Any published Gunks guidebooks before the 1964 Art Gran hard back, red book? Hell, in the Gran book Rusty Trifle was 5.2, Three Pines was 5.1, Commando Rave was 5.8, Pink Laurel was 5.7, Tough Shift was 5.9 and men were men. But High Ex was 5.7 and Simple Suff was still an aid climb.

Someone posted somewhere several months ago (how's that for helpful?) that there were a couple previous mini-guides before Gran's book.

There were informal notes around, and Dave Ingalls self-published something - I saw a copy once - but Todd Swain or Rich G. would probably know more. There was also a list (started and kept by whom I do not know) of the "first all nut ascent" of 'Gunks routes. All nut as in artificial chockstones, not a team of MJ, RS, BR, RR, et al.

Thanks for the information. I suppose my interest has been piqued based on climb details mentioned in the Gran book. Specifically on some of the hard free climbs that had been done that were one aid routes. Retribution, Nosedive, and other climbs were free by 1964. And there was obviously a push to free the other aid lines that still existed. So I was thinking that more light could be shed from earlier notes, preferably published information.

Thanks again!

There was also a list (started and kept by whom I do not know) of the "first all nut ascent" of 'Gunks routes.

That was our very own Jstan.

I remember this list. It was in a ledger type book that was at Rock and Snow.
Me and my climbing buddies at the time were able to claim several first all nut ascents of Gunks classics. I have wondered what happened to it. It would be a great time capsule to see again. Is it around?

After a 7 year hiatus from the forum, Roy Kligfield came up with the answer to his own question regarding early guidebooks.

http://gunks.com/ubbthreads7/ubbthreads.php/topics/50820/3

If I remember correctly, I recall back in the mid 70's, JStan proposed an idea for a very minimal guide with wide angle photos of just the beginning of the route showing only the first few feet of a route's line. This left all the route finding to the climber(s). Bold idea. RC

To summarize.

In 1964, when I started climbing in the Gunks, there was a mimeographed sheet (before xerox technology) of Shawangunk climbs--as reported in the posting above. I mistakenly attributed this to Dave Ingalls as author. However, it appears that it belonged to and was compiled by the IOCA, which at the time was the Intercollegiate Outing Club Association (I think that is the correct words)--perhaps authored by Willie Crowther? In any case, this series of pages had a few hundred Shawangunk climbs with multiple rating systems. See my reference in the above posting to this for those interested. It would be interesting to know who the primary authors on this "guide" were!

Rickster, the more I learn about Stannard the more I impressed.

Roy it would be pretty wild to actually get hands on a set of these old mimeographs. Anyone out there have them? Perhaps you can make more mimeographs of them.

RR

Interesting...
At the bottom it says


So you're saying Dave Ingalls took the IOCA list and created his own list? So somewhere out there is the IOCA list that predates this one? Or that the list I have was created by someone else and mistakenly attributed to DBI?