Lowell_Skoog

I looked at the award criteria and, frankly, found the discussion pretty incoherent. I guess the award is intended to recognize the most "Fred-like" climber. Since Fred has pretty unusual qualities, maybe I shouldn't be surprised that the Oregon section members had a hard time defining them. The "Mongo" stuff would be embarrassment to me if I was on the award panel. It undercuts the seriousness of what you're doing and suggests that you don't really know what the award is about. Basically, the "Mongo" clause means you can bestow the award to whoever you like "just because." Another thing that struck me was that some of the criteria may be a projection of today's politically correct ethics, not necessarily a description of Fred. And some of the criteria may be contradictory. For example, is the publishing of 1000+ pages of guidebooks "leaving no trace" when you consider the impact it has on the Cascades? Is competitiveness consistent with good style? Does pioneering apply only to the creation of new routes, or are there other ways that one can be a pioneer in climbing? Focusing just on new routes sells Fred short, since his biggest impact on the climbing world has been his writing. Having said all that, I think the names suggested so far are generally good ones. I second Burdo, Doorish, Kearney, Kloke and Serl. It's probably premature to award something like this to Colin. Some other names come to mind: Wolf Bauer Alex Bertulis Stimson Bullitt Ed Cooper Dan Davis Joe Firey Andy Fitz Dee Molenaar Jim Nelson John Roper Pete Shoening Pat Timson

The Challenger Arm Route, listed under Big Beaver Creek Trail in the Approaches section, is badly mangled in the 2nd Edition. (The 1st Edition was more accurate but still had some bad advice.) Here's my offering:

Here's a picture taken from Sourdough Ridge at the end of the May 1985 Picket Range ski traverse. A more distant view was published in the May 1986 issue of Rock & Ice with my article about the traverse. Bryan Burdo later told me that the picture inspired him to go check out the face. (I like historical trivia like that.) Should I post pictures like this, or would it be better to keep some of these places more mysterious. I don't know. What do you think?

Enlargeable pictures is something that Steve Firebaugh (our team's web designer) added late in the project. We didn't consider this a requirement and Steve created enlargements for photos of his choosing. He already had a big workload, so we didn't ask him to create enlargements for everything. (I should also mention that Steve was our photo editor and consistently prodded the rest of us to find more and better photos. The finished look of the journal is mainly thanks to Steve.)

A print version of the journal is something we will continue to discuss, I'm sure. I've promised the Mountaineers History Committee that we will provide a paper copy of the journal to the Mountaineers Library, so there's not much risk that the information will be lost. Experiments on my printer at home seem to indicate that just printing out each article from my web browser should be good enough to satisfy their requirements. As long as The Mountaineers remain a viable organization, they will maintain the information on their website, so the journal we have published there will survive. The two top priorities in producing the NWMJ have been, in order: 1. Get something out there of good quality. 2. Develop a system to do it again and again. The key to achieving these goals is to assemble a good team of volunteers and keep things simple. It would be really easy to succumb to the desire to create a fancy printed journal. But that would increase the likelihood that the team would burn out and publish nothing. A website is the simplest, cheapest way to go, so that's what we've done.

I've been notified of a descent that I missed. (Excellent! That's why I post this stuff.) April 24, 2004: Mt Hardy, NE couloir ski descent, by Dave Burdick and Phil Fortier. http://uw.cascadeclimbers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1519 http://www.mtnphil.com/Hardy2/Hardy2.html http://www.alpinedave.com/mt_hardy/ne_couloir/ne_couloir.htm

With the season winding down, I've updated the Chronologies on my history website, http://alpenglow.org/ski-history, for 2004. Most new entries are marked "undocumented," which means that I haven't written or posted abstracts of the trip reports. I'll get around to it eventually. I've also added a "strawman" annotation on routes for which the previous history is uncertain. Some of these reports have been published in the Summer 2004 issue of the Northwest Mountaineering Journal (http://www.nwmj.org). The NWMJ was assembled in the middle of the ski mountaineering season, so several reports won't be published in the journal until next year. Here's a summary of new route activity that I know about, with links to published trip reports, when available: February, 2003: Big Kangaroo, North Couloir ski descent, by Katharine Bill, Ottis Buzzard, Chris Clark and Scott Johnston (Johnston personal communication). http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts3.html February, 2003: Wallaby Peak, "Life is Good Gully", by Larry Goldie and Scott Johnston (Johnston personal communication). http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts3.html February 2, 2004: Chair Peak, South gully ski descent, by Sky Sjue (strawman). http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/306585/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://staff.washington.edu/skykilo/EclecticChair/EclecticChair.html February 21, 2004: Mt St Helens, Crater Wall ski descent, by [names withheld] (personal communication). Late February, 2004: "Jay Peak", Crescent Couloir ski descent, by Armond DuBuque, Craig Hatton and Scott Wicklund (DuBuque personal communication). http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts.html March 23, 2004: Mt Maude, NE Couloir ski descent, by Jason Cassarino and Ross Peritore. http://www.turns-all-year.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=tr0403;action=display;num=1080236015 http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/326329/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts.html April 2-4, 2004: Nooksack Traverse (Baker Ski Area to Ruth Mtn), by Sam Avaiusini, Jason and Josh Hummel, Sky Sjue and Lowell Skoog. http://www.turns-all-year.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=tr0404;action=display;num=1081186250 http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/330209/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1#Post330729 http://www.cascadecrusades.org/SkiMountaineering/MountShuksan/Routes/NooksackGlacier/TheNooksackTraverseApril2004/thenooksacktraverse.htm http://staff.washington.edu/skykilo/Nooksack/Nooksack.html http://www.alpineslider.com/nookie1.htm http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Nooksack.html April 3, 2004: Dragontail Peak, NE Couloir ski descent, by Ross Peritore. http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/330279/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts.html April 11, 2004: Monte Cristo Range ski circuit, by Josh Kaplan (strawman). http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/333251/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1#Post333480 April 26, 2004: Big Jim Mountain, NE Face ski descent, by Rob Castillo, Armond DuBuque and Jim Jack (DuBuque personal communication). http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts.html April 29, 2004: Mt Buckner, North Couloir ski descent, by Josh Kaplan and Sky Sjue. http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/340358/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://staff.washington.edu/skykilo/NFCouloir/NFCouloir.html http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts.html May 13, 2004: Mt Shuksan, Price Glacier Couloir ski descent, by Ben Kaufman and Sky Sjue. http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/347173/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://staff.washington.edu/skykilo/PriceCouloir/PriceCouloir.html http://staff.washington.edu/skykilo/PriceCheck/PriceCheck.html June 4, 2004: Mt Adams, Lyman Glacier (south portion) ski descent, by Amar Andalkar, Sam Avaiusini, Cyril Benda, Corey Bloom, Jason Hummel and Sky Sjue. http://www.turns-all-year.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=tr0406;action=display;num=1086464821 http://staff.washington.edu/skykilo/SouthLyman/SouthLyman.html http://www.alpineslider.com/AdamsLymanSouth.htm http://www.cascadecrusades.org/SkiMountaineering/MountAdams/Routes/LymanGlacier/LymanGlacierJune2004/SouthPortionLymanJune2004.htm June 4, 2004: Mt Torment, North Face ski descent, by Andy Dappen and Martin Volken. http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/357590/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 Also see 5/15/2004 descent of Moraine Lake Couloir: http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/349351/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 June 4, 2004: Magic Mtn, NE Couloir ski descent, by Phil Fortier and Matt Peters. http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/357795/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://www.mtnphil.com/Magic/Magic.html June 28, 2004: Mt Degenhardt, Degenhardt Glacier ski descent, by Ross Peritore and Sky Sjue. http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/368776/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://www.turns-all-year.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=tr0406;action=display;num=1089010711 http://staff.washington.edu/skykilo/Degenhardt/Degenhardt.html July 4, 2004: Sherman Peak (Mt Baker), NE Face ski descent, by Cyril Benda, Jason and Josh Hummel (Jason Hummel personal communication). ---- I've also posted a few earlier routes, previously unreported. These were uncovered during research for my "Cascade Steeps" article in the NWMJ (http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Steeps.html). These reports are based on personal communications: April 28, 1979: Mt Stuart, Cascadian Couloir ski descent, by Eric and Kurt Feigl. June 1984: Mt Adams, Avalanche Glacier ski descent, by W.D. Frank and Gary Nesvig (strawman). Spring, 1985: Robinson Mountain, East Cirque ski descent, by Sprague Ackley and Hope Barnes. Circa 1985: Cannon Mountain, NE Couloir ski descent, by Gordon Briody and Rob Harris (from Gordon Briody). Circa 1987, spring: Mt Shuksan, Summit Pyramid ski descent, by Steve Vanpatten, Jim Witte. Circa 1992, spring: Mt Rainier, Wilson Headwall ski descent, by Jim Collinson (from Ned Randolph). Circa 1993, spring: Tenpeak Mountain, North Couloir ski descent, by Andreas Schmidt. Circa 1997: Mt Stuart, Sherpa Glacier Couloir ski descent, by Jeff Mazinko and Shane Wilder (from Armond DuBuque). Circa 1998, April: Mt Spickard, North Face ski descent from true summit, by Steve Hindman. Circa 1998, spring: Mt Cashmere, SE Face ski descent, by Gordon Briody. Late 1990s: North Gardner Mountain, NE Couloir ski descent, by Sprague Ackley and Brian Povolny. http://www.mountaineers.org/nwmj/041_Shorts3.html May 2001: Klawatti Peak, South Face ski descent, by AMGA exam group (from Martin Volken). June, 2001: Mt Rainier, Tahoma Glacier complete ski descent, by Matt Farmer and Ned Randolph (from Ned Randolph). If you find errors or omissions in my records, or if you know about earlier reports than I've listed, please let me know. You can contact me through my website, http://alpenglow.org/ski-history. ---- This message has been cross-posted to the following forums: http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/374108/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1 http://www.turns-all-year.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=ha1;action=display;num=1090279350 http://www.telemarktalk.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=255098#255098

Northwest Mountaineering Journal, Issue 1, Summer 2004 The premiere issue of the Northwest Mountaineering Journal is now available on the web. See: http://www.nwmj.org This issue covers new climbing routes, first winter ascents, first ski descents, and pioneering traverses in the Cascades. It contains historical articles about crag, alpine and big wall rock climbing, guiding, and ski mountaineering. It also contains profiles of Northwest mountaineers and highlights from Mount Rainier and North Cascades National Parks. In short, it's a good example of what we hope will be an annual publication about all aspects of mountaineering in the Pacific Northwest. I'd like to thank everyone who contributed photos, stories, and information for this issue. I'd also like to thank the great team of volunteers who edited the journal and the folks at CascadeClimbers.com and the The Mountaineers who provided invaluable support. We hope you enjoy this issue and will begin looking forward to the next one. The 2004 Northwest Mountaineering Journal Team Ralph Bodenner Steve Firebaugh Paul Klenke Alex Krawarik Matt Perkins Gordy Skoog Lowell Skoog Gary Yngve

A skier and climber who delighted in music and theater, Jim Martin died recently in Portland, Oregon, at age 96. Born in Seattle, Martin was introduced to mountains and skiing as a teenager by Wally Burr, a shop teacher in the Seattle schools. Martin helped Burr steam and bend hickory slats into finely crafted skis in Burr's home workshop. In 1926, while a student at Seattle's Roosevelt High School, Martin attended a New Years outing to Mount Rainier with snowshoers and skiers of the Tacoma Mountaineers. He joined The Mountaineers and in the following years, with friends like William Degenhardt, Forest Farr, and Herbert Strandberg, he helped transform the club--and Northwest climbing--from mass ascents of the volcanos by large parties to a new era of adventurous climbing by small teams on remote Cascade peaks. Martin and his peers were regarded as "outlaws" by the old guard that founded The Mountaineers in 1906. Small-group climbing and the making of first ascents was considered rather subversive to the ideals of the founders, who stressed fellowship during regimented summer outings in which a few experienced climbers guided dozens of novices up one of the Cascade volcanos. That wouldn't do for Jim Martin and his friends. In August, 1930, with Bill Degenhardt and Evelyn McAlpine, he completed a "Triangle Tour," climbing Mount Rainier, Glacier Peak and Mount Olympus in a quick two-week vacation. In August, 1932, with Degenhardt and Herbert Strandberg, Martin explored the Southern Picket Range in the North Cascades, making first ascents of Mount Terror, West Twin Needle, West Peak, and The Chopping Block. Martin was also a pioneer skier. In 1930, with Bill Degenhardt and Ted Lewis, he entered the first Patrol Race, a grueling eighteen-mile dash on skis between Snoqualmie and Stampede Passes. He was also a member of the committee that selected U.S. skiers for the 1936 Olympic Games at Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany. Martin and his friends were among the last climbers to pioneer significant Cascade summits in the "pre-iron" age--before pitons, carabiners, and sophisticated belay techniques were introduced to the Northwest. Shoulder belays and the use of natural anchors like rock horns were the limit of their techniques. In an interview with Malcolm Bates for the book "Cascade Voices," Martin later admitted, "Nowadays they have grades 1, 2, 5 or 6 in Beckey's guide book. It's all Greek to me." Jim Martin loved to sing, dance and yodel, and he met his future wife Lucille Morrill in the Mountaineer Players. Like many mountaineers, his prospects for romance had to compete with his love of the mountains. "I'd wait to see how the snow was for skiing," he later confessed, "and it took me the longest time to work in a date, but I finally did." In 1941, Martin and his wife moved from Seattle to Portland where he was transferred by the Mutual of New York Life Insurance Company. He continued skiing and climbing near his new home. The May 1958 Mountaineer bulletin (p. 8) describes an incident in which Martin was caught alone by a storm high on Mount Hood during a March ski ascent. He survived a night without bivouac gear by digging three snow caves to escape from shifting winds and by performing calisthenics to aid circulation until the storm abated in the morning. As noted in the bulletin, "Once trapped by the elements, Martin showed what experience and equipment can do." Daughter Judy Martin Hedges of Corvallis, Oregon, recalls: "My father loved to tell stories about his years with The Mountaineers: about his old-time climbing friends, his singing and acting with my mother and about the climbing and ski equipment they sent for from Europe. They couldn't get much from home until an acquaintance (Lloyd Anderson) started REI in his basement. My father was a great story teller with so much history to pass on. My son videotaped him telling about his life in Seattle about three years ago. A wonderful piece of saved history for our family." Published photographs of Jim Martin can be found in "Cascade Voices" by Malcolm S. Bates (photos 2 and 6 at the end of Section 1) and in "The Mountaineers: A History" by Jim Kjeldsen (p. 39).

Yup. Gordy climbed the wider gully west of the Mantis summit. Your topo line is drawn on the very narrow gully east of the summit (left of the sunny prow in the attached picture). It probably hasn't been climbed.

That makes sense. It's been 8 years since I last did the route, so I don't know about the current anchors. I agree with what others have said--it would get tricky after you finish the first bolt ladder, which spirals around the buttress rather than climbing straight up. That's somewhere between the 3rd and 5th pitch, depending on where you start belaying. I suggest bringing a light second line in case you need to back off. If you're "not exactly the best climber in the world" (me neither) you'll probably find it helpful to haul your pack in a few places.

I usually downclimb the SW gully. It's easier (class 3) than the south arete and safe enough if you stick together. It's interesting that today climbers would consider rappeling a ~10 pitch route on a peak that has a walk-off down the backside. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, necessarily, but it's sure a different strategy then when I started climbing. How did this get started? Last summer a friend and I climbed Gimli in the Valhallas of B.C. The peak has an easy scramble route down the backside, yet we listened to two parties kick rocks on each other well past sunset as they rappeled back down the technical route after summiting. Call me an old fart but I kept thinking "What's with kids these days!" I asked one of them about it as he tromped past our camp in the dark and he said, "Oh rappeling is much faster." Well it wasn't, according to my watch after we scrambled down the back side the next day.

Um, yeah. That video is one part nostalgia, one part embarrassment. It wasn't made by Steve Marts. It was made in 1980 by Don McCune and the crew of KOMO-TV's Exploration Northwest. Not climbers at all. They did a pretty darn good job considering that. The program was called "Goldenhorn Pinnacle" and it won an Emmy for editing, I believe. There were a number of scenes shot near our base camp that aren't very realistic. The one-chock anchor was one and the bivi was another. But there was some pretty realistic stuff too like rockfall, rain, bad rock and simul-climbing to reach an anchor. The climb was actually the second ascent of the NE buttress. My brother Gordy and Jim Walseth made the first ascent a year earlier and Gordy suggested it to the TV crew as spectacular climb where it would be legal to go by helicopter. It's an interesting tale--someday I'll post a story about it on my website. I believe you can buy this program on videotape from Don McCune's widow Linda. See the following website: http://www.donmccunelibrary.com/ The Goldenhorn tape is V-107.

I've done the traverse twice. The last time, in 1996, we used a 50m half-rope (doubled), four wired stoppers, four small-to-medium hexes, two Friends (1.5 and 2.5), seven single and three double runners, extra webbing for rappels, one ice axe each, and crampons. (We didn't use the crampons but I wouldn't leave them behind.) In my journal I wrote "excellent rack for this." Obviously, you're mileage may vary.

Maybe so, but I have no reason to doubt Jim Hawkins' story. At the time, he just took advantage of a nice winter day to make what he figured would be the first ascent of 1958. Later, he heard that somebody else claimed the first winter ascent and he realized that his climb was probably the first. He never made a big deal about it because he knew that solo ascents were frowned upon in those days. But when Stella Degenhardt interviewed him about his IGY experiences, he mentioned his climb. When he heard through Stella that I was interested in his story, he was quite tickled. I have since exchanged e-mails with him for more information. I leave it to the editing committee of the Olympic Climber's Guide to decide how they want to handle this in their book. My intention here is just to share my findings. The Springgate article is especially important since it is a published account that has been overlooked. As for myself, in my research and writing, I will give appropriate credit to both Hawkins and the Springgate party. I think this is a case where both ascents are worth remembering.

I've long been puzzled by the lack of information about the first winter ascent of Mt Olympus. In the Climber's Guide to the Olympic Mountains (3rd Ed., 1988, p. 220), attempts by Pete Schoening and friends in the late 1940s and early 1950s are mentioned. These attempts are documented in the Mountaineer Annuals (1948, p. 54, and 1959, p. 63). In one attempt, Schoening reached the foot of the summit rocks, only to find them so coated in rime as to be unclimbable given the group's limited equipment. The Climber's Guide mentions the International Geophysical Year (IGY) party led by Ed LaChapelle, which wintered on the Snow Dome in 1957-58. It says they did not climb the main peak of Olympus. The guide concludes: "In all likelihood, Olympus has now been climbed. Unfortunately, there is no record." Well, that's not right. In the March 1965 issue of Summit magazine (p. 18) Richard Springgate writes that on New Year's Day (presumedly 1965) he, with John Norgord, Jan Still and John Wells, all members of the University of Washington Climbing Club, made the first winter ascent of Mt Olympus. They approached on foot via the Hoh River, climbing to the summit from the IGY hut during their fifth day out. How could the authors of the Olympic Climber's Guide have missed this? Is there a later edition of the guidebook where this has been corrected? The 1965 climb may deserve credit as the first winter ascent of Olympus made conventionally from the Hoh Ranger Station. But, in fact, it was not the first winter climb. In a 1997 interview with Stella Degenhardt of the Mountaineers History Committee, Jim Hawkins of the IGY team revealed that he climbed the true summit solo on January 5, 1958, during one of his stints at the research station. We was accompanied by Roger Ross, a U.W. meteorology student who, according to Hawkins, "was not a mountain person at all and would have no part of it." If you know anything more about the history of winter climbing on Mt Olympus, or any reason why the Hawkins and Springgate climbs should not be recognized as pioneering ascents, let me know.

Excellent! Well you can tell him that I enjoy his writing, next time you speak to him. Good reading!

Back at work on my ski mountaineering history project, I'm reviewing old Summit magazines. I found some stories by Michael Borghoff, who made the first winter and ski ascent of Silver Star Mountain with Fred Beckey in 1965. Since Silver Star is the only place where Fred appears in the chronology of Cascade ski pioneering, I looked for comments from Borghoff about his partner. The following is from "The Nooksack Tower," an April 1961 story written by Borghoff before he climbed with Fred, when he knew Beckey only by reputation. I thought you might enjoy this quote: The story also includes some of the more entertaining writing about Cascade brush that I've found:

Sounds like a good trip. I think a lot of people had their eye on Torment's north side. My brother Carl and I intended to ski it last June the day after our descent of Forbidden Peak's north ridge. However, we found a gaping schrund across the entire face. That was in late June. Another friend of mine was going to try it earlier this spring.

The more difficult pitches are on the north side of the crest. They might be wet or snowy. My recommendation would be to go a bit later in the season. It's probably doable though.

Prompted by some email from John Roper and Harry Majors on an unrelated topic, I looked through my copy of R. Duke Watson's outdoor trip record (which Duke generously gave me a couple years ago) for the month of August 1960. During a pack trip in the Washington Pass area with family and friends, Duke Watson, Warren Spickard and Dave Scott climbed both the east and west summits of Black Peak on August 23. This climb pre-dates the July 8, 1966 ascent of the west summit by the Firey-Meulemans party listed in CAG-2, 3rd Ed., p. 348. So, I think the first ascent record for this summit needs to be revised. R. Duke Watson is a little known and under-appreciated Washington mountaineer. He was an officer in the 10th Mountain Division in WWII, leading the company that seized Mt Della Torraccia in the Appenines, where Duke was wounded on the summit. He made the first ascent of the west peak of Mt Fury in the North Cascades and the fourth ascent of Mt Waddington in the B.C. Coast Mountains. He was a pioneer ski mountaineer and one of the founders of the Crystal Mountain ski area. Beginning in his fifties, he organized a series of canoe trips across Canada. Last I heard, Duke is still healthy and vigorous in his late 80s. I suspect that a more thorough review of Duke's outdoor record (I've looked at it only for ski mountaineering trips) would uncover other pioneering climbs.

The masters are on DigiBeta tape, which is professional quality, used by TV stations. We've made a small number of viewing copies on VHS tape. We chose VHS because the people who are most interested in these films are typically older and more of them have VHS than DVD. In another few years, I expect this will change. Nothing prevents making copies on DVD, except of course money. DVD is a fine viewing format, but it is not an archival format, since a huge amount of data compression occurs when you make a DVD. The Hessey and Brower films were preserved as part of a larger project. If you're interested, here are links to my notes on all the films in the collection. When we do a film night, I expect to show something from each of these filmmakers: Dwight Watson films: http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/movie/dw-movies.html Burge Bickford film ("Ascent of The Tooth"): http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/movie/mtneers-1940-tooth.html Bob & Ira Spring films: http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/movie/spring-movies.html Charles & Marion Hessey films: http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/movie/hessey-movies.html David Brower film ("Wilderness Alps of Stehekin"): http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/movie/drb-1958-wildalps.html

Once upon a time you could buy weather radios cheap at Radio Shack. I bet they still carry some. Try the Northgate store.

The Mountaineers History Committee has preserved seven movies produced by Charles and Marion Hessey in the 1950s. Another film by David Brower, "Wilderness Alps of Stehekin," has also been preserved. The Hesseys, of Naches, Washington, are probably the most widely traveled Cascade filmmakers of all time. Their films provide an irreplaceable motion picture record of hiking, scrambling and skiing in the North Cascades before the Glacier Peak Wilderness and North Cascades National Park were established. Together with "Wilderness Alps," the Hessey films show what would have been lost if wilderness protection for the North Cascades had not been achieved. The Hessey films include: Skiing Cascade Wilderness (1956) - Three weeks of skiing above Lyman Lake near Holden in the Lake Chelan mountains. Glacier Peak Holiday (1957) - A summer of rambling in the disputed Glacier Peak region with scenes of the Napeequa Valley, White Pass, Lake Chelan, Cascade Pass, and the northern end of the Ptarmigan Traverse. Cascade Crest Trail (1958) - Highlights of the Crest Trail from the Columbia River to the Canadian border, with skiing on Mt Adams, Hogback Mountain and Morse Creek and extensive mountain goat scenes. From East to West in the North Cascades Wilderness (1958) - A summer travelogue from the eastern Pasayten near Windy Peak to the west side of the disputed North Cascades wilderness between Mt Baker and Whatcom Pass. Pasayten Wilderness Skiing (1958) - Late winter skiing near Spanish Camp with scenes of Cathedral Pass and Amphitheatre and Bald Mountains. A North Cascades National Park? (circa 1958-59) - A high country trek between Downey Creek, the South Cascade Glacier and White Rock Lakes that urges protection of the area in a national park. Have You Seen the North Cascades National Park (circa 1968) - A survey of North Cascade attractions, compiled after the park was established. And by David Brower: Wilderness Alps of Stehekin (1958) - An award winning film narrated by Brower and including footage by Charles and Marion Hessey. This film argues eloquently for the protection of wilderness in the North Cascades. All these films are in color with sound. They have been transferred from 16 mm film to digital videotape and VHS copies have been placed in the Mountaineers Library for club members, historians and others to view and enjoy. More complete notes about these films can be found on the Alpenglow Ski Mountaineering History Project website: http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/movie/hessey-movies.html http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/movie/drb-1958-wildalps.html If you enjoy wilderness, skiing or the North Cascades, I think you'll enjoy these films. The Mountaineers History Committee plans to schedule a movie night at the clubhouse in Seattle to screen these and other historic films in the coming months. Stay tuned... Preservation of these films was made possible by a grant from The Mountaineers Foundation. The Hessey films were preserved with the gracious cooperation of Marion Hessey and Phil Dahl. "Wilderness Alps" was preserved with the assistance of Patrick Goldsworthy of the North Cascades Conservation Council.

Here are a few of my favorites. Not all are true guidebooks. Mt Baker, Its Trails and Legends (on CD-ROM) - Easton, 1868-1942 Climbers Guide to the Cascade and Olympic Mountains - Beckey, 1949 The Cascades - Peattie, 1949 High Adventure - Spring, 1951 High Worlds of the Mountain Climber - Spring, 1959 The North Cascades - Miller, 1964 Climbers Guide to the Teton Range - Ortenburger, 1965 Northwest Snow Trails - Mueller, 1968 Routes and Rocks in the Mt Challenger Quadrangle - Tabor and Crowder, 1968 Sierra Spring Ski-Touring - Burhenne, 1971 Snow Trails - Prater, 1975 Monte Cristo Area - Majors, 1977