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35-511: According to Fred Beckey there are differences of opinion about the names and locations of the subranges of the northern Cascades, especially between Canadian and American geographers. Nevertheless early geologists and topographers had a fundamental agreement about the location and names of the subranges. The Okanagan Range was seen as bounded by the Pasayten River on the west and continuing east to Chopaka Mountain . The Hozameen Range

70-539: A location in the Interior of British Columbia , Canada is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This article about a location in the state of Washington is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Fred Beckey Friedrich Wolfgang Beckey (14 January 1923 – 30 October 2017), known as Fred Beckey , was an American rock climber, mountaineer and book author, who in seven decades of climbing achieved hundreds of first ascents of some of

105-468: A member for first American Everest Expedition in 1963, he was never invited by his ex-teammates. Afterwards Beckey shied away from the large team efforts abroad, preferring smaller alpine-style undertakings alone or with a few companions seeking out America's last unclimbed peaks or striking routes considered too difficult to climb. He often climbed 40 or 50 different summits a year, and over the decades managed to achieve nearly one thousand first ascents. In

140-442: A print shop sales representative. However, he soon discovered that his work interfered with his climbing. For a time, he worked as a delivery truck driver, which left him time for climbing. As time went on, he decided that climbing was his life's focus. He never married or had children, he never pursued a professional career, he never sought money or financial security as a goal—his goal was to climb mountains. In 1955 Beckey joined

175-664: Is the highest peak in the Coast Mountains of British Columbia , Canada . Although it is lower than Mount Fairweather and Mount Quincy Adams , which straddle the United States border between Alaska and British Columbia, Mount Waddington is the highest peak that lies entirely within British Columbia. It and the subrange which surround it, known as the Waddington Range , stand at the heart of

210-680: Is the namesake of the Mount Waddington Regional District , which takes in the seaward slope of the Waddington Range and the adjoining coastline and parts of northern Vancouver Island adjacent to Queen Charlotte Strait . In 1925, while on a trip to Mount Arrowsmith , Vancouver Island , Don and Phyllis Munday spotted what they believed to be a peak taller than Mount Robson , the then accepted tallest peak entirely within British Columbia . In

245-565: The Knight Inlet , taking up to three days. A shorter water approach from Port McNeill , British Columbia, a northern community of Vancouver Island accessible by scheduled daily air connections and/or road from Victoria, reducing the water journey to less than a day may be undertaken. Alternately trails and rough roads do exist from the Chilcotin side of the range, and may be accessed via BC Highway 20, from Williams Lake , departing from

280-566: The Okanagan Valley and is sometimes classified as part of the Monashee Mountains . The eight highest mountains of the range are Mount Lago (8,745 ft), Robinson Mountain (8,726 ft), Remmel Mountain (8,690 ft), Grimface Mountain (8,645 ft), Ptarmigan Peak (8,614 ft), Cathedral Peak (8,606 ft), Mount Carru (8,595 ft), and Monument Peak (8,592 ft). This article about

315-570: The Pacific Ranges , a remote and extremely rugged set of mountains and river valleys. It is not as far north as its extreme Arctic-like conditions might indicate, and Mount Waddington and its attendant peaks pose some of the most serious expedition mountaineering to be had in North America — and some of the most extreme relief and spectacular mountain scenery. From Waddington's 4,019 m (13,186 ft) fang to sea level at

350-656: The 2017 Banff Mountain Film Festival ; the Best Mountaineering Film at the 2017 Kendal Mountain Film Festival ; and, the People's Choice Award at the 2017 Banff Mountain Book Festival . Mount Beckey, a previously unnamed, 8,500-foot peak in remote West-Central Alaska Range ( 62°51′20″N 152°8′15″W  /  62.85556°N 152.13750°W  / 62.85556; -152.13750 ),

385-505: The International Himalayan Expedition to climb the world’s fourth-highest peak, Lhotse . During the expedition his tentmate developed cerebral edema at 23,000 feet on the night before they were to attempt the summit. Beckey descended in the blizzard to get help, but was later blamed by his teammates for abandoning his partner, who was rescued by others. Consequently although Beckey seemed a likely choice as

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420-730: The Methow River. BCGNIS defines the northern boundary of the Okanagan Range as Young Creek and the lower Ashnola River. Peakbagger.com defines the Okanogan Range as a much larger region bounded to the south by the Methow River and to the east by the Okanagan River and Similkameen River. The Okanagan Range should not be confused with the Okanagan Highland , which is located on the farther side of

455-543: The Mundays to explore that area. Over the next decade, the Mundays mounted several expeditions into the area in an attempt to climb it. Known to them as "The Mystery Mountain", in 1927 the height was measured at 13,260 feet by triangulation; they reached the lower, north-west, summit on 8 July 1928, deeming the main summit too risky. On their recommendation the Geographical Names Board of Canada named

490-709: The Northwest Boundary Survey at Yale University ; and records of the Northern Pacific and Great Northern railroads in Minneapolis . Beckey continued climbing when over 90 years old. His life was the subject of a 2017 documentary, directed by David O'Leske and produced by Patagonia , called Dirtbag: The Legend of Fred Beckey . The film won over 26 international awards, including: the Best Feature Mountain Film at

525-848: The Olympic and North Cascade ranges. In 1942 he joined 10th Mountain Division , based in Colorado, and served as an instructor. After the war, Beckey studied business administration at the University of Washington , while still spending a lot of time climbing mountain ranges in the Northwest and desert rock formations in the Southwest. After graduation in 1949 he worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and became

560-719: The Weimar Republic forced his family to emigrate to the United States, settling in Seattle , Washington . His brother, Helmut "Helmy" Beckey, was born in Seattle in 1926 and would later become Fred's frequent climbing partner. At age twelve, Fred Beckey climbed Boulder Peak in the Cascades by himself, after wandering off on a family camping trip. Afterwards, his family signed him up with the Boy Scouts where he learned

595-561: The basic concepts of climbing. Later he joined The Mountaineers . In 1939, at sixteen, Fred and two friends climbed 7,292-foot Mount Despair in the North Cascades, which was considered unclimbable at the time. In 1942, the teenage Beckey brothers snatched a second ascent of Mount Waddington , which was then considered the most difficult climb in North America. Beckey followed that with many more first ascents of summits in

630-480: The face they rested on a ledge just below the southeastern ridge, a full 9 hours since leaving the snow patch on the south face. After climbing a short chimney they finally reached the small snowy mass at the top, 13 hours after their start in base camp. They aborted their earlier plan of descending the shorter north face and retraced their ascent line, reaching their tent on the Dais Glacier at 2 am. The ascent to

665-469: The final tower forced them to retreat, 180 m (590 ft) from the top. The second expedition, consisting of climbers Neal Carter , Alan Lambert, Alec Dalgleish and Eric Brooks from British Columbia, made their attempt from the southeast. On June 23, they established their base camp on the Franklin Glacier . The ascent abruptly ended three days later when Dalgleish fell to his death from

700-610: The head of the Knight Inlet . For the next twelve days they ferried loads to their base camp at Icefall Point on the Dais Glacier. While on the glacier, they were joined by another expedition led by members of the British Columbia Mountaineering Club and the Sierra Club . Wiessner and House agreed to allow the others a first chance at the summit but this group failed to find a route up the south face. On July 20, Wiessner and House first attempted

735-689: The heads of Bute and Knight Inlets is only about 32 kilometers; across the 3,000-metre-deep (9,800 ft) gorges of the Homathko and the Klinaklini Rivers stand mountains almost as high, and icefields even vaster and whiter, only a few aerial miles away, with a maw deeper than the Grand Canyon , comparable in relief to the Himalayas (to which the terrain of British Columbia was compared by colonial-era travellers). Mount Waddington

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770-1075: The history of the region, Range of Glaciers , was published by the Oregon Historical Society Press. According to a reviewer, he did much of the research for the volume in Washington, D.C. , at the Library of Congress and the National Archives, scouring files of the State Department, U.S. Geological Survey and other agencies. Beckey also perused the Canadian archives in Ottawa , Ontario; Hudson's Bay Co. archives in Winnipeg, Manitoba ; British Columbia archives in Victoria, British Columbia ; records of

805-822: The late 1940s, he asked The Mountaineers of Seattle to publish his first climbing guidebook for the local peaks. They turned him down, and the American Alpine Club agreed to print a few thousand copies for a flat fee. Between climbs, he wrote several books, most notably the Cascade Alpine Guide , the definitive three-volume description of the Cascades from the Columbia River to the Fraser River , now in its third edition, published by The Mountaineers. In 2003, his 563-page book on

840-426: The line of a great couloir that comes directly down between the main summit tower and the northwest peak. It was an excellent line for quickly ascending but they were unable to traverse onto the south face proper due to poor rock conditions and were forced to retreat to base camp. By 3 am the next morning they were already climbing up a couloir to the right of the face. Good weather the past few days had cleared most of

875-566: The northwestern flank which had not been explored by the Mundays. After crossing Tatlayoko Lake and making their way down the Homathko River, they then spent two days constructing a bridge over Nude Creek before reaching the Tiedemann Glacier on June 23. It took them three days to reach the shoulder of Mt. Waddington at 3,200 m (10,500 ft). They attempted the summit on June 28 but poor weather and route conditions on

910-491: The peak Mount Waddington after Alfred Waddington who was a proponent of a road route, known as Waddington's Road , and again later the same for a railway , via the Homathko River valley and Bute Inlet , which would connect to Vancouver Island via Seymour Narrows . In the summer of 1934, two expeditions attempted to climb the mountain. The first expedition, made up of climbers from Winnipeg , made their attempt on

945-468: The saddle between Mt. Waddington and Combatant Mountain , to obtain a climate and environmental record from the ice covering the last few hundred years. The 2023 core reached 219 meters in depth, at or near the base of the ice. To reach Mount Waddington, one could take a long approach originating from Vancouver , with the bulk of the journey consisting of a long boat ride through the Strait of Georgia and

980-552: The snow away from the ledges making for good climbing conditions. Following the left branch of the couloir, they reached a snow patch in the middle of the face. The final 1,000 ft (300 m) of the south face then presented a fierce hurdle of "sheer forbidding-looking rocks" as noted by Wiessner. While Wiessner initially started in boots, he quickly changed to rope-soled shoes and gave his ice axe and extra rope to House. Wiessner led several pitches up technically difficult rock including several overhangs. After traversing east across

1015-674: The southeast ridge. In 1935, a group of climbers from the Sierra Club of California made three attempts from their base camp at the Dais Glacier . The group failed in two attempts on the south face due to stormy conditions, poor route conditions and falling ice. Two climbers succeeded in reaching the northwest summit (first climbed by the Mundays) on a third attempt but proceeded no further. On July 4, 1936, Fritz Wiessner , Bill House , Elizabeth Woolsey and Alan Willcox reached

1050-571: The summit and back to base camp had taken over 23 hours. The Waddington Range massif is known for fierce as well as unpredictable weather, located as it is at the brunt of the warm, wet winds that soak the British Columbia Coast, of which it is the highest point. Precipitation levels in the area of the peak are among the highest in the Coast Mountains . The peak has an ice cap climate ( EF ). In 2010 and again in 2023, scientists successfully drilled ice cores at Combatant Col,

1085-661: The tallest peaks and most important routes throughout Alaska, the Canadian Rockies and the Pacific Northwest . Among the Fifty Classic Climbs of North America , seven were established by Beckey, often climbing with some of the best known climbers of each generation. Beckey was born in 1923 near Düsseldorf , Germany to Klaus Beckey, a surgeon, and Marta Maria Beckey who was an opera singer. In 1925 economic hardships due to hyperinflation in

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1120-424: The words of Don Munday, "The compass showed the alluring peak stood along a line passing a little east of Bute Inlet and perhaps 150 miles away, where blank spaces on the map left ample room for many nameless mountains." While there is debate as to whether the peak they saw was Mount Waddington (Don Munday observed that the feat is impossible), they almost certainly saw a peak in the Waddington Range , and this led

1155-435: Was a quintessential dirtbag climber , well captured by a classic portrait of him by Corey Rich from 2004 Patagonia 's Fall catalog, where he is trying to hitchhike while holding a sign "Will belay for food". His reputation is well known among many climbers, captured in a T-shirt "Beware of Beckey: He will steal your woman, steal your route." Mount Waddington Mount Waddington , once known as Mystery Mountain ,

1190-455: Was named after Beckey, after he, Calvin Hebert and John Middendorf climbed it in 1996. Fred Beckey died of congestive heart failure , in Seattle, on October 30, 2017 at the age of 94. Partial list of notable first ascents: Timothy Egan captures Fred Beckey's personality in a chapter of The Good Rain . Beckey named Vasiliki Ridge , by Washington Pass, after his one true love. Beckey

1225-674: Was seen as separated from the Okanagan Range by the Pasayten River. This definition of the Okanagan Range included most of today's Pasayten Wilderness and extending south to joins the main Cascade Range at Harts Pass, near the headwaters of the Methow River . The core of the Okanagan Range under this definition marks the divide between streams that flow north to the Similkameen River and those that flow south to

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