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Katie Ives

Smugglers' Notch, Vermont. [Photo] John Pitocco

The Ice Mirror

In recognition of International Women’s Day, we’re now sharing this Sharp End story by Alpinist Editor-in-Chief Katie Ives that first appeared in Alpinist 65, which is now available on newsstands and in our online store. Ives writes, “I became fascinated by recurring myths and images in the ways that climbers interpret fragments of existence. And as I looked for more examples, I grew absorbed by the sheer volume of alpine fiction written by and about women…. For authors [during the turn of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries], alpine settings seemed to offer their heroines a level of empowerment that they rarely found in cities…. ‘Why do we want to have alternate worlds?’ asked the fantasy writer Joan Aiken in Locus Magazine (1998), ‘You have to imagine something before you do it.'”

Morning view of Trisul (7120m), Nanda Devi (7816m) and Nanda Kot (6861m), from Kaser Devi in the Garhwal Himalaya of India. [Photo] Coni Horler

Silences at Dawn

In this Sharp End essay from Alpinist 63, Editor-in-Chief Katie Ives contemplates the varying meanings of awe as she delves into mountain darkness and solitude in search of peace.

The great Himalayan chronicler Elizabeth Hawley paging through files at her apartment in Dilli Bazar, Nepal, after the 2015 earthquake. [Photo] Alet Pretorius

The Mountain of Data

In this Sharp End story from Alpinist 62, Editor-in-Chief Katie Ives contextualizes some of the life and work of the great Himalayan chronicler Elizabeth Hawley, who died January 26, 2018, at age 94. During her lifetime, Hawley became an icon for her fact-checking and record-keeping, aspects of journalism that remain as important as ever today.

Clarence King (far right) with other members of the Geological Survey of California in 1864. [Photo] Silas Selleck, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution

The Mountain of Diamonds

In this Sharp End story from Alpinist 61, Editor-in-Chief Katie Ives ponders the legend of the “mountain of diamonds” in nineteenth-century American history and the obsession with the idea of hidden riches: “How quickly visions of distant summits turn into longings for conquest, exploitation and gain. But if an imaginary peak is a creation of desire, its elusiveness might also hint at more insubstantial or transcendent things.”

Edward LaChapelle and Austin Post in 1995. Glacier Ice continues to influence current photographers' efforts to document climate change. [Photo] Courtesy Ananda Foley

Vanishing Uplands

Alpinist Editor-in-Chief Katie Ives recounts the lives of Austin Post and Edward LaChapelle and their contributions to the study of glaciers and snow, including their influential 1971 book Glacier Ice, which contained words that now read like early warnings of the impacts of climate change: “Much of modern civilization exists by virtue of a delicate balance between this climate and present snow and ice masses.” In the decades since its first publication, this collection of glacier photography has become a powerful testament to both the beauty and losses of its frozen worlds. Ives now ponders what might happen if more climbers were to look beyond some of our focus on individual fulfillment to face the bigger challenge that confronts us all.

The altered map from the May 1960 Summit article, An Unclimbed No Name Peak, showing the imaginary location of the mountain. As Ronald Peattie pointed out in Mountain Geography, surprisingly few people agree what a real mountain is, how high and steep it must be for that term: To a large extent, a mountain is a mountain because of the role it plays in popular imagination. [Image] Courtesy of the American Alpine Club

The World as It is Not

During the mid-twentieth century, an ardent conservationist and Cascades mountaineer planted a series of elaborate hoaxes in Summit magazine. He hoped to prod readers to see the mountains in fresh and unfamiliar ways–and to remember the value of wild lands. In this Sharp End from Alpinist 59, Editor-in-chief Katie Ives talks with some of the climbers involved in the story, as well as friends and family members, to learn more about the great imaginary mountains of Harvey Manning (1925-2006).

The Black Dike, Cannon Cliff, New Hampshire, 1970s. Laura Waterman was the first woman to climb the route, four years after John Bouchard's 1971 first ascent. [Photo] Ed Webster

The Precarious World–The Sharp End, Alpinist 57

At a time when the word precarious is used increasingly to describe many aspects of our current existence, Katie Ives reflects on the differences between confronting risk in the mountains and responding to much vaster political and ecological uncertainties in the US and the world. “I think now, especially with climate change, we are without a doubt living in a precarious world,” climber and environmental advocate Laura Waterman tells her. “We have to make the right decisions, ethically, as best we can.”

Lauret Savoy's Trace: Memory, History, Race, and the American Landscape (2015). [Photo] Katie Ives

Lauret Savoy’s Trace: Exploring Landscapes of Exclusion and Inclusion in American History

Alpinist Editor-in-chief Katie Ives describes some of the reasons Lauret Savoy’s 2015 book, Trace: Memory, History, Race and the American Landscape has become deeply relevant today: “Much of prior mountain literature, all too often, has been solipsistic and exclusionary. More than ever, we need writers like Lauret Savoy, who can help us see our shared land for it has been, what it is, and the many possible futures of what it can be. In a world in which so much seems starkly uncertain, there are much greater risks to all peoples than the individual and self-chosen ones that climbers face. There are also greater responsibilities that we all share.”

The Emperor Face of Mt. Robson (3959m), where Barry Blanchard, Eric Dumerac and Philippe Pellet made the first ascent of Infinite Patience (VI 5.9 M5 WI5, 2200m) in 2002. Fourteen years later, Marc-Andre Leclerc soloed it. [Photo] Jeffrey Pang

Off Route and Out of Time – The Sharp End, Alpinist 56

Back in April 2016, Canadian alpinist Marc-Andre Leclerc described his solo of the Emperor Face of Mt. Robson: “My thoughts had reached a depth and clarity that I had never before experienced. The magic was real…. I was deeply content that I had not carried a watch with me to keep time…. I felt more at peace than I would have had I been counting my rate of kilometers per hour.” In the Editor’s Note for Alpinist 56, Katie Ives looks at the complex relationship that has long existed between evolving visions of mountaineering and the measurement of space and time.

Kyle Dempster and Bruce Normand in Shuangqiao Valley, Siguiang Shan Mountains, Sichuan, China. [Photo] Andrew Burr

Edges of Maps: The Mountain Stories of Kyle Dempster

At the time of his disappearance on the Ogre II, Kyle Dempster was one of the most promising mountain storytellers of his generation. Alpinist editor-in-chief Katie Ives looks back at some of work, and wonders about the writer he might have become.