Mountain Men The Remarkable Climbers And Determined Eccentrics Who First Scaled The World's Most Famous Peaks

by Conefrey, Mick; Jordan, Tim

• ISBN13: 9780306812262
• ISBN10: 0306812266
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2003-03-27
• Publisher: Da Capo Press

Summary

Traversing a century of climbing that begins with Victorian enthusiasts and ends with the conquerors of the Himalayan peaks,Mountain Mentells the stories of the extraordinary men who were the first to climb the world's best-known mountains: the Matterhorn, McKinley, Everest, and K2. Edward Whymper's relentless siege of the Matterhorn ended in controversy when four of his companions plunged to their deaths an hour after leaving the summit. In Alaska there have been many disputed claims to the first conquest of Mt. McKinley, and locals still insist that the honor belongs to three miners who climbed on a bet, armed with homemade climbing irons and bags of donuts. For a hundred years mountaineers have fallen victim to the fatal attraction of K2. An Italian aristocrat, an American millionaire, and an English Satanist were among the first to reach its slopes. They found a place of disappointment and madness; one of them never returned.Accompanied by unique archival materials, detailed maps, and photographs, Mountain Men invites us to follow in the footsteps of these fearless explorers, and tells us their stories with all the romance and audacity, bravado and suffering, courage and miscalculation intact.

Author Biography

Mick Conefrey is a producer and director for the BBC. He produced the Mountain Men series. Tim Jordan was the associate producer of Mountain Men.

Table of Contents

Introduction	1	(7)
The Man Who Sold the Alps	8	(21)
The Misfit and the Matterhorn	29	(30)
High Society	59	(20)
The Shameless Diary of an Explorer	79	(18)
The Fingerprints of Dr. Cook	97	(39)
The Misplaced Optimism of Maurice Wilson	136	(24)
The Rise and Fall of Fritz Wiessner	160	(41)
Houston's Last Expedition	201	(21)
The Jealous Mountain	222	(25)
Why Climb?	247	(18)
Bibliography	265	(6)
Index	271