The
proper way for Dr. Cook
To get the records left behind him
On
Mt. McKinley, that’s to say
If he’s really anxious to find them,
Is
just to wait till aeroplanes
Go everywhere gaily chug-chugging,
Then
take sky passage to the mount
And save so much climbing and plugging.
Oct.
27, ‘09
(Frederick) Cook claimed to have achieved the
first summit of Mount McKinley (Denali) in September 1906, reaching the top
with one other member of his expedition. Other members of the team (e. g.,
Belmore Browne), whom he had left lower on the mountain, expressed private
doubts about this immediately. Cook's claims were not publicly challenged until
the 1909 dispute with Peary over who had first reached the North Pole. Peary's
supporters then publicly alleged that Cook's claim of ascent of Mt. McKinley
was fraudulent.
Unlike Hudson Stuck in 1913 (Ascent
of Denali, 1914, photograph opposite p. 102) Cook took no photograph of
the view from atop McKinley. His photograph which he claimed to be of the
summit was found to have been taken of a tiny peak 19 miles away.
In late 1909 Ed Barrill, Cook's sole
companion during the 1906 climb, signed an affidavit denying that they had
reached the summit. Since the late 20th century, historians have found that he
was paid by Peary supporters to do so. (Henderson, 2005) (Henderson writes that
this fact was covered up at the time, but Bryce says that it was never a
secret.) Up until a month before, Barrill had consistently asserted that
he and Cook had reached the summit. His 1909 affidavit included a map correctly
locating what became called Fake Peak, featured in Cook's
"summit" photo, and showing that he and Cook had turned back at the
Gateway.
Modern climber Bradford Washburn has
gathered data, repeated the climbs, and taken new photos to evaluate Cook's
1906 claim. Between 1956 and 1995, Washburn and Brian Okonek identified the
locations of most of the photographs Cook took during his 1906 McKinley foray,
and took new photos at the same spots. In 1997 Bryce identified the locations
of the remaining photographs, including Cook's "summit" photograph; none
were taken anywhere near the summit. Washburn showed that none of Cook's 1906
photos were taken past the "Gateway" (north end of the Great Gorge),
12 horizontal bee-line miles from McKinley and 3 miles below its top.
An expedition by the Mazama Club in
1910 reported that Cook's map departed abruptly from the landscape at a point
when the summit was still 10 miles distant. Critics of Cook's claims have
compared Cook's map of his alleged 1906 route with the landscape of the last 10
miles. Cook's descriptions of the summit ridge are variously claimed to
bear no resemblance to the mountain and to have been verified by many
subsequent climbers. But, in the 1970s, climber Hans Waale found
a route which fit Cook's narrative and descriptions. Three decades later,
in 2005 and 2006, this route was successfully climbed by a group of Russian
mountaineers.
No evidence of Cook's purported journey between
the "Gateway" and the summit has been found. His claim to have
reached the summit is not supported by his photos' vistas, his two sketch maps'
markers, and peak-numberings for points attained, nor by his compass
bearings, barometer readings, route-map or camp trash. But, samples of all such
evidence have been found short of the Gateway.
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