Most influential american climber

[scott_harpell]

to attempt to keyhole people into a list of most important follows christain rhetoric.

 

I don't follow.

[riptorn]

George Lowe (for alpine)- Putting up hard ass commiting Alpine Climbs in fine style way back in the day.

[Alpine_Tom]

Is no one going to even nominate Dan (the man) -? He's certainly been influential in killing more electrons on this site than anyone else, more even than Beckey!

[fern]

[Lowell_Skoog]

Interesting thread with good suggestions. It's hard to think of better ones.

 

I'll add my vote for John Muir. His early technical climbing was already mentioned. Even more important was his advocacy of wilderness. I read an interview with Reinhold Messner a few years ago in which he compared the over-developed state of the Alps against the more natural state of our American mountains. He said the reason for the difference was that America had John Muir and Europe did not. Food for thought...

[Lambone]

Alex Lowe

 

or...Warren Harding

[EWolfe]

Alex Lowe

 

or...Warren Harding

 

Thread drift:

 

Don't you mean "War'n Hardware"

 

[snoboy]

...we may appreciate Gill's focus, Croft's solos...

 

Croft is a Canuck, case you didn't know.

 

I'm still trying to think of who I would nominate.

[scott_harpell]

...we may appreciate Gill's focus, Croft's solos...

 

Croft is a Canuck, case you didn't know.

 

I'm still trying to think of who I would nominate.

 

Born in Israel.

[DPS]

John Roskelly.

[Stefan]

Who were the guys who made it to a significant elevation on the Abruzzi Ridge on K2 in 1937 or 1938 - even climbing the section where there is a wire ladder now. I think it was one or two years before Fritz Weissner attempted the climb.

 

My mind thinks it is Paul Petzoldt. If it is him, then he is the most influential.

[Dru]

MisterE, not tri-cams...the original SLCD design was by Lowe, not Jardine. Greg Lowe invented the first SLCD...he patented it. He showed it to Jardine, who ripped off the idea, tweaked it (substantially, by adding the trigger among other refinements) and sold it to Wild Country. Lowe sued, and they settled out of court.

 

Ref: "Wizards of Rock"

 

 

Only partly true. Lowe had used a spring loaded cam in a climbing devise (early 70s). Jardine admits to using Lowe's concept. BUT concept only. Jardine's devise was far more refined that Lowe's, that's why it was copied by everyone else and is still with use today.

Lowe did sue. But it was ruled that he could not patent the cam portion of the devise. Cams have been around to long. Jardine's devise was different enough, in other ways, to win the case. He got the patent.

Every other cam manufacturer has used basically the same concept as Jardine's. He could not sue Chouinard for the Camalot design even though only the double-axle was new.

Give credit where credit is due.

 

 

chris

 

(sorry for the subject drift)

 

i read somewhere that lowe stole the cam idea in turn from vitaly abalakov who had experimented with prototypes of eccentrically rotating protection in the 1950's or something and showed them to lowe at an exchange meet.... of course i also read in a biographical piece on lowe where he said abalakov stole the idea from him....

 

in fact Lowe has invented a lot of weird stuff but aside from the TRICAM not a lot of it is very good. mostly the refinement made by someone else is what has caught on. Footfangs were the shit for a while but no longer. Some of the "new" lowe inventions like the SBG belay device and Tri-Nuts strike me as silly.

[Off_White]

I dunno Dru, Snargs were pretty good in their day. They seemed like a huge improvement over my old Salewa tube screws, and removed easier than a warthog. Still, I think Lowe's climbing has been more influential. I do think we're mixing our Lowes up, and some of that stuff came from George and some came from Jeff.

 

We should just create a meta-personality by lumping those two together with the unrelated Alex Lowe, and then perhaps you could say Lowes are perhaps the most influential US climber.

[catbirdseat]

Alright -obvious one - Royal Robbins, especially for visionary aid routes, as well as being an early proponent of clean climbing.

 

But how about Ray Jardine for making a toy that allowed us gapers to climb cracks grades harder than we may attempt with just Hexes and nuts - look at it this way - we may appreciate Gill's focus, Croft's solos, anyone's big numbers or audacious ascents, but every one of us who climbs any iota of trad carries derivatives of those funky camming devices on our harnesses.

My vote goes to Ray Jardine. He took an idea and refined it until it was practical and then he manufactured it and sold it and popularized it. I read that his first prototypes didn't have triggers. He'd place them on lead and then have to rap the route with tools to remove them. The trigger is the key along with selection of metal, and camming angle. Few, other than sport climbers, would be climbing above 5.10 today if it were not for Ray. Who knows, if Ray had met with an accident, we might all be clipping bolts today. More likely, some other clever person would have figured it out eventually, but Ray was the one.

[ivan]

anyone said peter parker? i mean, that guy can climb fuk'n ANYTHING!

[lancegranite]

Clint Eastwood.

I saw The Eiger Sanction and just knew that I wanted to be a assassin.

Climbing looked like good assassin training, so I climbed as much as I could.

after a while, killing was not the game it used to be, and I retired.

 

...this was close as George Kennedy is aslo a favorite.

[MrDoolittle]

Dan -'s speed ascents have revolutionized american alpine climbing.

[Rodchester]

Who were the guys who made it to a significant elevation on the Abruzzi Ridge on K2 in 1937 or 1938 - even climbing the section where there is a wire ladder now. I think it was one or two years before Fritz Weissner attempted the climb.

 

My mind thinks it is Paul Petzoldt. If it is him, then he is the most influential.

 

You are correct. It was Paul and he is one of the most influential by far. His climbing career was ground breaking and he was very infuential in guiding when he and Exum founded Exum Guides. He was also very influential in outdoor education in founding NOLS.

 

Paul

 

[Dru]

it's about "what is meant by influential". Do you mean the climber that is most respected, most emulated, who you'd most like to be, or who has done the most to change the sport?

 

 

One who hasn't been mentioned yet is John Sherman. By making a guidebook that graded and named boulder problems, and applying open ended grading system to those problems, and popularizing the crash pad, one could argue Sherman is more responsible than anyone else for the current popularity of bouldering.

[MrDoolittle]

Sadly, any american climber pales in comaprison to their european contemporaries. They just rule, especially the eastern european and former soviet union climbers. Even the hardest americans today are putting up weak routes, in poor style, compared to the euros.

[Ducknut]

Who were the guys who made it to a significant elevation on the Abruzzi Ridge on K2 in 1937 or 1938 - even climbing the section where there is a wire ladder now. I think it was one or two years before Fritz Weissner attempted the climb.

 

My mind thinks it is Paul Petzoldt. If it is him, then he is the most influential.

 

You are correct. It was Paul and he is one of the most influential by far. His climbing career was ground breaking and he was very infuential in guiding when he and Exum founded Exum Guides. He was also very influential in outdoor education in founding NOLS.

 

Paul

 

 

Charlie Houston should be mentioned in this breath (pun intended) for his leadership in furthering American climbing and high altitude physiology.

 

Pete Schoening had a major impact on American climbing for saving 5 leading US climbers (6 if you count the already seriously ill Gilkey) with single hip/ice ax belay.

[chriss]

""i read somewhere that lowe stole the cam idea in turn from vitaly abalakov who had experimented with prototypes of eccentrically rotating protection in the 1950's or something and showed them to lowe at an exchange meet.... of course i also read in a biographical piece on lowe where he said abalakov stole the idea from him....

 

in fact Lowe has invented a lot of weird stuff but aside from the TRICAM not a lot of it is very good. mostly the refinement made by someone else is what has caught on. Footfangs were the shit for a while but no longer. Some of the "new" lowe inventions like the SBG belay device and Tri-Nuts strike me as silly.

""

(that should of had quotes around it)

 

 

I remembered reading an article about the "Abalokov Cams" in an old Off Belay magazine from February '78 (#37 looked it up). It mentions an article from #25, February '76, which I have lost over the years. The cams in the pictures (#37) look almost identical to the Tricams of today. The American/Soviet climbers exchange was also in '76. The article in #25 is about that event. So, if someone has the #25 issue of Off Belay around....

 

Of note is, cams were already being used passively, meaning no springs. CMI and SMC had Kirk's Cams and Camlocks in production and on the market in that same timeframe.

 

Lowe's Footfangs introduced a few concepts it took years for other manufacturers (and consumers) to grasp. Vertical frontpoints, "anti-bots", "step-in" bindings. Way, way ahead of their time. Considered standard on ice crampons today. Lowe had vision that's for sure.

 

chris

Edited March 30, 2004 by chriss

[gmknight]

Hey Dru, dont forget about the Lowe Bolo. Those are coolest things on my rack.

[nolanr]

Somebody mentioned Charlie Houston, so I'll throw Bradford Washburn in there. The history of Alaskan mountaineering just wouldn't have been the same w/out him.

[dylan_taylor]

Layton Kor and Harvey T Carter deserve some recognition for their slew of desert and alpine first ascents.

"...Not because they are there, but because they might not be there much longer..." -Kor trying to explain the reason for climbing rotten desert towers.

 

Jim Donini, and (to an extreme effect) F Becky, for giving us hope that one can have a long and fruitful climbing career.