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deeski
Trad climber
North Carolina
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It was the winter of 84/85 and I was working as a lift operator in Telluride. In those days the "new Mountain Village" was just an idea in the minds of developers and the base of Lift #3 was a remote, beautiful area with only trees and snow in sight. I had the opportunity to get to know Muggs through my friend Mona and knew how much he loved to ski the backcountry. Lift #3 only had 103 chairs on it and was not very busy on powder days....so when Muggs would come out of the woods beside the ski area in his backcountry skis and skins...of course I let him onto the lift so he could telly the upper mountain. I was just learning to telemark and was having trouble just committing to the "fall line" and pointing my skis downhill on the steep powder slopes. I remember one powder day when I joined Muggs for some powder runs...he told me to quit thinking about technique and just go fast and have fun. I followed him down the mountain cranking the best telly turns of my life and had FUN and the best day on the mountain ever. Lots of falls, but lots of memorable Black Diamond runs following him down the slopes! I miss Muggs and the way he would inspire all of us to give it our best to get the most out of whatever we did! Thank you Muggs!
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
SoCal
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Oct 19, 2010 - 06:54pm PT
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I applaud Deeski for letting Mugs in on the lift line. Great people in their sport deserve a bit of privilege.
I recall a Yosemite ranger once telling me how proud he was of meeting Mugs as he kicked him out of Upper Pines for overstaying the 2 week limit. That guy should have let him slip by, or used his insider info to get him into a low-key arrangement so he could stay. I'm sure that ranger regrets his action.
Anybody want's to pass me on a route. I let them.
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Prezwoodz
climber
Anchorage
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Oct 19, 2010 - 07:01pm PT
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There is a Mugs Stump route along the Seward Highway which is some terrible rock. Its at an area called Bermuda Triangle. It goes through this roof,
I think I am going to replace the bolts on the route but they are going to go in the exact same place even though the routes scary as I could possibly imagine at that point. The first bolt is mid crux. For an 11d that makes it scary!
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Hoots
climber
Toyota Tacoma
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Oct 19, 2010 - 08:54pm PT
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Bump for the stories. This is great folks. Thank you all so much for sharing.
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10b4me
Ice climber
Happy Boulders
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Oct 20, 2010 - 02:14pm PT
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Conrad, thanks for posting that letter from Eva
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okay,whatever
Trad climber
Charlottesville, VA
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Oct 23, 2010 - 09:43pm PT
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I met Terry (aka Mugs) Stump in '79, I think, maybe '78, via my friend Dakers Gowans, in Boulder. We did a couple of Eldorado standards together, and he "dated" a woman I knew there for a while.
The next January or February, he was charged up to do a winter ascent of the East Face of Mt. Alice (this will only be meaningful to those who know RMNP). I agreed, and was excited for a moment, but then remembered the misery of winter climbing in RMNP, and was ultimately glad that the weather was so horrible that Mugs called it off! He was definitely more hard-core than I was, and was no doubt bummed by the the weather forecast.
Very good guy, unique and driven....
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Oct 31, 2010 - 09:18pm PT
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A Mugs ad from Climbing May 1990.
Bhagirathi III Youth!
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Conrad
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 5, 2011 - 06:15pm PT
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Double D
climber
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That's a classic image!
I was recently editing the Bird's story on the Moose's Tooth where he describes leading a hideous chimney pitch and belaying on a prayer. Mugs follows it like he's done it before. Bridwell deducted that it must be because, as far as he can tell,
Mugs is from UT & CO where all climbs end up in chimneys and off-widths whereas Cali boys, with the exception of Jay Smith, just don't got the groove!
(Heavily paraphrased)
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Conrad
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 28, 2011 - 07:48pm PT
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Happy Birthday Mugs.
This would be 62.
Thanks for the inspiration.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Aug 28, 2011 - 07:52pm PT
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He was THE MAN!
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Aug 28, 2011 - 11:08pm PT
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Mugs was a rare and much larger than life character and I smile at the 62...He would have too!
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Conrad
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Aug 29, 2011 - 04:01pm PT
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Sonic
Trad climber
Hilly, but no rocks Folsom, California
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Aug 30, 2011 - 06:51pm PT
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bump for climbing heroes
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Aug 30, 2011 - 07:54pm PT
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What an amazing thread....reading the old posts and stories from M. Kennedy and Conrad has been really cool. Sometimes The Taco is pathetic....sometimes its amazing. Thanks Conrad for re-igniting this thread. What a treat. I was inspired by Mugs as a new climber....couldn't wrap my mind around how fast he moved in the mountains. Still cant.
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Trusty Rusty
Social climber
Tahoe area
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Oct 15, 2011 - 12:48pm PT
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Reflections of a solid individual
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ec
climber
ca
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Nov 19, 2011 - 03:16pm PT
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The following article is adapted from The Roof At The Bottom Of The World, Ed Stump's history and exploration of the Transantarctic Mountains, the most remote mountain belt on Earth. The illustrated book is the first authoritative look at this little known region.
I distinctly remember the first time I saw a picture of the Organ Pipe Peaks in a 1935 Geographical Review article by geologist Quin Blackburn, who had led a party of three to the headreaches of Scott Glacier in 1933. It was 1970 and I'd the good fortune to land a position on an Ohio State University geological research expedition in the Transantarctic Mountains. I was reading all of the old literature that I could get my hands on, but I struggled to believe that any grouping of summits could be so dramatic, so beautiful, and so fine.
They were a fantasy of mountains rendered with bold and simple strokes, faceted grandeur in black and white.
I dreamed of traveling to those peaks, bowing down before their central spire, The Spectre, and sampling a piece of the rock. Alas, the Organ Pipe Peaks remained beyond my reach that season.
Ten years later, on my fifth Antarctic expedition, I found myself camped on Sanctuary Glacier in the shadow of the Organ Pipe Peaks. My work that season had begun with geological mapping of the La Gorce Mountains and ended with a collecting traverse down the east side of Scott Glacier, essentially retracing Blackburn's route. Now I was one day away from attempting an ascent of The Spectre.
Being a klutz with ropes myself, I have always had someone in the party who is experienced with roped climbing in case we needed it. This time, the field assistant/mountaineer for the party was my brother Mugs, who ad made his first big mark in climbing the previous year by scaling the Emperor Face on Mount Robson in British Columbia. From the beginning of the field season, Mugs and I had joked about climbing The Spectre. We figured he would do all the leading and if necessary would winch me, the older brother, up on a rope.
Now that we were camped in the shadow of The Spectre, looking up its backside, the climb was no longer a joke. It was real, sheer, and daunting. Mugs studied the fractured upper wall of the spire, and, although he couldn't see a clear route, said: "We'll just wander around on the face and see where it leads."
I understood Mugs's nonchalance and trusted him completely. I also trusted myself. I must admit, however, that I didn't sleep well the night before the climb. What would it be like? Would the rough passages be vertical or overhung? Would I be in way over my head? I hadn't had such a case of butterflies since before wrestling matches in high school.
After a big breakfast Mugs and I snowmobiled over to the foot of The Spectre. We carried a minimal rack of climbing gear: a half-dozen carabineers, several slings, and four pitons to secure the rope. The first half of the ascent was a straightforward climb up a steep (50°) snow chute to a shoulder on the right skyline, with Mugs kicking in all the footsteps and I following in his prints.
At the shoulder, we pulled out the rope and while I belayed Mugs began working his way across and up the face, which in this stretch was pretty much vertical. When he reached secure spots, Mugs would set the belay for me, and I would follow up his path. There were good-sized cracks in the rock that gave plenty of handholds and places to rest, so I mostly managed to climb with no problem.
The most difficult passage of the climb -- the crux -- occurred at a place where there was a slight overhang. The only handholds were high above my head, but there was nowhere to place a toe if I pulled myself up. I thrashed around some as Mugs laughed and tightened the rope. But then I found a bulge on the rock out to my left side that could be grasped between my knees. From there I could reach the next handhold, and we were both past the touchiest part of the day.
After about two hundred feet of roped climbing (two pitches), we made it past the steepest stretch, and came out onto a rock face with a slope angle closer to 60° than to vertical and with lots of snow-filled cracks that made planting steps easy. Here Mugs packed the rope, and we continued upward across the face. We had started the day in full sun, climbing in shirt sleeves with our parkas packed, but as the sun circled its way to the south, we slipped into shade and the chill that it brings. Rather than take off our packs on the steep terrain, we decided not to pull out our parkas, and pushed on to the summit.
A small cornice of soft snow maybe eight feet high was the last barrier to the top. Mugs chopped and kicked his way through and over it, and we emerged into sunlight on the flat of the summit. In all directions splendid peaks reached for the heavens, piercing the undulating mantle of white and blue. No sound stirred the silence. We took a round of photos and then had some lunch.
You could say that we were pleased with ourselves. I can also say that we brothers never felt closer. Each of us knew that he wouldn't be at this spot were it not for the other. I had provided the opportunity and Mugs the expertise. What I recall most was agreeing with Mugs that our parents would be more than doubly proud. We lingered a bit longer and finally descended; I rappelled most of the distance down to the shoulder and Mugs mostly downclimbed after me, stripping the hardware from the belay points.
At the shoulder, we figured a glissade down the snow chute would be the fastest way back to the base of the mountain, so we sat back on our heels, set the points of our ice axes in the snow for braking, and slid all the way down to our snowmobile. My dream a decade earlier of bowing before The Spectre had been exceeded.
Photos at this link:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ed-stump/conquering-the-spectre-in_b_1101902.html#s484291
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ec
climber
ca
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Nov 19, 2011 - 08:44pm PT
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bump...
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ec
climber
ca
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Bump
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TAM
climber
Tempe, Arizona
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I recently became aware of this forum, and am touched by how many folks have weighed in with comments about my brother. Thanks, Conrad, for starting this ball rolling. I have been blogging about the Transantarctic Mountains since August in connection with the publication of my book on the same subject. My lastest post briefly outlines some climbs that Mugs and I did in the Scott Glacier area and on the Vinson collecting for fission-track dating studies. Readers might be interested in the photos, or earlier posts where Mugs is mentioned or pictured. The link is http://www.transantarcticmountains.com/blog/ The other climber during the 1986-87 field season was Lyle Dean, whom I have lost track of. If anyone out there knows Lyle's whereabouts, please let me know. I have something from that season that belongs to him.
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