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Jim Lawyer
climber
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Researching the history of climbing in the Adirondacks, I had the pleasure of conversing with Turner himself, both through email and on the phone. We had delightful exchanges, although, memories being what they are, exact details often escaped his recollection.
Regarding Poke-O, the cliff was virtually unrealized until Turner and the Quebec crew began their explorations in 1957. Their best work included Gamesmanship (a very popular full-length 5.8), The FM (a popular full-length 5.7), Garter and SRT (fun traverse routes), Psychosis (rated 5.9 A2 by Turner, later freed by McCarthy and Goldstone at 5.9), Bloody Mary (major sand bag, named for a woman that was hit by a stone), Positive Thinking (known more for an ice climb), Body Snatcher (5.8 A2, later freed by Stannard at 5.9), The Cooler (today a jungle-fest), Neurosis (also known more as an ice route), Paralysis (popular 5.8 route with a super exposed 2-pitch traverse), and Catharsis (arguably one of the most popular 5.6's in the park). Even today Bloody Mary and Psychosis are two of the "most feared 5.9s" on the cliff due to their sustained difficulties and intimidating appearances. Being the authority on Poke-O allowed Turner to write the first mini-guide to the cliff, published in Appalachia in 1961.
In those days, as Turner described, it was the custom to climb to the top. Times change, and today many of these routes are climbed only for one or two pitches. Another interesting tidbit was that he thought bolts were immoral and removed those he came across.
Regarding the discussion of the "Nose" feature, in the guide published in 1961, Turner describes the "Nose Traverse", climbed by himself and Hugh Tanton, although it goes up the right side of the nose, not the left. I'd be interested in more details of early climbing up the left side.
Outside of Poke-O, but also within the Adirondack Park, Turner added routes to the Upper Washbowl (Hesitation and Partition) and Deer Leap (Guermantes and Meseglise, two unknown chossy routes on Lake George). I'm pretty sure he also had a hand in the routes at Chapel Pond Slab, although he doesn't recall such details.
From my correspondence with Turner, he described his introduction to climbing and various other recollections, which I make available here with his permission.
"I started climbing (almost by accident) near the end of my second year at the University. In Eastern England we were 100 miles from the nearest rock, and being ‘in statu pupillari’ we were forbidden from keeping a car ‘within 25 miles of Great St. Mary’s church’. Hence we worked out in the gym during the day and climbed on ancient buildings after dark. I had located some climbers around my home town of Ashby de la Zouche with whom I climbed on Derbyshire gritstone (it was said that because of its sloping holds and ferocious cracks, if you could climb on gritstone, you could climb anywhere: possibly true!)"
"Life was so primitive in 1951 that for a brief period we used hemp rope guaranteed to break if a leader-fall exceeded ten feet, and in wet weather we wore naileboots. Thereafter I climbed in Wales and the Lakes with the University club, which included George Band who later did the first ascent of Kanchenjunga. Sadly, although I knew them well and saw them as role models, I never got to climb with the two impoverished plumbers from Manchester, Joe Brown and Don Whillans, who between them pushed up British standards by four decimal points, had an amazing eye for a good line and went on to many first ascents in the Alps, the Himalayas and the Andes. I also knew Chris Bonington, but since he would not share the lead, we never climbed together."
"When starting my post-doctoral year at MIT, I was told by their Outings Club that they could not offer serious rock climbing; they introduced me to Ray Darcy, then sent me to the firm down the road, the Harvard Mountaineering Club. Here I struck instant rapport with the President, Craig Merrihue, and we climbed together at the Quincy quarries, Joe English, North Conway, and the Gunks. At the time the AMC was dominant at the Gunks, and appeared more concerned with regulating climbing than with doing it. Craig was a natural rebel and perhaps because like their ruling elite, he was a WASP and a Preppie, they turned a blind eye on our not having been through their laborious procedures of tests and certifications; but the old order was crumbling, and I believe collapsed finally with the advent of the Vulgarians shortly afterwards. The leading figures at the Gunks were Hans Kraus and Jim McCarthy: Jim and I never hit it off, despite climbing to a similar standard; he seemed always to be competing with his fellow humans, whereas I was competing with the rock, or perhaps even with myself. Other Gunk characters who I met and climbed with later were the irreverent Dave Craft and ‘Super-Jew’ Art Gran. I got on particularly well with Art, and we spent many rewarding days together, the most memorable being the first ascent of Repentance."
"In retrospect, first impressions of North America were two-fold. There was a vast amount of high-quality virgin rock awaiting routes to be put on it; secondly, I had exchanged the UK environment in which protective pitons were almost prohibited for the US where they were almost compulsory."
"When the MIT year was up, for complex reasons I moved to Canada, and found the Canadian Mountain Club in the phone book. This (I discovered later) had been founded by a Frenchman who had climbed mostly in the Pyranees, who had left France in a hurry in 1945, and had been denied membership of the ACC because of his status as a Nazi collaborator. He was no longer active, and the club consisted of a couple of immigrants, and half a dozen Quebecois, including Ben Poisson, Frank Garneau and Pierre Garneau, all climbing enthusiastically in the Laurentians. At the time ACC activities were centered on their summer camp in the West, and to keep partially fit for this they trotted up existing routes from time to time, but did not innovate (they were also somewhat Francophobic)."
"Their chairman was an elderly and very civilised Swiss, John Brett, who was with me on The Snake at Poko, and later arranged a couple of occasions when I climbed with Fritz Wiessner."
"As the Mountain Club went further afield, putting up more new routes, it attracted more new members, both native and immigrant. The former included Claude Lavallee, Dick Wilmott Erwin Hodgson, Bob O’Brian and Mary ?; an Irish group Brian Rothery, Phil Gribbin, Doug Sloan, and Keith Millar; Scots Stan Patterson and Gerge Tate; German Wilfred Twelker; Hungarian Ferenc ?; and Englishman Dick Strachan. We ventured North in the Laurentians to Weir, Southeast to Smugglers Notch, Cannon and North Conway; South to Chapel Pond and the Gunks (our speeding fines became a major source of revenue to Northern New York State)."
"The two major breakthroughs were the first ascent of The FM at Poko, and Brian Rothery’s Vertiginous at Bon Echo. These confirmed that face climbs on two cliffs previously deemed impregnable were in fact possible. A wealth of new opportunities opened up. There was so much to do, and so little time in which to do it!"
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C. Small wall climber.
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Willmott ventured as far afield as Squamish, where in 1962 he did the classics Clean Corner (with Strachan) and Snake, both stout 5.9 routes by modern standards.
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GBrown
Trad climber
North Hollywood, California
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Rich, This makes me feel better and better. And your description of Positive Thinking makes me realize that it must have been a positively sarcastic naming ceremony considering all the negative thinking it inspired.
Gary Hutchinson wrote a wonderful hai ku poem I committed to memory (no problem being so short):
Don't be a mountaineer
Be a mountain
And shrug off a few with avalanches
I add:
Whether a mountaineer
Or a mountain
It's the ability to shrug that counts
Anybody want to add to this in hai ku?
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markmuehlbauer
Social climber
Enumclaw, WA
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Reply for Clint Cummins on the post you did.
I can confirm this is Alf Muehlbauer. I recognize my Dad's picture anywhere.
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dickcilley
Social climber
Wisteria Ln.
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Don't forget .Those first 5.9s and 10s in Elbsandstein were put up by an American Oliver Perry Smith.Americans weren't late comers to hard rockclimbing.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - May 3, 2011 - 05:51pm PT
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True, Oliver Perry-Smith was climbing in Dresden in the first years of the 20th century at levels not reached in the US for 40 or more years after. However his climbing accomplishments were, to all intents and purposes, unknown to American climbers (except Fritz Weissner!!!!) until J. Monroe Thorington's profile of him in the 1964 American Alpine Journal. And even then it really took the visits of climbers such as Steve Roper (who wrote a wonderful article about his trip in the 1972(?) issue of Ascent)and,a few years later, Henry Barber, Steve Wunsch, et al for true extent of his climbing accomplishments to become recognized by the American climbing community.So Perry-Smith's climbs really contributed nothing to the progess of American climbing during the following decades. It is significant to recognize that while mountaineering was being developed in North America during the years that Perry-Smith was active in Europe, rock climbing as an activity was not yet being pursued over here. While there was some climbing on the Boulder Flatirons, some isolated "engineered ascents" such as Half Dome and Devil's Tower, and a few other eccentric individuals scrambling about this was all limited and very localized activity. Rock climbing as such really didn't get started on this Continent until the time of the First World War, and, more significantly, during the mid-1920s.I think what is particularly fascinating about the early accomplishments of Perry-Smith and the other Dresden climbers is that it illustrates the role of "peer influence" in climbing development, since it wasn't just one or two individuals climbing at such a level in the Dresden area, but many. However since they were a relatively isolated community, far from the mainstream, this level of climbing was not replicated by their contemporaries elsewhere (though many of those contemporaries such as Preuss and Dulfer were still climbing at quite a respectable level themselves but still not at the level of the Dresden climbers--at least as far as we can tell today).
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Some real Americans, the Anasazi, were probably knocking off 5.10 a thousand years ago.
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steveA
Trad climber
bedford,massachusetts
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When I first started climbing at Cathedral Ledge, John Turner was already a legend. I still remember the wood wedge he placed at the crux on Recompence. It is in private hands and ought to be in a museum.
I have done many of his classic climbs and they were bold, aesthetic lines.
The guy was one tough SOB, with a great eye.
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jstan
climber
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A year or two ago when communicating with Dr. Turner I told him of ST and as I remember sent him a link. Just like so many of our correspondents, he could have added immense value.
Nothing beats talking to the source.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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what is particularly fascinating about the early accomplishments of Perry-Smith and the other Dresden climbers is that it illustrates the role of "peer influence" in climbing development, since it wasn't just one or two individuals climbing at such a level in the Dresden area, but many. However since they were a relatively isolated community, far from the mainstream, this level of climbing was not replicated by their contemporaries elsewhere (though many of those contemporaries such as Preuss and Dulfer were still climbing at quite a respectable level themselves but still not at the level of the Dresden climbers--at least as far as we can tell today).
Yes, the milieu is everything. OPS was part of a circle of climbers, and his most famous partner, Rudolf Fehrmann, did more difficult climbs than he did. For Germans, OPS is just one of Fehrmann's early climbing partners.
Dresden was one of Europe's major capitols at the time, so it's not surprising that hte nearest climbing area was on the cutting edge. But it was just one of a variety of different centers. The best climbs in the Lake District were pretty close to the Dresden climbs in technical difficulty. And the best climbs in Fontainebleau were on par, although much shorter, as were the short climbs at the Munich and Innsbruck bouldering areas.
Tough to measure those Dresden climbs against the stuff folks like Preuss did in the Alps, because the Alps were, well, alpine.
One of the unusual things about Elbsandstein was that it offered middle-scale crag climbing close to a major urban center.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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jstan- If at first you don't succeed...dog 'em!
I almost hooked Wunsch but his time management skills are too formidable. LOL
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Trad climber
Will know soon
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Alan Rubin, what a great topic for a Thread made into Golden by all who contributed.
What a pleasure to spend my evening reading and enjoying....Cheers, lynne
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Jan 23, 2012 - 08:41pm PT
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Turner History Bump...
How many areas in Canada did John establish routes? My guidebook selection is slim north of the border in the northeast.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 21, 2012 - 12:52pm PT
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I am involved in a group conversation with John at present and will share the results here as it progresses.
Dear Steve,
Good to hear from you again: I thought you might have given up. Yes, your choice of font is excellent.
I shall be happy to fill in the background to my climbing career, although slightly worried that we elderly people can be prone to rewrite history quite unconsciously. But here goes!
No, my parents were not outdoors people, although my father played tennis at a high level, having earlier been a high school jock in cricket and football: my inadequacy with any kind of ball was a big disappointment to him, so I suppose it was some kind of compensation for me to be at ease on a rock face whilst he suffered vertigo on a stepladder. But perhaps I am getting too Freudian.
When I went up to Cambridge University aged 18, I discovered that I had to read a fourth subject for the first two years, and chose geology as a soft option. Near the end of the course we had a two-week field trip to the Isle of Skye, famous for the Cuillin hills, constructed of black gabbro. Several of the party were members of the University mountaineering club, and I spontaneously tagged along as they made sure they collected their samples from the highest points they could find. I realised that I got immense pleasure using small holds in exposed situations, and joined the club myself on return to Cambridge, and started leading almost immediately
Initially we climbed partly during day trips to Derbyshire gritstone and very extensively after dark on the university buildings. The latter were of course prohibited, but so extensively utilised that they had a virtual guidebook entitled' The Night Climbers of Cambridge' published under the pseudonym of Whipplesnaith. Sadly, the famous chapel of King's College had been structurally modified to prevent the previously frequent appearance of chamber pots on its four pinnacles. (Sorry if this sounds like an extract from Brideshead Revisited, but that is the way it was around 1950) A group of us was climbing at around the 5.6 level, and the most influential for me was Geoff Sutton, who placed greater value on the aesthetics of a climb rather than its absolute difficulty.
Times were changing, as was apparent on gritstone but more so on the larger cliffs of Snowdonia and the Lake District. Up until 1945 UK climbing had been dominated by the universities and the army, but for 10 years thereafter most new routes were created by the 'Rock and Ice', a working class group from Manchester led by Joe Brown and Don Whillans. Almost overnight they pushed up standards to 5.9 and beyond, opening up many attractive natural lines, which previously had been deemed impossible. By the end of my sixth year at Cambridge we were beginning to repeat some of these routes. Most regretfully I had to decline an invitation to climb with Don. However, he gave me some invaluable advice: stay relaxed and conserve energy no matter how extenuating the circumstances.
In 1955 I moved to the other Cambridge for a postdoctoral year at MIT. No one at MIT seemed interested in climbing, so I joined the Harvard club, where I climbed mostly with a fellow Englishman,Al Alvarez and the club president Craig Merrihew (sadly killed a few years later, winter climbing on Mount Washington). The Harvard club climbed mainly at the Shawangunks, but brief trips to New Hampshire and the Adirondacks opened my eyes to their extent of beautiful rock, almost untouched by human hand. Some of this I was able to rectify during my six years near Montréal, from 1956. Preferred companions during this period were Dick Willmot, Dick Strachan, and Art Gran: but there were several others.
Favourite climbs by others: Brown's 'Cenotaph Corner', Whillan's 'Cemetery Gates', both on Dinas Cromlech, and Birtwistle's exquisitely delicate 'Diagonal' on Dinas Mot. Favourite climbs of my own include 'Recompense' and 'Repentance' at Cathedral Ledge, and 'Sweet Dreams' at Bon Echo. I also have a love – hate relationship with 'The Joke', also at Bon Echo, whose fourth and last pitch took four attempts and a fracture. It received its second ascent only this year by two Canadians: they rated it 5.10 A1, although Dick and I had used no aid on the first ascent.
By 1962 I had come to realise that an eccentric Englishman would never be promoted in the Canadian chemical industry, and as a ticket home took a job that was at the very limit of my capabilities: there was absolutely no time for climbing, and when I briefly tried to resume eight years later, I found I had lost the edge. So, I took up riding to hounds instead: a more dangerous pursuit
Well Steve, this probably tells you much more than you wish to know, but help yourself to anything that might be useful.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 21, 2012 - 03:19pm PT
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Great Steve. Thanks for having your "conversation" with Turner and posting the results here. Keep it up. The last line of Turner's response appears to confirm one of the "Turner legends"---the he was one of the first non-Rock and Ice climbers to repeat the Brown/Whillans routes in the UK, particularly Cenotaph Corner. He mentions both Cenotaph and neighboring Cemetary Gates as being amongst his favorite climbs put up by others. Given that he moved to North America in 1955, remained here for a number of years and largely quit climbing after he returned to the UK in the early '60s, it is likely that he climbed these routes prior to his '55 departure from the UK.The Gates was put up in 1951 and Cenotaph the following year and both routes had an enormous reputation in the ensuing years that scared off most other climbers for almost a decade (sort of what later happened with Turner's hardest routes in the northeast). So Turner's ascents of those routes, which were (and are) virtually unknown in the UK, were considerable breakthroughs and effectively made him one of the top climbers in the country at the time. It is probably because he moved over here soon after those climbs that he never achieved the recognition in his home climbing community that his ability deserved---and because most of his hardest climbs on this side of the Atlantic were in the northeast US or in eastern Canada his contributions over here are similarly not as widely recognized as they would have been if he'd been based in Colorado or California. This all may seem trivial to some on here, but I do believe that it is valuable and appropriate to recognize those who have contributed much to the history of our sport/passion.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 23, 2012 - 03:42pm PT
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John added a bit more to his first response that posted above.
Favourite climbs by others: Brown's 'Cenotaph Corner', Whillan's 'Cemetery Gates', both on Dinas Cromlech, and Birtwistle's exquisitely delicate 'Diagonal' on Dinas Mot. Favourite climbs of my own include 'Recompense' and 'Repentance' at Cathedral Ledge, and 'Sweet Dreams' at Bon Echo. I also have a love – hate relationship with 'The Joke', also at Bon Echo, whose fourth and last pitch took four attempts and a fracture. It received its second ascent only this year by two Canadians: they rated it 5.10 A1, although Dick and I had used no aid on the first ascent.
By 1962 I had come to realise that an eccentric Englishman would never be promoted in the Canadian chemical industry, and as a ticket home took a job that was at the very limit of my capabilities: there was absolutely no time for climbing, and when I briefly tried to resume eight years later, I found I had lost the edge. So, I took up riding to hounds instead: a more dangerous pursuit.
Well Steve, this probably tells you much more than you wish to know, but help yourself to anything that might be useful.
Solid 5.10 in the early 1960s, THAT'S THE STUFF folks!
"Climbing is a jealous sport. If you don't do it you get sloppy." Bonnie Prudden
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 23, 2012 - 03:51pm PT
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The next installment...
What brought you to Montreal and how did you connect with the climbing community once there?
Describe your initial explorations for rock and ice routes in the Montreal area. Which routes stand out in your memory now looking back?
Thanks for digging around in your past with us.
Cheers,
Steve Grossman
Had I returned to the UK after my year at MIT, I should have been faced with two years of National Service. Had I stayed in the US I should have been eligible for the Draft. Like most dodgers, I had seemingly valid reasons for avoiding each of these. Canada was the best option, so I drove to the border and talked my way in. Within days I was taken on in the central research labs of C I L, 20 miles east of Montréal. Searching the phone book, I found an entry for Club de Montaingne Canadien. This group initially was mostly French-Canadian, and was much more active on the rocks than was the Montréal section of the ACC. Like myself, and other birds of passage, immigrants from Europe seemed to flock to it, and in due course English Canadians also. On my first weekend in Canada I climbed with them at Val David in the Laurentians, and before winter set in we had put up half a dozen new routes on Mt Saint Hilaire. In 1957 we started exploring the Adirondacks and the White Mountains, but I don't think we heard about Bon Echo until 1958. The most memorable climb of this period was the FM, which refuted the supposed invincibility of Pokomoonshine.
Yes we did do ice climbing, but nothing dramatic: mostly we went skiing.
Hope this plugs most of the gaps in previous narrative.
Kind regards,
John
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Nov 23, 2012 - 05:58pm PT
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Turner was definetly on the forefront of hard free climbing in the 50's and 60's and his visibility suffered from plying his trade on the East Coast. Had he gone to Stanford instead of MIT he would be a household name in climbing history. It's amazing how many people think that the Open Book on Tahquitz Rock was the first 5.9 climbed in America.
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steveA
Trad climber
bedford,massachusetts
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Nov 23, 2012 - 06:16pm PT
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+1 Jim!
I had the chance, more than once, to snag the wooden wedge Turner placed on
Recompence BITD. A friend of mine has it.
I told him that it ought to be in a museum.
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