 2010 - 10:33pm PT
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Rick
Somehow I'd missed this the first time.
A well spoken, very sad story.
We all try not to think of these things,
and the last couple of years has been gruesome.
I wish I could add more, but can only say those that
are gone are missed.
Thanks for sharing.
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, Ca.
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Jan 25, 2010 - 10:57pm PT
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pretty brutal. Those SAR dudes have to see some gnarly sh#t....
Cheers, Sar guys!
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jstan
climber
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Jan 25, 2010 - 11:05pm PT
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Have to agree with Vawter. This piece needs to be quite generally accessible.
If putting it into the TR section would begin that process, perhaps you should do so.
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pc
climber
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Jan 25, 2010 - 11:22pm PT
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Powerful story. Thanks for sharing.
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Chief
climber
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Jan 25, 2010 - 11:26pm PT
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Rick, thanks for sharing your story.
That was my first trip to the Valley and I clearly remember Bob's death hit everyone pretty hard. Don't know what else to say but thanks for sharing.
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Jan 25, 2010 - 11:31pm PT
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In 1978, I think about three years after Bob's accident, I did a new route on Watkins with Bridwell, Kauk and Schmitz, which Bridwell named the Bob Locke Memorial Butress. I never knew Bob so the name never made much sense to me. After reading Rick's really excellent story, I'm happy the route - one of the best new walls I ever did - bears Bob's name.
JL
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Jan 25, 2010 - 11:47pm PT
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I always wondered who Bob Locke was, because of the name of Largo's route. Thank you so much for such a well-written and passionate account.
How did Bob get hurt? Did he take a bad leader fall? Was he climbing the regular route?
Chris Falk - could we please get your take on this?
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Fritz
Trad climber
Hagerman, ID
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Jan 25, 2010 - 11:58pm PT
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Rick: Thank you for sharing a difficult story to tell. I can appreciate the shock, when you suddenly have to deal with death in the mountains.
I had the charmed mountaineering life of "near-misses." The most serious climbing accident I was ever associated with was a friends shattered ankle. It screwed his leg up forever, but we carried him out and felt good about that.
Then in the early 1980's I finally got to see the dark side of "taking chances." I was climbing with a friend along the South Fork Clearwater River in North Idaho. Steve York and I were pioneering a route on a rock formation that looked interesting from the highway.
We were up several leads when we noticed kayakers on the South Fork. That stretch is considered Class 5 water and I had never seen boats on it. Soon the boats were all clustered on the far side of the river. Steve told me: "I've got a bad feeling about this," and I agreed. We started down.
By the time we got to the river, there was an ambulance there, and a county sheriff. Some other climbers had loaned their rope and the kayakers had taken one end of it across the river.
It was explained that one kayaker had taken a long swim and was unconscious on the far side of the river. His companions were doing mouth-to-mouth and closed chest heart massage. The sheriff was whining that no-one had told him the kayaker was on the far side of the river.
Steve and I gave the kayakers a climbing harness and told them to get the first rope tied off up high on a tree trunk, then tie their buddy into our second rope, and we would pull him across in a Tyrolian Traverse. It worked like a charm, and we soon had the unconscious kayaker on our side. I noted he was very blue in the face, but having recently read about miraculous recoveries from "cold water drowning:" I had hope of his survival.
Just as the ambulance guy was shutting the back door of the ambulance after loading the kayaker, I realized the first rope was tied off to the rear wheel of the vehicle.
I went running around the ambulance to the driver, and yelled that we had to get the rope off before he left.
"That’s OK", he said. "There's no hurry."
The kayaker died. Turned out he was the least experienced of a group of eastern U.S. boaters that were testing western rivers. His companions tried to talk him out of boating that stretch, but he insisted on going.
Remembering the incident is still disturbing to me, especially since I do a lot of white-water boating these days.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Jan 26, 2010 - 12:03am PT
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1977: Bob Locke on Guido's new deck in Santa Cruz
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guido
Trad climber
Santa Cruz/New Zealand/South Pacific
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Jan 26, 2010 - 12:07am PT
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Thanks Peter
I was looking for that photo.
A good lad indeed.
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Dick Erb
climber
June Lake, CA
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Jan 26, 2010 - 12:41am PT
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This is the first time I've read this well told account of such a sad and scary event, and as I too wondered where he took that long fall, the memory came back to me of some unprotected face climbing below Sheraton Watkins. It is a part of the climb that sticks in my mind, where hurrying stopped, no hold broke, no bug flew in my eye. I was given passage. Gives me a shiver to think how close how many of us have been.
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Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
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Jan 26, 2010 - 01:59am PT
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Powerful, moving stuff, thanks for sharing it.
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TripL7
Trad climber
san diego
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Jan 26, 2010 - 02:11am PT
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Bobo loved to climb, to write, and he had many friends.
I recall one afternoon, sitting in the back of his VW van in the Valley. After I had mentioned that I had minored in English Lit. a big smile broke out on his face and he handed me a short story he had penned. He stated that English Lit. was his major, if I remember correctly.
He was anxious for me to critique his work. A paragraph or two into reading it, someone or something pulled us away from the solitude of the van, out into the parking lot. Wanting to give it my undivided attention, alone on top of a boulder or out in the meadow, I handed it back to him, commenting that I would prefer to read it later. He looked disappointed. I am very disappointed that I didn't take the time to read my friends story that afternoon.
The last time I saw Bobo, he and Dale had stopped by the little A-frame cabin a couple of us climbers were renting in Mammoth. I don't recall what the occasion was, perhaps someones birthday. Millis was there...and all was well. Bobo and Dale had just returned from the Palisades, they had climbed Dark Star, I believe that was the name of the route. Dale mentioned how easy it would be for someone to die on the route. He explained that it followed a knife edged arete to the summit. Bobo commented that he was going to concentrate on the safer, classic routes from then on. He and Dale had been pushing it for some time.
Just a few weeks or so later, while listening to the radio one morning, we heard that a rescue was in progress in the Valley. We called the Mtn. Room Bar, the rescue was for our friend Bobo...he was already gone.
We all gathered together later that Fall to say goodbye to Bobo, at the top of Mt. Dana. I remember Dale was there, Yabo, Peter H., Chris F., Bob F., Vern C., Jimbo, Animal Art, Kevin L., Dennis O., Tom C., Don R., Walter R. and many others.
Millis led the ceremony, and at the end tossed Bobo's ashes down Cocaine Shute. Dale and Bobo had skied it the previous Spring.
Bobo's parents looked pleased whenever I dared to steal a glance in their direction that afternoon. No doubt that pleased look came from knowing that their son had so many good friends during his brief life.
EDIT: Dale had implied that if someone fell on the route(Dark Star?), they could die as a result of the rope being cut in two by the sharp/jagged nature of the knife edged arete. Bobo fell(Mt. Watkins) leading a run-out 5.9 section(well within his ability)and slammed into a dihedral. The edge of a bong, or pins on the rack, cut the lead rope in two. And he then continued to fall a long ways, the haul line in which he was tied into stopped his fall.
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gonamok
Trad climber
poway, ca
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Jan 27, 2010 - 02:37am PT
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Really moving account, thanks for sharing that.
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MH2
climber
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Jan 27, 2010 - 02:58am PT
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A painful event, a sober reminder.
Good job on going up there at night and getting down to Bobbo safely.
We were listening in on a radio John Dill left behind.
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Levy
Big Wall climber
So Cal
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Jan 27, 2010 - 03:05am PT
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Rick,
That was a well written account of this tragic tale. I echo the sentiments of others in that this piece belongs in an anthology somewhere.
Thanks again for graciously sharing.
Bill Leventhal
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James Doty
Trad climber
Idyllwild, Ca.
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Jan 28, 2010 - 08:52pm PT
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Nice bump, Pate.
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