Simian Climbing Club

Publication Year: 1968.

Simian Climbing Club. The 1966–1967 school year was a busy one for the University of Illinois Simians. More than 100 members received club instruction in rock climbing, while attendance at outings to Portland Arch in Indiana and Devils Lake, Wisconsin, was greater than 250. Simians climbed in the Shawangunks in New York and at Seneca Rocks in West Virginia at Thanksgiving. During Christmas vacation several members made a technical ascent of impressive Baboquivari Peak in Arizona. During the same vacation there was an 18-man winter expedition to the Sawatch Range in central Colorado which succeeded in placing 10 Simians atop Mount Harvard (14,420 feet). After this preparatory winter trip, eight Simians and three Wisconsin Hoofers hoped to climb in the Tetons during semester break, but were denied permission, owing to poor weather and avalanche conditions in Garnet Canyon. Consequently, the group packed up Cache Creek in the Gros Ventre Range east of Jackson. During one week of constantly cloudy and snowy weather a route was gradually pieced together up Jackson Peak (10,707 feet). Three other Simians drove to Mexico, where they eventually climbed Orizaba via the glacier route. Easter vacation saw Simians scattered about in the Shawangunks of New York, in the Smoky Mountains, and once again in the Chisos Mountains of Big Bend National Park, Texas.

During the summer Simians were to be found in Colorado, in the Tetons and in Canada. A party of four ascended Mount Robson on July 14 via the Kain route from a fourth camp atop the Dome at 10,000 feet. Other ascents in the Canadian Rockies included Mounts Lefroy, Louis, and Victoria. The rest of the summer was spent in the Purcells of British Columbia. In the Bugaboos, besides the standard climbs of Bugaboo, Pigeon, and Snowpatch Spires, new routes were placed on the west faces of Eastpost Spire and North Howser Spire. Also climbed was a virgin pinnacle of about 9100 feet on a ridge northwest of North Howser. The Simians also made a second ascent of Mount Stone (9990 feet) in the Conrad group on July 31, three weeks after its first ascent by members of the Harvard Mountaineering Club. Later, first and second ascents were made of two unnamed peaks (about 10,350 and 10,250 feet, respectively) in the western Truce group from the valley of Hamill Creek.

Curt Wagner, President