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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Yeah for Turner, and way to go Alan for bringing this up.
Still, the Elbsandstein had 5.9 in 1906 and 5.10 in 1910, so the U.S. was just a bit behind on the learning curve. Goodro's Crack in the Wasatch range is 5.10 and was done by Harold Goodrow in 1949. So when Robbins freed the Open Book at Tahquitz at barely 5.9 in 1952, one could be pardoned for viewing this, at least in retrospect, as bursting through doors already long open.
Returning to the narrower chauvinistic perspective, Turner had to be among the best climbers in North America in 1959, although his exploits up in the Northeastern Boonies never penetrated the Californicentric vision of U.S. climbing at the time.
The Turner routes Recompense and Bloody Mary are, in my opinion, much harder than the Open Book. Bloody Mary especially is in a different class altogether in terms of boldness and committment, and probably would have been 5.10 if it had been at Tahquitz at the time. But since Turner's routes were done in 1959, seven years after the Open Book, and at the dawn of 5.10 in this country rather than the dawn of 5.9, perhaps it is not fair to make comparisons.
On a related topic, anyone with a historical bent want to post an appreciation of Pete Cleveland? His incredibly bold lead of Superpin in the Needles (SD) has never been repeated, and Henry Barber's easier variation has been desecrated with at least one and, I think in fact, two bolts for the delectation of the masses. Cleveland's 1969 toprope of Bagatelle at Devil's Lake stood at the threshold of 5.13 at a time when the rest of the U.S. was busy breaking into 5.11.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 4, 2009 - 04:28pm PT
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Thanks Rich, I was hoping that you (and Stannard) would chime in on this. Since you guys were among the first (if not THE first) to repeat some of Turner's more intimidating climbs. I'd love to hear any stories from those ascents, as I'm sure would other Topians who posted on this thread. As to the "first 5.10", it surely is a nit-pickingly academic topic---but a fun one none-the-less. Clearly they were climbing routes of 5.9 and 5.10 much earlier in the Elbesandstein, various areas in the UK, and probably a few other areas as well--who really knows how hard the actual free climbing on some of the routes in the Eastern Alps in those years actually was, since later ascents tended to aid sections that originally had been done free. However, since US climbing pretty much evolved independently of that overseas such "local" milestones are still significant. Goodro's Crack is a fine and difficult climb, though it seemed to me to be easier than Bloody Mary, Recompense, etc, let alone Repentence, though, of course, it was done a decade earlier. I've also had the impression that there remains some uncertainty as to whether it was led free at that time. I imagine that Mr. Ament can provide some insight from his research. Anyway, it is a fine climb.Northcutt's start to the Bastille Crack is from the same late '50s era as Turner's routes and technically harder than any of them, at least in my opinion, though not as sustained or committing. And then there are plenty of Gill's routes of that vintage at Devil's Lake and elsewhere that are harder still. The latter leads nicely into your suggestion of a Peter Cleveland Appreciation, which is surely well deserved. However, expanding on that, what we really should see posted is a Devil's Lake Appreciation thread, because the routes that first Gill, then yourself, Derenzo and others, then Cleveland, Erickson etc. did there in the early/mid '60s surely represented the most concentrated hard free climbing in the country at the time. As an observer of those developments such a thread has been on my mind for some time--maybe someday....
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C. Small wall climber.
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Al's ideas are good ones - though, as with all volunteer environments, my working principle is that those who have good ideas, and express them aloud, are taken to have volunteered to do something about them. :-)
The history of climbing is more nuanced than is often appreciated, and developing context and perspective can be a challenge. The devil is often in the details.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Rich and Al-Thanks again for sharing your respective wealth of historical knowledge and insights.
If John Gill has read this thread, I hope that he might throw aside his usual modesty and offer some comparative assessment of his own early roped testpieces.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Al, I believe that I was actually involved in the second ascent of Bloody Mary, sometime in the mid-sixties, along with McCarthy and Mick Burke. The route had gone unrepeated for six or seven years by then, and had an imposing reputation as being both hard and dangerous. But we also knew that Turner had failed on MF, so was not made of superhuman stuff.
McCarthy led it and paused right in the middle of the hardest moves to place a bong (McCarthy was as strong a laybacker as I've ever encountered). Of course, Turner had nothing close to that level of protection, but on the other hand one had to admire McCarthy's coolness and endurance.
I posted the following picture in the Poke-O-Moonshine thread. My position in the shot is almost exactly where McCarthy stopped to place a bong.
At the time, we were certainly climbing a full grade harder (or more) and so Bloody Mary, although impressive, did not seem to be a test piece. I did it fairly recently (I think maybe two years ago) and was far more impressed with the difficulty and boldness, but this is partially because I was not exactly the same climber at, ahem, 64 as I was at 24.
John Gill's roped climbs would be an interesting topic. Apparently, his seconds were so frightened that there has never been any account from them, and only Gill knows what he did out there on the South side of Disappointment Peak---at least one of those leads convinced him to henceforth devote all his energies bouldering. It is a great historical misfortune that Gill went looking for difficulties and so continually veered from the natural and obvious line. The real climbing on his routes is not on his routes, and no one really knows how to find it.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 4, 2009 - 05:50pm PT
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I , too, did Bloody Mary again 2 years ago, after a 3 decade gap since my previous ascents and had similar impressions. I first did it in '71 or '72 with Rocky Keeler and Bob Harding. We knew you guys and some others had done it, but you were all much stronger climbers than we were and it still had quite a reputation. We made what we considered to be the first "mortal" ascent and were pleasantly suprised to find it relatively reasonable; i.e.,we didn't die!!! It felt about the same when I did it with Al Long a couple of years later. Sure did feel much harder in '07---must have been the rock !!!!!
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jstan
climber
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Trundlebum just emailed me about this thread so maybe I can add a little.
At Facelift I was cheering myself up with a four pack in Camp 4 after the Great Tarvia Expedition when a fellow walking by mentioned the Toronto Section of the ACC. I, as would anyone, immediately started talking about Dr. Turner. He, Kit Moore would you believe, said, "Yes! I know John Turner. Would you like me to send him your email address?"
A little while ago I got a very nice note from John. I can't go into any specifics but suffice it to say John is still interested in what is happening today in climbing and continues to be interested in the people. I have to run now and forward to him the link to this thread. Kit has probably already done so but, the more the merrier.
At Facelift you quite simply get one miracle after another.
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MH2
climber
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Amen
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TrundleBum
Trad climber
Las Vegas
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I think Recompense was my first 5.9 lead.
A couple of N.H .9+'s later I made my first trip to the Valley.
My first 5.10 lead was Maxine's Wall...
Which lead me to wonder:
"If the Y.D.S system came from Yosemite, then way are the grades so soft?"
Then I went and did Reed's and Midterm, putting that internal dialog to rest.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The morning of the (Lynne's) Bachar memorial I was introduced to John Stannard by Gene.
As I was off climbing for the day I kept thinking "Stannard, Stannard, Stannard, known for...?"
That eve during Lynne's opening for the J.B memorial I look over to see Mr. Stannard standing next to me. I looked at him with a tentative smile and said "Mr. Stannard, did you ever climb at Cathedral Ledge in N.H?" He said he had once or twice but that he mainly climbed in the Gunks. Upon hearing 'Gunks' My brain finally engaged and I looked at Mr. Stannard and said "Ahhh yesss Foops, how silly of me!" Mr. Stannard questioned the term "Silly" ? I explained that when I tried to think of what gem he (Mr. Stannard) was responsible for I kept thinking of Recompense on Cathedral. Mr. Stannard said "Oh no, that was John Turner". I mentioned what an eternal classic and ever so bold a lead for it's day.
Now I don't remember what Mr Stannard said verbatim, so I can't quote it, but it was something to the tune of...
"Turner, now there was one heck of a gifted climber, I could only wish to be a climber of his caliber."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
What an evening that was for me, I tell you...
1. I got to meet a bunch of Taco'eads and pay tribute to J.B in the finess'a kin.
2. Had a very pleasant chat with R.R and got him to autograph my Blue Suede shoes.
3. I got to stand along side John Stannard during the start of the J.B trib and...
Ta boot, hear Stannard essentially pay (albeit brief) homage to Turner.
For me the third was akin to getting to stand abreast of Michael Jordan verbally admiring the talents of Wilt Chamberlain!
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Al,
Thanks for bringing up the name John Turner -- a real
master of rock, a true pioneer. Some of these names
generally unknown in the west were in fact made of
solid stone and were the best, as good as anyone in their day.
My friend Barry Bates told me a week ago the first
time he saw a one-arm pull-up was in about 1967 or maybe '68
when Rich Goldstone was in the Valley and showed off his
really solid one-arm. Those guys in the east, of course,
were among the first to become acquainted with the great Gill,
and individuals such as Turner, McCarthy, and Goldstone
set very high standards at the Gunks, Devil's Lake,
and other areas. Of course John Stannard,
one of the best of the very best is often underplayed in
the histories. In Boulder when I was the most serious free
climber, during the mid-later 1960's, I was fully aware
of all these guys. What a joy it was when each of them, except
John Turner, visited me and climbed with me in Eldorado. Pete
Cleveland, who also would become my friend, came from that
same community...
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slabbo
Trad climber
fort garland, colo
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Yo Trundle- That's 'cause Maxines is about Gloucester 5.7 ! Stannard was WAY good, yet he took 160 ! (rumored)tries for Persistent in the Gunks.First I see a post from 'Rubes, now you HA Ha Ha !
JS
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GBrown
Trad climber
North Hollywood, California
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Hey Al, it was great having lunch with you in Northampton. And Rich, thanks again for getting me off the ground at the Gunks. (By the way, those weren't really falls . . . I was just checking to see if you were really holding the rope.) Boy, this thread brings back the Poko memories. JStan and I were there twice in the late 60s and Bloody Mary was my intro to John Turner. The climb is an aesthetic marvel and I always wanted to be able to say "thank you" to him.
John and I put in a cool climb that started left of a HUGE "Nose" that hung out over the cliff away off to the right (I think) of Bloody Mary. Some nice corner climbing off the ground, aid out ceiling and up a bit to the steep 5.9 off-with jam crack; traversed right to the nostril of the "Nose," got over the nostril momentarily but we couldn't hang on and then access the front of the nose and get into the gorgeous crack that led dramatically up to the bridge -- had to ascend unaesthetic cracks up the side of the Nose instead. We called it the "Nose Route" because we were so creative. Does anybody know if anyone ever completed what would have been a dramatic route if completed like we had wanted? John, any feedback?
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jstan
climber
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Gary:
Me? I can't even tell you what I did yesterday.
Actually it's getting so I like it that way.
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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It's not as stout as Recompense or Bloody Marry, but Turner's Flake on Cathedral
deserves mention for quality. Long before the days of 4" cams, I wonder if Turner
could protect this long layback at all.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Gary, what falls?
The day was fun. Hope we can manage another one before father time has his way with us.
Your Nose Route with John hasn't made the record books. The route you did is now the combination of two routes. One of them is called Summer Break, which climbs the roof you guys aided at 5.12a. Or some facsimile of the roof you aided, because eleven years ago the entire left side of the offwidth you did just above the roof fell off, perhaps also changing the nature of the roof below.
The "nice corner climbing" you mentioned up to the roof is considered to be 5.9 and is often done as a single pitch, called Raindance,
Summer Break continues straight up in a line parallel to the Nose, following an erstwhile Jimmy Dunn classic, Summer Solstice, that included the now departed offwidth. But Summer Solstice climbed the roof you guys aided further right, and now another route, called Wild Blue, climbs the Summer Solstice roof at 5.11a (Dunn graded it 5.10+++) and continues up the left side of the Nose, no doubt substantially following the route you traversed over to, eventually moving right into an overhanging 5.10b offwidth.
Jim Lawyer and Jeremy Haas recently wrote a fantastic guidebook to the Adirondacks, Adirondack Rock, which is the source of the information I just recorded. Jim made extensive efforts to get as much of the history right as he could, but there is no mention of you guys and the credit for the various portions of the route you did goes to others, almost certainly after you did them, since the earliest date mentioned is 1977. And so it is that your heroic early efforts are doomed to languish in obscurity (unless of course Jim publishes a second edition). Such is life on the rock.
Larry, cool picture! I'm pretty certain Turner would have had at most a ring angle, equivalent (in size but not in strength) to a 3/4" angle or, in modern terms, a yellow Alien. If the crack was bigger than that he was running it out.
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GBrown
Trad climber
North Hollywood, California
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John, the important things are that we know the people we like, have a viewpoint from which the present is pretty well understandable and what we do now is generally helpful. I'd say you're doing well! A few weeks ago I got to climb 2 days at the Gunks. Day one with Dick Williams, Claude Suhl and Elaine Matthews. Claude, Elaine and I had been climbing together 40 years and about 4 months earlier on Moby Dick in Yosemite. Day two with Rich was a gas!
Rich, it makes me feel remarkably endurable to know that "The Nose Route" that John and I did has fallen apart while we are still ongoing. The second time we did the route, the corner climbing off the ground was quite squishy wet (I think the Nose was running) and after each giving it a try we got apathetic and abandoned it in favor of a couple other routes. However, our apathy wouldn't let us get off the ground on the other difficult possibilities. I finally got up to being pissed off and we went back to "TNR" where I kicked the squish out of it and we had dry rock after that. Too bad about that crack cracking off, it was a treat. Maybe a guidebook could be put out for routes that no longer exist. "A Picnicers Guide to Non-Existent Rock Climbs." Instead of packing gear you pack food, find where the route was and have a picnic there. I'll talk to Williams about it. :)
I'll be talking at you guys. Thanks again Rich.
Gary
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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rgold:
Larry, cool picture! I'm pretty certain Turner would have had at most a ring angle, equivalent (in size but not in strength) to a 3/4" angle or, in modern terms, a yellow Alien. If the crack was bigger than that he was running it out.
On Turner's Flake (5.8), I imagine an old piton could give good protection for the
technical finish, at the top part of my photo. Not much chance on the wide, initially
overhanging layback flake that forms the first half of the pitch, though.
On that part (below Leslie in the photo), self confidence would be your only pro.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Gary, we are, by and large, doing a lot better than the rock. Poko has had a number of rockfalls, the biggest of which involved the upper pitches of Positive Thinking, yet another burly Turner route. I actually climbed those pitches in the mid-sixties with Roman Laba, and remember them as among my most frightening experiences.
There were huge blocks stacked upon blocks with little evidence that anything was much more than just balanced there. (The fact that it eventually all fell down certainly confirms those original impressions.) It was before nuts, and I was terrified to drive pitons, after the first pin I placed caused ominous clunking and shifting tones as well as provoking the telltale sounds of previously trapped pebbles rattling down newly expanded cracks.
My mind filled with feverish representations of engineering free-body diagrams of the blocks, their actions and reactions, and somewhere, perhaps a hundred yards away, a tell-tale but catastrophic unbalanced load sending the whole mess, like a freight train derailed on a trestle, over the edge with Roman and I as a most unlucky set of hitchhikers. For the rest of the pitch I hand-placed pitons in horizontal cracks without hammering them, hoping that perhaps they might stop a fall simply by virtue of their mechanical configuration and, of course, counting on the giant detached blocks they were placed on top of to stay in place under the loads of a leader fall which, thankfully, never happened.
Although not relevant to the issue of whether we or the rock are more decrepit, that particular ascent of Positive Thinking had another charming aspect. We did the route in the Spring before the leaves were out, and the first pitch had a 5.9 jam crack that had some vines or bushes in it in one or two spots. I had my entire forearm in the crack with the sleeve rolled up and got quite scratched passing those vines. What I didn't realize was that the vines were poison ivy vines, without the leaves as yet, but, as it turned out, packed with plenty of urishol, which by virtue of the scratching process had been subcutaneously injected into my forearm. I guess the best way I can convey what happened is to say that when I took off my shirt in the dermatologist's office a few days later, he let out an involuntary gasp and, instantly summoning his command of appropriate medical terminology, exclaimed "Oh, yuk!"
Returning to the celebration of living longer than rock, I direct your attention, back in the Gunks, to Pink Laurel, which suffered a major rearrangement in 1971, Chimango, whose second-pitch crux fell off in a major rockfall in 2008, and a number of substantial rockfalls in the Near Trapps. We may think of the talus field as a record of prehistoric events, but in fact our crags are also falling apart in a very contemporary time frame.
Pink Laurel went from 5.6 to 5.9 after a giant flake one could sit on at what is now the new crux yielded to gravity's Newtonian imperative. McCathy and I made perhaps the first ascent after the flake fell out, in the late winter or early spring, intending to enjoy a pleasant early-season warm-up. For some reason, we failed to notice the absence of a giant feature, and came away astonished and depressed at the deterioration of our physical and technical skills over the winter hiatus.
Of course, the last word in human vs. rock endurance is probably about how we've outlived the Old Man of the Mountain on Cannon, which came crashing down in 2003, making instant mockery of New Hampshire's license plates and adding a fresh perspective to the accompanying "Live Free or Die" motto inscribed on those plates next to the newly defunct profile.
So let's raise a glass to old climbers and crumbling crags. May we continue to crumble at a slower rate than those rocks of ages.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Hear! Hear! No loose flakes are you gentlemen!
"Fall down mountains, just don't fall on me!" - Voodoo Child
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