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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Jun 21, 2011 - 05:15pm PT
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The evolution of things is obvious in this thread. Take the Chouinard/Herbert, the 2nd route up the North Face, 1st ascent 1962, repeated probably 30 or 40 times before British climber Pete Livesy and I freed the route in 6/76, making it the 2nd free climb of a Yoz big wall (the 1st was the East Face of the Column - Astroman). Last week, with CBS anchor Laura Lohan, I co-hosted a 60 Minutes show on Alex Honnold free soloing the route.
JL
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Jun 22, 2011 - 01:06am PT
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Caryl Chessman's trial, conviction, appeals and execution were a major reason why the US ended capital punishment from the 1960s through 1977. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caryl_Chessman
Who named it Chessman Pinnacle? It must have been before 1960, when Chessman was executed. Was it Steve Roper, or was that before his time? He seems to have some interest in civil rights, as he talks in Camp 4 about participating in a march in 1965 in Selma, Alabama, with Ralph Bunche and Martin Luther King.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Jun 22, 2011 - 02:37am PT
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I think it was Chouinard who named it the Chessman Pinnacle.
When Royal and I repeated the Chouinard-Herbert, we free soloed to the top of the Chessman Pinnacle. Royal thought it was 5.9, near the top of the scale at the time. He asked if I wanted a top rope and was impressed that I was comfortable without it. [Edit: I think Royal was somewhat testing me regarding the fact that I had recently free soloed the Grand Teton North Face including 5.9 on the upper Pendulum Pitch.]
We bivouacked on a small ledge a couple of pitches above the pinnacle. We climbed around the bivouack area ropeless, and gathered enough twigs to start a small camp fire in the evening chill. I recall sleeping with my head on a small lip of rock at the edge of the ledge with the sheer drop below my face; and feeling very at home there.
This was also the climb where I gave Royal one of the two sets of nuts that I had obtained from Joe Brown parcel post from England. We tried the nuts for the first time along with parachute cord slings to pretty much eliminate using pitons except for belay anchors. We were impressed at how the nuts worked better than pitons in the expanding flakes.
I used my new Jumars to climb the fixed ropes on the West Face during a rest day in the filming of “The West Face” with Roger Brown. For decades I thought that was the first use of Jumars on a Yosemite wall. However here on ST I’ve learned that Guido may have gotten there ahead of me. Anyway as I approached the top of the wall; I climbed up a rope that was nearly chewed through by rats just below the anchor. Then as I climbed the next rope, I realized that it had been chewed all the way through and was just snagged on a flake. So I switched to free soloing in my Terray mountain boots. I couldn’t make it past the 5.9 squeeze chimney free soloing with those big boots, and so spent the night jammed in the base of the chimney and listening to the big rats scurrying around.
The next morning I heard Tom Frost’s cheerful ‘Good Morning, Tom’ as he tossed a top rope down for me to finish the climb. I never felt that waiting for a top rope from a friend constituted a ‘rescue’; particularly since the camera team could have wound up prussiking an unsafe rope if I hadn’t pioneered exploring the rat invasion and warned them about it. However your opinion may differ...(lol). At the time Royal was furious with me for embarrassing him during the filming schedule and he made the summit registry entry about it. Then he tried to outrun me on the descent down the boulder field; but I stayed shoulder to shoulder with him all the way to where Liz was waiting on the trail. So I never got credit for demonstrating the value of Jumars and the incident put a cloud over our relationship for quite some time. Now we both agree the incident was hilarious.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Jun 22, 2011 - 02:57am PT
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I made several attempts on Sentinel that only went a few pitches. I was secretly trying to solo a first ascent of a route to the left of the Chessman Pinnacle. Just above the big overhang there was a guillotine flake jammed in the crack. I went up there twice by myself trying to figure a way past it. However it seemed unstable and was pretty intimidating to stick your head out from under the overhang and face up to this big loose flake.
Later in Camp 4 I talked about it to Kim Schmitz who hadn't yet done a Yosemite wall; and he took this as an opportunity to go up there with me. He took the lead over the overhang and agreed with me that this flake was best left to itself.
While we were up there, Kim dropped his sleeping bag, when it slipped out of the straps on his pack. This was a major disaster to a young climber with plans to climb all summer. We searched the ledges below the climb for hours and days and never did see where it went.
Another time I went up to do the Steck-Salathe with Chris Frederics. We were not feeling great and moving slowly and Chris got all bloody scrunching up one of the chimneys. We came down, and I still have never done that route.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Jun 22, 2011 - 01:32pm PT
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Thanks, Tom! Good stories. It is amusing how in the entry relating to your 'rescue', someone noted the various climbers' heights - real and apocryphal, apparently.
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Jun 22, 2011 - 01:42pm PT
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I relate to your comments, Dennis, about climbing with Pratt.
I did Sentinel with him the year before you did and cherish
that memory. I honestly can't recall now if we brought water.
I have trouble imagining we didn't, but since we made it in about
five hours it's possible. I've said this before, but at one point
up in the Narrows Chuck told me Sentinel (we didn't call it "the
Steck-Salathe" then), was one of his three favorite climbs. He
mentioned the Lost Arrow Chimney and the Salathe Wall as the two
others. I find it unique to Pratt, perhaps, that he could see
Sentinel in such a special light. I believe it had lots of the
kind of climbing he enjoyed but also may have been a place of
great history of the area, a place where one can go and feel
the spirits of all those predecessors, from Salathe to Royal and on...
Pratt, as irreverent as he could be at times, had a notable reverence
for the Valley's history and its people...
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Ihateplastic
Trad climber
It ain't El Cap, Oregon
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Jun 22, 2011 - 02:22pm PT
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It is amazing to see how many times people were drawn back to that rock. Robbins, Frost, Pratt, Kor, etc... it is as if they could not get enough. I was also surprised to see Barry Bates up there three times in less than a year with two ascents coming within weeks of each other.
Nice stuff!
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Jun 22, 2011 - 02:29pm PT
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Anders and Tom,
I think Roper said that he named it Chessman Pinnacle, and climbed it before Chouinard and Herbert did their eponymous climb.
John
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Jun 22, 2011 - 03:58pm PT
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John, you could well be right on that. I was just going by recalling a comment from Royal as we were climbing it all those years ago. I didn't know about Roper's early ascent until reading this thread.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Jun 22, 2011 - 05:12pm PT
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With regard to the question raised by John and Kevin, what is a Yosemite "big wall"? Bearing in mind that the definition may change with the passing of time.
My simple definition would be that a (medium) big wall is one that usually requires at least one bivouac, possibly two, and is rarely done in one day. (Assuming ground up, no fixing or trickery.) A big big wall usually requires two or more bivouacs. Perhaps there would be some element with regard to length of route, difficulty, getting to top of a formation, etc. Given this, what was the first Yosemite big wall to be done free, based on the route fitting the definition of and being considered a big wall at the time it was freed?
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ddriver
Trad climber
SLC, UT
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Jun 22, 2011 - 05:17pm PT
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Caryl Chessman sniffs the air and leads the parade. He knows in a scent you can bottle all you made.
...had to.
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Ihateplastic
Trad climber
It ain't El Cap, Oregon
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Jun 22, 2011 - 07:26pm PT
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Mighty, JL, Warbler, et al...
I wondered this same question when the new Big Walls guidebook came out and there was NOTHING between Liberty Cap and Leaning Tower.
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Jun 22, 2011 - 11:40pm PT
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Caryl Chessman sniffs the air and leads the parade Excuse the thread drift but 51 years later and we are 1 of only 5 developed nations with capital punishment (Singapore, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea)
We're right in there with Communist China, Libya, Sudan, Yeman, Iran, Iraq, Somalia......
you get the picture.
Caryl Chessman actually never killed anyone, not to excuse his brutal sex crimes. He may have missed another stay of execution literally at the last minute by a secretary misdialing the Chamber phone number.
(end of rant)
In "Camp 4" Roper mentions that he specifically named it as a protest against capital punishment and Chessman's impending execution.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Jun 23, 2011 - 02:24am PT
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26 pitches Sacherer and I did up GPA in 1964...
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Jun 23, 2011 - 01:54pm PT
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Tom,
Was that the Glacier Point -- NE Face route from the Red Roper Valley Guide?
As to Valley "big walls," I'd always thought that the Lost Arrow Chimney was the first Valley "big wall" climb. If so, Sacherer and Pratt's one-day free ascent needs to be on the list.
Many of these FFA's were evolutionary in nature, in the sense that most of the routes were already largely free climbs. In contrast, to my mind, Sacherer and Beck freeing the DNB eliminated a lot (maybe 100?) of aid placements. Admitedly, the FA was done in wet weather, but that's still a lot of aid eliminated.
John
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Ihateplastic
Trad climber
It ain't El Cap, Oregon
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Jun 23, 2011 - 03:05pm PT
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If Warbler is right...
The rack and the baggage is really the only thing bigger than the free walls those same folks probably wouldn't include in the category.
The why are Astroman, El Corazon, El Nino, The Nose, Salathe, RNWF, and Quantum Mechanic (there may be more)included in the "Big Walls" book? I agree to the definition that a BIG WALL is one that is BIG. If you climb it in a few hours or a few weeks the mass of the wall does not change. If you yard on every piece you can find or float past them on dimes the wall is still massive. Only your experience has changed.
If we include WFLT and SFWC in the definition of "big wall" then we MUST include Sentinel and perhaps others.
Then again... whatever.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Jun 23, 2011 - 08:18pm PT
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It does seem a nebulous question, and there's no obvious objective measure. I always associated "big wall" with aid climbing (nailing), hauling, bivouacs, and so on. In other words, a stout effort, involving time and suffering. But then people start freeing them in a day - is it still a big wall? Bearing in mind that the biggest big walls, in places like Baffin and the Karakoram, take a month or more. (Does that mean El Cap routes are medium big walls?) Maybe it's like what was famously said of pornography - I can't define it, but I know it when I see it.
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PhilG
Trad climber
The Circuit, Tonasket WA
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Jun 24, 2011 - 04:53pm PT
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Thought I'd add a few old slides from a 1960's ascent of Sentinel.
The "mandatory" rack-up picture with Pat Merrill and a rather youthful Barry Bates.
A pitch that probably now goes free by grandmothers in tennis shoes!
Standard haul bag in those days
Largo made a rather insightful comment about the evolution of climbing. When we climbed the Chouinard-Herbert in the 60's it took 2 1/2 days. When my son climbed the same route he did it in the afternoon after first climbing the Steck-Salathe in the morning!
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