Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada / by Clarence King ; edited and with a preface by Francis P. Farquhar. [electronic resource]

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

King, Clarence, 1842-1901.

Contributor:

Farquhar, Francis P. (Francis Peloubet), 1887-1974.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

King, Clarence, 1842-1901--Journeys--Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.).

King, Clarence.

Mountaineering--Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.).

Mountaineering.

Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.)--Description and travel.

Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.).

King, Clarence, 1842-1901--Travel--Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.).

Physical Description:

1 online resource (320 p. ) ill. ;

Place of Publication:

Lincoln, Neb. : University of Nebraska Press, 1997.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

A bona fide classic, originally published in 1872, Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada is still exciting reading. It describes the perils and pleasures experienced by Clarence King (1842-1901) while conducting the first geological survey of California in the 1860s. His language was equal to the marvels he found, and here with unfading brilliance are his accounts of scaling such mountains as Tyndall, Shasta, and Whitney. The chapters on the Yosemite Valley and surrounding High Sierras were written while he was surveying the boundaries of a newly designated national park. There are also delightful vignettes of western characters, including a Sierra artist and a family of Pike County hog farmers. King, who in 1879 became the first director of the United States Geological Survey, will always be remembered for Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada, which was praised by Wallace Stegner, Van Wyck Brooks, and Henry Seidel Canby as a watermark of frontier literature.

Contents:

Preface / Francis P. Farquhar

1. The range

2. Through the forest, 1864

3. The ascent of Mount Tyndall, 1864

4. The descent of Mount Tyndall, 1864

5. The Newtys of Pike, 1864

6. Kaweah's run, 1864

7. Around Yosemite walls, 1864

8. A Sierra storm, 1864

9. Merced ramblings, 1866

10. Cut-off Copples's, 1870

11. Shasta, 1870

12. Shasta flanks, 1870

13. Mount Whitney, 1871-1873

14. The people

Bibliographical notes.

Notes:

Originally published: Boston : J.R. Osgood and Co., 1872.

Includes bibliographical references (p.317-320).

ISBN:

0-585-27432-0