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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Any dates on the love letter?
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the finder
Social climber
california
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The stationary is headed Yosemite Lodge. On the first page he wrote, "Wed. eve 2230 hours Camp 4". The fourth and last page is only dated, "Thurs. 8:20 a.m."
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LilaBiene
Trad climber
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Incredible.
Brings to mind something Neebee wrote not too long ago:
i love this whole story, it has touched my heart... i love families and i love how trails reach around and can come back and hug those that have
lost part of their lives...
this is what life should be about...
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Rollover
climber
Gross Vegas
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Bump for quality.
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Mighty Walker
climber
Vancouver
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 9, 2013 - 12:36pm PT
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Hello Finder! What a phenomenally generous gift you are offering. My James Baldwin will be so thrilled to receive it. You can mail it to:
Christina Peressini
PO Box 53563
Vancouver, BC V5Z 4M6
Please include your mailing address so that I might send back proper thanks.
Thanks too go out to Mighty Hiker Anders, for pointing me toward this recent post.
Since I first posted that query looking for information about James's uncle, I too began climbing. It was a greatly delayed start because I was overcoming a knee injury for a few years but I am so happy to be learning now (five months in) and enjoying the challenge and the grace of the sport. I'm still only climbing indoors and am climbing primarily up to 5.10a difficulty, but I'm getting there slowly. Now to heal this sprained pinky so I can get back at it with full force!
Thanks again all. Great community you have here.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Jun 10, 2013 - 12:24pm PT
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Serendipity strikes, it seems. However the things got to remote Mendocino, what are the odds that someone would pick them up, preserve them, and eventually follow up? Anyway, if they find their way back to the Baldwin family, that would be the right ending to the tale.
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BooDawg
Social climber
Butterfly Town
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Jun 10, 2013 - 05:33pm PT
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I never met Jim Baldwin but I know many climbers who knew him during his times in Yosemite. All agree that he was a wonderful person, and that he was sorely missed after his passing.
I did attend Ed Cooper's presentation of the 50th Anniversary of the FA of the Dihedral Wall. There I took several pictures, one of which is reproduced here twice in two different forms.
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ms55401
Trad climber
minneapolis, mn
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Jun 20, 2014 - 09:52pm PT
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hey there, I know of Jim Baldwin only through the historical record, but the name stuck on account of the Dihedral Wall FA and Roper's writing in his book. JB struck me as a cool, adventurous guy, maybe a little rakish but so what. I was born well after his death and am now older than he was when he died. Hard to believe.
I've gone up a few pitches of the Dihedral Wall and was very conscious then of the first ascensionists and what they must have experienced seeing the terrain for the first time. True pioneers.
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Charlie D.
Trad climber
Western Slope, Tahoe Sierra
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Jun 21, 2014 - 07:05am PT
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Pure gold ST, this thread is an example of just how rich content can be. Thanks to all who have shared and to Jim himself who set a standard to aspire, a great human being.
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zombie
climber
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Dec 23, 2014 - 01:14pm PT
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Hi Everyone. I am not a climber, but I have flown a Cessna past the Chief many times and always remember my high school classmate, Jim Baldwin. We were in Booth Memorial HS in Prince Rupert, and we always use to kid Jim about his "big archaeological nose". I was a member of the ski club which Jim sometimes visited. He was a quiet kind of guy with a great sense of humor. Who would have thought that I would be flying and airplane past the cliff he made famous so many years ago. RIP Jim.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, CA
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Dec 23, 2014 - 06:23pm PT
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Zombie, Tami and I think you should elaborate on this. We are all interested to hear your recollections!
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Mighty Walker
climber
Vancouver
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Topic Author's Reply - Jul 25, 2015 - 07:04am PT
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Hello everyone. Christina Peressini here again, James Baldwin (the Younger's) girlfriend. Thank you so much once again to all who have posted here.
There is a bit of information James and I have learned since I posted here and my aim is to share much of it with you so please stay tuned. It's now a matter of time and logistics.
During my quest for information about Jim for James, I heard from one or two people privately and chose not to share it publicly. Hope Meek, Jim's girlfriend from those many years ago, was one of those people. Now that Hope has passed on I feel more comfortable sharing her sweet memories of Jim as well as some of her poetry. It's clear she was smitten.
Here's is a generous excerpt of Hope Meek's correspondence with me:
– – –
I was introduced to Jim Baldwin by Steve Roper. Steve had been teaching climbing for the Sierra Club on top of Mt Tamalpais in Marin County, CA. I had gotten pretty good and kept begging him to put me together with a climber in the Valley who would be willing to climb with a #1 woman and #2 a neophite on the big walls. He finally relented and Introduced me to Jim at Camp 4. JIm was a wonderful gentle, bear of a man. He took me up Royal Arches first, in the days when there was a trecherous rotten log at the top that had to be gotten over. He was an addictive personality and I lived with him in his tent and in a rock cave at the top of Camp 4 for two years. That was in the days when the only heated place for climbers in the winter was the men’s room. I remember sleeping on the floor with the few diehard climbers. Not comfortable but warm.
Jim and I and Jeff Foote did a first ascent of the Great White Book in Tuolome 1963. You can find it the records of first ascents. Like Ed Cooper’s wife I am a poet.
– – –
J.B.
I have lain with you
In fields of flowers
On mountain tops beneath
The murmuring sky
Even on the granite slabs
Heated by the sun
Never feeling prick nor bite
Nor hardness beneath
But only joy above face
Shadowed by sun haloed head
And now you are dead.
I loved you and I love you still’
As you were and are for always
On the rocks and hills
Of memory. Good bye my Jim
Goodbye.
(Published in the S.F. Sierra Club mag, Yodeler)
– – –
I was very touched when Jim’s parents came to visit me after his death knowing how attached we were. I have buckets of stuff on Jim this is just a small taste.
I had been raised in Montreal as a child and I loved Jim’s soft Canadian accent.
If you want to see a picture of me today you will find it on My Space. Eric and Laurie Beck sent me a heads up on your SuperTopo search. This is a bit bitter for me to write as I sit at my computer. I have a picture of Jim framed, to the right of my keyboard.
– – –
Jim was a gentleman in every way. Manners, behavior, and love. One thing not often mentioned, he was also very shy. Odd for a big brave bear of a man but he was shy and unassuming. I loved him dearly and only the fact that I was eight years older than Jim, divorced with a three year-old daughter prevented me from making the decision to marry Jim.
I remember a climbing party given by our friends in Oakland. Jim had just come back from being fed outrageously by his mother in Prince Rupert. His belly was rather prominent and I was sitting on his lap. There was a hush in the conversation as I said “Hey, Jim and I have an announcement.” I patted his stomach and said, “Jim is pregnant.” Everyone broke up laughing but they were disappointed because they were expecting a lasting bond to be announced. There is in fact a lasting bond. I still miss him terribly.
Ed Cooper has some wonderful pictures of Jim, I particularly like the one of him nailing up on the Dihedral Wall.
– – –
TOO SOON TO LATE
If I should meet you once again
I’d run to you.
If I should see you in the street
I’d run to you.
I’d sound glad noises in my throat
And love and laugh
And curse the day
The mad gods laid me in your path.
They made me late, and you too soon
Or is it I
Who came too soon and you too late?
Time is awry.
You are a home
A hearth that I can only rent
My fingertips and cheeks and lips
Retain your scent.
I wanted you
To walk the mountain ridge with me.
To listen
To the silent hillside melody.
To have you hold me
Only briefly, all content.
My fingertips and cheeks and lips
Retain your scent.
– – –
I left the valley and remarried and then ended up in a sanatorium with Tuberculosis. I didn’t want to chain Jim with an old lady. I’m 81 years old now and have just had total knee replacement which will end my activity on the big walls. I emailed Eric Beck yesterday having heard from him that he was wet and soggy from bouldering in this wretched weather we have been having but with my new knee I might just be able to join him. I was one of the earliest women in the Valley to do technical climbing. I really miss it.
Sorry this is so long but I have been preparing a manuscript for publication and am startled how much of my old stuff is about Jim. I think you can gather how important he was to me.
– – –
Christina, loving a climber takes courage, I hope your James is worth it.
 - -
TUOLUMNE
I took rock climbing 101 under the aegis of Steve Roper in the sixties. Steve gave classes for the Sierra Club on top of Mt. Tamalpais.
I had become pretty proficient on various techniques and asked Steve to put me together with an experienced climbing partner in Yosemite so I could go on to higher endeavors. (Pun intended)
Steve mischievously put me together with Jim Baldwin. Jim had the reputation of being able to fall in love with a glass of water. Well, I did and we did, and I lived with Jim in Camp 4 commuting from the Bay area every weekend for two years, climbing any route Jim would lead. I’ll never forget that damn rotten log at the top of Royal Arches.
Jim finally decided it was time for me to graduate into something more difficult so we packed up our gear and Jeff Foote, Jim and I drove to Tuolumne. The boys selection of route delighted me. I love climbing but am a lazy walker. I remember being able to drive almost to the bottom of the approach.
Polly Dome is a pleasure to climb it’s so clean. At the time, the boys promised I could name it. I wanted to name it Hope’s Crack but these wild and wooly and full of fleas boys demurred and chose to name it modestly ‘Great White Book’.
The approach is easy, little talus or brush to wade through. We roped up, Jeff Foote leading, me in the middle and Jim on my tail. As I remember, it is about 3 1/2 pitches, the half being the friction at the top.
We used no bolts but maybe a few pitons. The book is very wide open with few cracks in its spine. A foot and hand on each leaf ( to continue the simile of “Book”) with cross pressure and a few good hand holds did the trick most of the way. There was very little feel of exposure until the last pitch where one has to fiddle around a small ledge to get up to the friction at the end of the climb.
To sum it up this is a sweet heart of a climb and I would recommend it to ambitious beginning climbers.
– – –
Thought I had lost this one.
It pretty much tells it like it was when Jim was the center of my life. I was camp cook for our close family of climbers.
– – –
WE WERE THE JEWELS
Yosemite’s Camp 4 in the sixties
We were the jewels on the walls of the valley,
The young and the beautiful, rebellion on granite.
Climbing our passion, our family camp 4
We loved and we trusted our lives to each other
On the end of a rope. A sexual high,
As is flying, rappeling with tinkling hardware,
Pitons and beeners chiming on stone,
Breathtaking slow motion, our music drifts down,
Ignoring Viet Nam, final exams, anxious mothers,
And more. WE were poor, but we ate and we drank
Like the royalty we were.
The tourists in campers were our quarry for food.
Together we foraged our family’s meals
From their blanketed compounds complete with RVs
And TVs ignoring the glory around them.
Their steaks and wine were fine with us,
Just so long as they didn’t dine with us.
Hope Meek 9/21/03
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guido
Trad climber
Santa Cruz/New Zealand/South Pacific
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Jul 25, 2015 - 10:44am PT
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Thank you Christina that was beautiful.
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Mighty Walker
climber
Vancouver
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Topic Author's Reply - Jul 26, 2015 - 11:26am PT
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I can only imagine what a thrill it would be to meet those "super humans" as a child. Watching In the Shadow of the Chief again recently made me wish I could experience the 60s in small town coastal BC. Instead I got to experience the 70s. :)
Yes, Hope's poetry and emails really struck a chord with me. She sure loved that man.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Jul 26, 2015 - 12:11pm PT
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Christina, I'm so glad you were in contact with Hope before she died. I spent a week camping out in Yosemite with her in 2010. I first learned of Hope when she wrote me an email announcing that she was coming to the Sacherer memorial, bringing her Teton Tea recipe with her and would like to camp with myself and another friend who were going. I had never heard of her before but she seemed like an interesting and adventurous woman so I agreed, which turned out to be one of the better decisions of my life, particularly when the other friend had a climbing accident and ended up in the hospital and couldn't come. I was flying in from Japan so the hospitalized friend was supposed to supply all the camping gear. This meant that when I flew into Reno and Hope picked me up, we had to suddenly organize camping gear from Hope's 50 year old supplies, many of which had not been used since her days with Jim Baldwin.
Sentimentally priceless, they were barely functional. The Coleman stove and lantern were real antiques that took a lot of energy to keep going, especially in the week of high altitude rain we endured when we were camping near Tuolumne Meadows. The sleeping bags were so inadequate we had to sleep in the car and go to a motel on occasion but Hope's had an all important heart embroidered on it from her days with Jim. I marveled that Hope who was already 82 at the time and obviously frail after a heart attack and knee surgery, not only endured the hardships but seemed to thrive on them
With the help of lots of red wine (we never did get around to making the Teton Tea) we spent one of the best weeks of our lives, reminiscing about our climbing days, our time living in Japan (how many women climbers have lived in Japan?) and of course all the men we had known and loved. Hope brought her scrapbook of poetry and she spent hours reading those poems to me, alternately laughing and weeping. I heard the story of her being torn between her duty to her daughter and the love of her life who could not give up full time climbing. I heard of her tuberculosis and her pain and lack of closure at not being able to attend Jim's funeral, which I had also experienced in a different context. I heard a lot about her upper class New England background, her Dutch ancestors who owned the land under Wall Street, her winters on the family sugar plantation in Cuba. We shared our stories of rebelling against being "little ladies" while men had all the adventures. We discussed our marriages of which she had three. Her first husband was a high powered American bank executive in Japan who became an alcoholic, since recovered, causing her to return to the U.S. Her second husband was an abusive academic, and her third was a comfortable fit from an old New England family who had been friends of hers for generations.
I understood her relationship to Jim as not only the love of her life but also her muse, the person who symbolized the freedom and return to nature that inspired most of her poetry and that we all long for. I have no doubt that she would have stayed with him if it had not been for her daughter. Jim was a unique personality in a unique time. He represented carefree love and freedom from responsibility in the Eden that was Yosemite at the time, the ultimate in lost innocence. He clearly had taken on mythological proportions in her mind, as almost always happens when someone dies too young. I wondered if she would ever have ever started writing poetry if not for Jim. Her memories and her poetry rescued her from being a staid and respectable housewife. She was able to reclaim her youth and ideals by remembering and writing about Jim. The relationship ended, but the love only grew. I've often thought that Jim would have been overwhelmed if he had known the influence on her life that he really had.
MIDDLE CATHEDRAL AND CAMP 4
Moon in tension over the valley floor
Elk bugle renewal, the rock walls roar
Baldwin left our warm sleeping bag to
Piss his name in the snow, returning
He loved me, our breath a light fog
Like the morning mist river below
As angels going home we climbed
Middle Cathedral that day
Bridal Veil Falls put pearls in Jim’s beard
He laughed when I licked them away
With well laced Teton tea we drank,
Contentment to finish our day.
JIM
Let me touch his hand once more.
Let me sip his nectared tongue.
Let me be his wanton whore,
Thereby stay forever young.
Love is short and life is long.
Friendship lasts forever.
Youth with age is always wrong,
Love’s not very clever.
Now he’s dead, forever mourned
I , the one who maimed him.
Body never more be warmed
by the one who tamed him.
J.B.
I have lain with you J.B.
In fields of flowers
On mountain tops beneath
The murmuring sky
Even on the granite slabs
Heated by the sun
Never feeling prick nor bite
Nor hardness beneath
But only joy above face
Shadowed by sun haloed head
And now you are dead.
I loved you and I love you still’
As you were and are for always
On the rocks and hills
Of memory. Good bye my Jim
Goodbye.
BALDWIN
O.K., O.K.,,,
I've loved you two years live
and ten years dead
isn't that enough?
And in my rage and in my age
given two youths your face
and excused myself, saying their
need was greater than mine
I would love them and make
them well,, HELL! - my lying head
my lying head you're dead
why must I resurrect you
always 24 always beautiful
why can't you grow old , get
bald and paunchy. 24
when I killed you...
When I killed you ? !
Sharon said I did, John
screamed you bitch you bitch
you killed him! I wasn't
even there - I was busy
dying too - in the sanatorium,
remember? - did I kill you?
I meant to give you life
instead, both of us are dead.
CHASING SHADOWS
I chase my voice thru echoing years,
past friends and former husbands.
Rebelling from the trap of expectations
I can tell you stories and preposterous tales
of how I lost my innocence before Matins.
A golden grapefruit picked from a tropic tree
and the luscious youth I gave it to.
A girl bound rigid by society,
in rooms of scrupulous taste and hot house blooms,
I hear those who thought
they owned me. Still hear their voices
calling once they’re sober,
“Come home, come back”.
And I have walked beneath the cherry blossoms
sprinkling in my hair and hurried to the Ryokan
to meet my lover there on gold tatami
far from reality.
My voice,
canters down an unpaved road.
It coats its throat with maple syrup
for singing in the wilderness and throws
echoes up Yosemite’s climbing walls,
while laughing at outrageous dirty jokes.
I was not brought up to sing the thing I am.
Elitist, Iconoclast,
unowned by any man.
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jul 26, 2015 - 12:58pm PT
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Jan,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts and memories of Hope and Jim.
In addition to the premature death of a former lover, part of her poem you quoted and also her earlier post suggest she also felt some regret, that their breakup may have been very distracting to Jim and may have contributed to the accident:
I thought I was doing him a favor leaving him but it had lousy consequences. (Personally, I feel a climber has to take responsibility and not go climbing if they are not feeling mentally ready).
Past love lost and regret can be powerful feelings.
They can motivate creativity, productivity or even just provide a temporary escape from the routine of ordinary life. I think many if not most of us have experienced these things.
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Mighty Walker
climber
Vancouver
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Topic Author's Reply - Jul 27, 2015 - 01:38pm PT
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Thanks so much for your stories about Hope, Jan. Clint, I agree completely. Each person has to take responsibility for their state of mind when putting themselves in harm's way.
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Mighty Walker
climber
Vancouver
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Topic Author's Reply - Jul 28, 2015 - 08:21am PT
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"A climber never dies. His body may not live but his name and his record will live forever. And this is why I am never scared. Because I will live for a thousand years."
Jyothi Raj, India's famous "Monkey Climber"
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Rick A
climber
Boulder, Colorado
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Jul 31, 2015 - 06:29am PT
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In Butch Farrabee and Michael Ghiglieri’s book, Death In Yosemite, there is a description of Baldwin’s accident, apparently gleaned from the Park records:
June 19, 1964… Twenty six year old James E Baldwin, a Canadian who only two years earlier had done the first aid-climb of El Capitan’s 2,400 foot Dihedral Wall was retreating off Washington Column with John Evans. Baldwin’s heart had not been in the climb since before even the onset—he was having relationship problems with a woman named Helen. The problem? It seemed she was not interested in being his girlfriend.
Near dusk, Baldwin gave up on trying to focus on the climb. He stopped and yelled to Evans: “Would you hate me for the rest of my life if I chickened out?” Evans said no, he would not...Baldwin rappelled right off the end of his rope and fell several hundred feet.
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Flip Flop
climber
Earth Planet, Universe
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Jul 17, 2016 - 08:56pm PT
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What a fascinating thread.
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