Jim McCarthy
  legendary Gunks climber
- July 1, 2010

FRB: Name?

Jim: Jim McCarthy.

FRB: Age?

Jim: 77.

FRB: Height/Weight?

Jim: 5'8”, 200 lbs.

FRB: Location?

Jim: Ridgway, Colorado.

FRB: How did you get into climbing, Jim?

Jim: At Freshman orientation at Princeton I saw a notice for the Mountaineering Club, signed up and the next weekend we all went up to the Gunks.

FRB: Who were some of your early mentors in your climbing careers?

Jim: At Princeton I was lucky enough to meet Joe Murphy and Tim Mutch who started me off. But that first weekend at the Gunks we all met Hans Kraus and his crew. Soon thereafter Hans took me under his wing. Later on I was lucky enough to meet the great Fritz Wiessner, who was very kind to me.

FRB: Who were some of your favorite early partners?

Jim: My first partner was John Ewing, who, tragically, was killed the next season in a fall at Sleeping Giant State Park in Connecticut. After John's death I climbed a lot with John Rupley and was lucky enough to climb a bit with Hans and some of his friends.

FRB: Tell us a cool, exciting epic story from your early years climbing.

Jim: The first year or so I went up to the Gunks with a guy named John Milner, who was in the Institute for Advanced Studies after his mathematical genius was recognized in a freshman math course. We decided to to an easy climb called the Southern Pillar. On the last pitch, in a fit of hubris, I decided to try to do a new direct finish, got way over my head and promptly fell off. Milner held me, so I had the honor of my first climbing fall being held by one of the world's great math geniuses.

FRB: You were a driving force in the formative days of Gunks climbing.           What was your motivation to excel at your climbing?

Jim: When I first arrived the leading climbers were Hans, Bonnie Prudden and, of course, Fritz. With them to look up to it wasn't too long before I realized that I could climb at their level and perhaps beyond.

FRB: You raised the bar in the Gunks. You brought 5.10 to the Gunks.
          Tell us about the genesis and development of your climbing
          during this period of your career.

Jim: When I first arrived the hardest free climb that was generally known was Han's Pus 5.7. What was not generally known was that Fritz had a climb at Skytop, Minnie Bell 5.8. With the protection of the day the start was very serious and the younger climbers were actively discouraged from trying it. So my first 5.8, Yellow Belly, was a complete Aha to me. The next breakthrough was MF, a solid 5.9. The next step in the progression was Retribution, my first 5.10. After that, The Deluge.

FRB:  You traveled extensively exploring and developing new climbs throughout the world. Impart to us some of the excitement and glory of your life as an international climbing star.

Jim: It's kind of hard to convey to present day climbers how different the climbing world of the 1950's and 60's was. First of all it was a very small world. Second, there were no American stars, excepting perhaps Royal Robbins. We pretty much knew each other, but no one else did. There was plenty of excitement in traveling around and doing new routes, but glory? Not much.

FRB: You climbed at the Cirque of the Unclimbables with Layton Kor
          and Royal Robbins. Tell us about the adventure you shared
          with them up north.

Jim: The President of the AAC at the time was Carlton Fuller. He was a mountaineer, but also a visionary. He knew the guys in Yosemite were up to something, even if he didn't quite understand it. He approached me and asked me to assemble a group and do something "significant". I contacted Royal who suggested Dick McCracken. I chose Layton and off we went to the Northwest Territories. When we got to the Cirque we did a quick fly around and spotted Proboscis. I had just finished my bar exams so wasn't as fit as I wished. On the third day, after one bivouac standing in slings, Layton took a leader fall. Stopping the fall dragged my hand through the carabiners and I jugged the rest of the way. A fantastic adventure... the first really big wall outside of the Valley!

FRB: You did early development of the Devil's Tower in Wyoming. Tell us about those routes you did on the Tower. The gear, your mental state, the experience, the climbing.

Jim: After stopping at the DT several time while returning to the East from the Rockies it occurred to me that all the climbs on the DT (there were 3) were on the broken up part of the Tower. No one had ventured onto the unbroken areas. So John Rupley and I picked on the West Face intending to nail every inch. Trouble was we had only soft iron pins with the biggest about the size of an inch and a half. So much against my will I had to do a whole lot of free climbing that wasn't in the game plan.

FRB: Your climbing resume is almost to voluminous to delineate. Please break your climbing career down into chapters and periods so we can fully grasp the depth of your accomplishments and experiences. (ie., gunks, then tetons, then devils tower, then canada, then overseas, then the himies... etc.) Please elaborate so we can really get a sense and feeling of the extent of your accomplishments and ascents.

Jim: Too much like an autobio that I am too lazy to undertake.

FRB: Your climbing resume could be envied by anyone.
          How does it feel now from your perspective looking back?

Jim: Looking back it is apparent that I was bloody lucky to have been in the right places at the right time.

FRB: Tell us a grand, inspiring story from all your years of climbing that when you think about it now still makes your hands sweat and your pulse race.       

Jim: One of the best times was on Lotus Flower Tower. We had found the best bivouac ledge imaginable. Tom Frost was leading and it was getting late, even at those latitudes, and I was concerned about finding a bivvy. So as Tom was finishing his lead I anxiously asked what he had found. He replied that he had found a ledge, if you didn't mind that it was flat and grassy.

FRB: There is no way this writer can address the necessary questions to showcase your climbing career. Tell us what your learned from a lifetime of a brilliant climbing career. (ie., character building stuff, moral lessons, emotional highs and lows, how you dealt with loss and accidents where you lost partners... please impart to us the gems of knowledge gleamed from a life on the sharp end.      

Jim: I think a lot of present day climbers don't really "get" how serious climbing really is. I had to face that when I was quite young when my friend John Ewing fell and died on the climb next to me. I had to really do some soul searching in deciding to go on. Kraus who had faced the same issue at about the same age was tremendously supportive.

FRB: You've been actively involved with the American Alpine Club.
          How did you get involved with the AAC?
          What does it mean to you?

Jim: When I first started the AAC was THE alpine organization. I was asked to join the Board when I was still in law school. As the decades fly by I see my commitment to the AAC as "giving back".

FRB: You were instrumental in saving Camp 4 from closing.
          Please tell us all there was involved in the process of
          saving Camp 4.

Jim: It was Frost who discovered the Park Service plan to build 3 story dormitories on the site of Camp 4. He contacted Alison Osius, the President of the AAC, who asked me to go to San Francisco to meet with the planners and concerned locals. Tom had already retained a fantastic attorney, Dick Duane. We all met with the Park Service, including the Regional Director. It was obvious there would be no give. I informed them all that I would recommend that AAC join a proposed lawsuit. Duane and I realize from the get go, that, while we could hinder the plan for some time we could not win in the end. We began a vigorous media campaign that must have shocked the Park Service. All the while Duane was reaching out for political contacts who could reach the Secretary of the Interior, Udall. We also had the active cooperation of the President of the UIAA, Ian MacNaught-Davis who arranged for an avalanche of letters of support from national climbing organizations all over the world. At the end of the day the Regional Director of the Park Service on the West Coast told Galen Rowell that he was stunned that dirtbag climbers could generate such support internationally in addition to Op Ed pieces appearing in the New York Times, Washington Post, LA Time, NBC TV. Through his contacts with one of the US Senators from California, Secretary Udall became aware that something was going on. He sent a troubleshooter out to the West Coast. As a result of his visit a copy of Steve Roper's CAMP 4 reputedly found its way to the bed stand of the Secretary of the Interior. Shortly thereafter the Superintendent of Yosemite quietly retired, the Master Plan was scrapped, the lawsuit was withdrawn and Camp 4 survived.

FRB: What can climbers expect from the AAC in the future?

Jim: The climbing community can expect a great deal more from the AAC on the Conservation front. Witness the Exit Strategies Conference being held in Golden at the end of July. The social networking capabilities of the AAC will be greatly expanded in the near future. The finest alpine library in the world is being digitized, which will make this unique resource available to climbers everywhere.

FRB: Why should climbers be involved and be a member of
          the American Alpine Club, Jim?

Jim: Climbers do like the benefits, AAJ Accidents, rescue insurance. The responsible climbers will want to join the effort to protect the climbing environment. We partner in restorations projects in the Andes and the Himalayas and are actively supporting human waste management projects here at home.

FRB: During the 1960's in the days of the Cold War and with the specter of nuclear proliferation threatening, you were hired by the CIA to place a plutonium powered listening device on Nanda Devi in the Himalayas to spy on China. Please tell us all about the incident: how you were courted by the CIA, the training necessary for the operation, the people involved, the days leading up to the operation, the travel involved in getting in place, the climbing itself, the sherpas and the Indian climbers you had to team up with, how the plutonium device came to be left on the mountain... everything. Take us back in time and relive the bold, brash accident... please tell us everything from your intimate perspective dealing with the CIA.

Jim: Haven't got time right now to rewrite Pete Takeda's book, AN EYE AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD.

FRB: And now looking back, what are your thoughts and feeling of the Nanda Devi incident. Do you feel like you were used by the CIA or were you doing your patriotic duty at the time? Please elaborate and tell us all your thoughts and feeling now.

Jim: I still feel quite positively about it. We didn't have any real idea about Chinese nuclear delivery capability. Unfortunately realpoitik reared its ugly head and we had to submit to Indian leadership (it was after all their country). If our guys had been left alone the outcome would have been quite different.

FRB: You ran wild with the Vulgarian in their heyday. What was the Vulgarian movement? Who were the Vulgarians? What influence did they have on climbing? What can climbers today learn from those wild and wooly days when the climber lifestyle was new and the world was open to a carefree and genuine experience? (I know it isn't strictly true you 'ran wild' with the VMC but you did experience and live through some of their 'antics.')

Jim: Too lengthy a topic to get into right now.

FRB: Was the VMC(Vulgarian Mountain Club) legacy less
          than it is remembered to be?       

Jim: I'd say it was an artifact of the roaring 1960's.

FRB: Thank you for the thrilling and informative interview, Jim.

Jim: I apologize for not replying at length to some of these inquiries but I'm a little time pressed right now.

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