north cascades photography by tom miller.

So I came across a book entitled The North Cascades with text by Harvey Manning (an old Cascades curmudgeon) and photography by a gentleman named Tom Miller while reading, well, another book about the North Cascades called North Cascades Crest (written and photographed by James Martin). I will post something about that wonderful book soon, but for now want to concentrate on this first one that I finished reading in a day and am still and will be for a while marveling at the photographs.

The book was published in 1964 by The Mountaineers–before there even was a North Cascades National Park. It was on the agenda, but Manning and in part Miller were both trying to persuade a national public that this area of spectacular and wild beauty was in need of protection before it was logged and stripped of its very essence. Manning's prose here tends to stay on the congenial side (whereas he normally–or perhaps just as he got older–wrote in more of an Edward Abbey style–crusty and gruff, but always with a sense of humor just like Abbey). He even tries to be optimistic and is downright nostalgic as he recounts family outings to Lake Chelan alongside reminiscing about his first climb and foray into the North Cascades after spending all of his time previously in the Olympic range–with The Mountaineers to the fog-enshrouded summit of Eldorado and the remarkable knife-edge ridge of snow.

About that first climb he recounts ~

Eldorado would have been a thought-provoking ascent if only for the eccentric summit and the ridiculously few names in the summit register. But as we returned along the knife-edge of snow, with rivers roaring in unseen valleys far below, a hole opened in the fog and we saw an appallingly large mountain. The hole closed before we were fully recovered from the shock–but then a new hole disclosed an enormous glacier, and when that hole closed another opened, with another mountain, another glacier. Holes opened and closed so fast we could only gasp in conternation and click our cameras.

Eldorado was the beginning of my personal discovery of the North Cascades–a discovery that continues every summer as each new hillwalking excursion increases my awareness of my ignorance. We hope ultimately to become, in some degree, experts on the subject; meanwhile, we present these glimpses of our explorations in order to stimulate in others the desire to commence their own discoveries.

Kool-Aid Lake, with Mt. Formidable in the background. Coincidentally, I am thinking of heading up to Cascade Pass this weekend to camp more or less in this very spot, as despite being up to the pass many times, I have yet to head south–up onto Mixup Arm and over Cache Col under Magic and Spider Mountains to wander beneath the imposing fortress of Formidable (beyond just being cool, many North Cascades peaks have spectacularly-fitting names–Formidable, Terror, Torment, Forbidden, Challenger and others).

Upper Challenger Glacier of Mt. Challenger in the northern Picketts. You can see two climbers making their way towards the summit in the middle of the frame, approaching an imposing ice cliff reminiscent of what makes this eighty-some miles from the Canadian border south so absolutely amazing.

Buckner, taken in mid-September of 1951. That is the north face, the climb that it looks like Matthew and I will be doing now in the beginning of August as our schedules have just not been able to line up.

And finally, a parting shot of a climber on a glacier or snowfield heading towards an unidentified North Cascades summit.

Tom Miller's photography is spectacular–with a certain candid quality to it but with obvious signs of a mastery of his cameras and his work. He was a climber first and photographer second as he admitted in the afterword, pointing out that most shots were taken during rest breaks, summit sackouts or when the group was in camp. For those moments when he felt compelled to break out his camera from deep inside his rucksack, his climbing partners evidently reacted in typical fashion–by continuing on, leaving him to catch up on his own.

But through his work this book was published and he can partly be held responsible no doubt (at least in my opinion) for the creation of the national park. The book is out-of-print and the copy I found was on Amazon, but if you are also compelled by incredible mountain photography and stories of climbing trips half a century ago when climbers–despite the upscaling of gear and clothing–were still climbers, unchanged and just as excited and in awe of these peaks as those of us climbing are today I would recommend trying to find a copy for yourself. It smells wonderfully like an old book, and the ink rubs off slightly on my fingers as I work through the pages.

I think this range perhaps more so than any other instills in climbers that venture out to unknown or seldom-traveled areas an intense passion and a deeply-held sense of revere for the ruggedness and the accompanying beauty to be had in the mist-filled, fog-enshrouded valleys, the seemingly-endless glaciers, the rock walls and steep, icy north faces.

And to that end, Manning also writes ~

We think that consideration must be given to scenic and recreation values in order to achieve the greatest good for the greatest number of American citizens, in this generation and a century from now. We are not ashamed to say that the spiritual values of virgin forests and wild rivers are also worthy of consideration.

I have caught myself wondering at times why human beings have through our history felt the need to build cathedrals and synagogues, when places like this exist–not created by the hand of man, but here for all of us to find our own way and our own meaning. To take away something from each visit and encounter when we find ourselves in these wild places, uncompromising in their indifference and beauty. Finding ourselves isolated from everything but the sound of water cascading over rocks or under glacier moraines, or the complete silence raking over the ice of glaciers still carving through time.