Construction, Grand Trunk Railway, 1911 || The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, proposing to open up the northern section of the mountains in a manner similar to that done by the Canadian Pacific Railway in the south, had pushed west as far as Henry House near Jasper. They were keen to support Wheeler’s plan, which they did with funds and transportation from Edmonton to the end of construction. They sought Wheeler’s advice as to sites for future hotels, sending their top marketing people in a special car to consult with him.
Swift's Trading Post, Suzette Swift and Her Children, 1911 || Swift’s homestead, near Jasper House, was on a trade route through Yellowhead Pass to British Columbia.. This area became first a forest reserve and finally part of Jasper National Park. The Swifts were initially grandfathered but eventually forced to sell.
Lewis Swift's Mill, Harry Blagden, 1911 || “Two miles and a quarter below Maligne River, on the west side of the Athabasca, a piece of land has been taken up by Mr. Swift, who has demonstrated that the country is capable of producing wheat, potatoes, and various kinds of vegetables. On September 2 he had harvested a crop of two kinds of wheat and his potatoes were of good size and quality. A great part of the Athabasca valley would make good farming land, the higher ground, however, would require irrigation. — McEvoy 1900, Spiral Road, Vicinity of Mt. Robson, spiral road.com
Falls, Moose River, 1911 || Moose River is a short tributary of the Fraser River, its water coming directly from the glaciers around Mt. Robson.
A.O. Wheeler, Donald (Curley) Phillips, Harry H. Blagden, Conrad Kain, Charles Walcott Jr., Jim Harvie, J.H. Riley, Rev. George Kinney (seated), 1911 || An unlikely crew of mountain experts and scientists from Smithsonian Institute explored and surveyed the region around Mt. Robson in 1911. This is the company of adventurers, missing only Ned Hollister of the Smithsonian, Casey Jones, the cook, and Byron Harmon, the photographer: A.O. Wheeler, Director of the Alpine Club of Canada and surveyor; Donald ‘Curley’ Phillips, outfitter; Harry Blagden, hunter, part of the Smithsonian party; Conrad Kain, guide; Charlie Walcott, hunter and son of Dr. Walcott, Director of the Smithsonian; Jim Harvie, wrangler; J.H. Riley, scientist from the Smithsonian; Rev. George Kinney, assistant to Mr. Wheeler, and Byron Harmon, the photographer
Calumet Creek Camp, 1911 || Mosquitoes or horse flies must have been bad. The Canadian group: Jim Harvie, George Kinney, Conrad Kain (looking at the photographer), and Curley Phillips are clustered on one side of a smudge by a tree and the Smithsonian group: Charlie Walcott, Harry Blagden, R.H. Riley, and Ned Hollister (with pipe) on the other. A.O. Wheeler sits behind the Smithsonian group. A smudge is created by burning green boughs for smoke to drive off insects.
Mt Robson from Berg Lake, 1911 || At 12,973 feet, (3954 metres), Mt. Robson is the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies. It was the focus of intense interest from mountaineers of Canada, Britain and the USA in the early twentieth century. Conrad Kain wrote of Mt. Robson in his auto-biography, Where the Clouds Can Go, “In all my mountaineering in various countries, I have climbed only a few mountains that were hemmed in with more difficulties. Mount Robson is one of the most dangerous expeditions I have made. The dangers consist in snow and ice, stone avalanches, and treacherous weather.”
Robson Glacier and the Lynx Range, 1911 || Robson Glacier flows around the base of Mt. Robson. The distant mountains are named for the Canada lynx, member of the cat family, which ranges through northern North America.
Kinney (seated) and Wheeler Surveying from Lynx Mountain, 1911 || A.O. Wheeler was a member of the Dominion Survey, which aimed to survey and map the entire country. In the mountains Wheeler’s technique included photographing from mountain tops. The view of Wheeler and Kinney is straight on, placing the photographer on an equally high distant location.
Conrad Kain, Summit of Mt. Resplendent, First Ascent, 1911 || The Canadian group were dead keen on climbing Mt. Robson, Wheeler, as group leader refused his permission. In an act of defiance Conrad and Byron slipped away from camp early one morning and made the first ascent of Mt. Resplendent, the beautiful horned twin of Mt. Robson. They climbed in snow and fog and photographed each other on the summit ridge.
Emperor Falls Camp, 1911 || On a long trip, such as this was, even the laundry had to be done and boots and socks dried near the fire, in this case a smudge.
East (Kain) Face of Mt. Robson, 1911 || The first ascent of Mt. Robson occurred, which had defeated aspirant climbers for years, occurred in 1913; Conrad Kain guided two climbers at an Alpine Club of Canada camp. He had planned his route in 1911, up the east face of Robson, a route still famous which bears his name.
Harry Blagden, Mt. Robson from Fraser River, 1911 || A friendship between Harry Blagden and Byron Harmon must have flourished on this expedition as Byron took many pictures of his friend. Blagden was one of the ‘big game’ hunters’ for the Smithsonian, charged with collecting specimens. Meat for the pot and heads for the museum. Despite the glorification of this context, hunting for meat on a long trip such as this was inevitable.
Phimister Proctor Painting Maligne Lake, 1911 || Alexander Phimister Proctor (September 27, 1860 – September 5, 1950) was an American sculptor with the contemporary reputation as one of the nation's foremost animaliers. A sculptor of the "old school," Proctor resisted even the vestiges of modernism that many of his contemporaries adopted. Examples of his legacy are scattered from coast to coast throughout America. As one of the witnesses of the death of the old America (many other artists saw only the birth of the new one) Proctor's works showing the animals and peoples of frontier America remain popular and as vital today as when he produced them.
George Kinney and Harry Blagden on Kinney Lake, 1911 || From Berg Lake at the base of Mt. Robson the trail descends, past Emperor Falls, to Kinney Lake, named for Rev. George Kinney, who is on the raft. Kinney made twelve attempts to climb Mt. Robson. In his final attempt, in 1909, he and Curley Phillips missed the summit, in snow and fog, by fifty feet.
Dome Glacier, Edge of Columbia Icefield, 1911 || On the return trip Curley Phillips led half the pack-train, with George Kinney, Conrad Kain and Byron Harmon through the snows of early autumn, past Columbia Icefield, all the way to Banff, Harmon photographing all the way.
Byron Harmon: Rainbow Mountains / Yellowhead Pass Expedition, 1911
The Rainbow Mountains refers to the group of peaks around Mt. Robson, west of Jasper National Park in Canada. At 12,973 feet, (3954 metres), Mt. Robson is the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies south of the Yukon. It was the focus of much avid attention by climbers in the early years of the twentieth century.
Around the Rainbow Range, 1911
Expedition to Yellowhead Pass, Mt. Robson and Maligne Lake
…continued from above.
A surveyor, climbers, scientists and a photographer
In 1911 a party of worthies from the mountaineering community in Canada, and scientists from The Smithsonian Institute, made one of the most ambitious expeditions into the northern Rockies those old mountains had yet seen. Arthur O. Wheeler, then President of the Alpine Club of Canada, and a Dominion Surveyor, was the motivating and organizing force behind the expedition which has fascinated me for years because of its serious intentions but flamboyant nature.
Originally intended as a small group, cooperation and financial assistance by the British Columbia, Alberta. and Dominion Governments made it possible to enlarge the scope of the expedition, and an investigation of the fauna, flora, and geology was added to the planned topographical, exploratory and photographic work. An attempt was made to interest Canadian scientists in the expedition, without success, so the matter was submitted to Dr. Charles Walcott, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institute of Washington. Dr. Walcott had been a frequent summer visitor to the Canadian Rockies and was a friend.
The group was an odd mixture of experienced mountaineers and novices
From Canada: A. O. Wheeler, Dominion Surveyor; Conrad Kain, guide; Byron Harmon, photographer; Rev. George Kinney, assistant to Mt. Wheeler; Donald Phillips, outfitter; his assistant, Jim Harvie; and Casey Jones, cook.
From the Smithsonian: Charles Walcott Jr. with another big game hunter, Harry Blagden, and two curators from the United States National Museum: Ned Hollister and J.H. Riley, were sent to collect, under permit, specimens of flora and fauna.
This was not an expedition into virgin territory
Viscount Milton and Dr. Cheadle, who travelled from Edmonton to Kamloops via the Yellowhead Pass in 1862, described Mt. Robson and Tête-Jaune Cache in their book, The North-West Passage by Land, published in 1865. Yellowhead Pass was used by prospectors as a route west through the Rockies, into the gold fields of northern BC. Hunting, trapping and trading were also common in this region in the late nineteenth century.
However, the mountains around Mt. Robson had never been surveyed, never been mapped, and its peaks had not yet been climbed.
Civilization was knocking at the door of this wilderness
The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, which proposed to open up the northern section of Canada in a manner similar to that done by the Canadian Pacific Railway in the southern section, had pushed west as far as Jasper House. They were keen to support Wheeler’s plan, with the expectation of tourism to follow.
Wheeler hoped “to investigate the facilities for holding one of the Club’s big camps close to the great monolith and, while doing so, to make topographical survey of such area as might fall within the scope of the expedition, using photo-topographic methods as a basis of the work.” *
First ascent of Mt. Robson - Rev. Kinney and Donald Phillips
In 1909 Rev. George Kinney had set out alone, hoping to beat a British party to the summit of Robson. At Moberley House, near Jasper Lake, he met Donald Phillips, a young canoe guide from Ontario, who hoped to set up an outfitting business in the Rockies. Phillips had never set foot on a mountain. Nevertheless, Kinney invited Phillips to join him. Together they bushwhacked for fourteen days to reach the base of the mountain and were greeted by twenty days of bad weather. Several summit attempts failed. Finally, on August 13, amid dense cloud, cold, and high winds, they at last reached the summit, (or so they thought). This was Kinney’s twelfth attempt to climb Mt. Robson. Phillips wore cowboy boots and had carried a climbing staff he had cut from a tree at the foot of the mountain.
First ascent of Mt. Robson, Conrad Kain
In 1913, at the long awaited Alpine Club of Canada camp at Mt. Robson, guide Conrad Kain will lead a group to the summit, in what will be the official first ascent. They will discover that Kinney and Phillips, in snow and fog, missed the actual summit by a few feet. First ascent or not, their 1909 climb was one of the most remarkable in Canadian Rockies history.
Conrad Kain wrote of Mt. Robson, “In all my mountaineering in various countries, I have climbed only a few mountains that were hemmed in with more difficulties. Mount Robson is one of the most dangerous expeditions I have made. The dangers consist in snow and ice, stone avalanches, and treacherous weather.”
Circling the Mountain
The expedition began at the ‘end of the line’ of the Grand Trunk Railway, near Henry House and Swift’s Trading Post, from which over a hundred mile circuit of the mountain began. A detailed account of the trip may be found in The Canadian Alpine Journal, Volume IV, 1912, The Alpine Club Of Canada’s Expedition To Jasper Park, Yellowhead Pass And Mount Robson Region, 1911.
While Wheeler and Kinney are surveying from various mountain peaks and promontories, the rest of the party explores, Harmon photographing all the time: the Reef Glacier, the Lynx Range from Robson Glacier, Mt. Rearguard, Robson itself from various angles, (including from the east, showing the face Conrad will use in 1913 on his first ascent with Albert McCarthy and William Foster).
The flavour of the trip is captured in this letter from George Kinney to his friend, J. Monroe Thorington, President of the American Alpine Club, written on September 7, 1934 and shared with me by Dr. Thorington when I was researching my grandfather’s films and photographs in the 1970’s.
The promise
I first met Conrad at the meets of the Canadian Alpine Club. Then in 1911 as you know he was official Guide during our Mount Robson expedition. He and I and Byron Harmon had many things in common, and had each been especially promised by Mr.Wheeler, as the main attraction to us, that we should have a chance to climb Mount Robson. Conrad had his own reasons. Harmon wanted photographs, and I wanted pictures that I had failed to get on my climb. We often talked over and planned for that event….
We reached the Mount Robson region. As you know we were making the first topographical survey of what are now Jasper Park and Mount Robson Park. We were locating for the first time hundreds of miles of the Inter-Provincial boundary line between Alberta and British Columbia, and Wheeler got out the first official map of that region, because of our work that season…Conrad, Harmon and I were now in serious doubt whether Wheeler intended to keep his pledges to us severally re. the climbing of Mt. Robson. When I asked Wheeler about it he always sidetracked me with some imminent plan he had.
Rebellion
We were greatly disappointed and even suggested some desperate plan – and then it happened. Conrad, under pretence of walking down the Emperor Falls gorge alone, disappeared. He did not get home that night. In the early morning he strolled into camp. He had captured Mt. Whitehorn. Wheeler was wrothy, but could do nothing. He claimed that Conrad was crazy, and that his climb could not be recognized; but later on his cairn and records were found on the peak of Whitehorn, and Wheeler was robbed of the privilege of farming out the “first climb” to some ambitious climber later on. We were never given a chance at Mount Robson on that trip and soon left that region, but often Conrad chuckled how he had evened up things a little against Wheeler…
First ascent of Mt. Resplendent
In a further act of defiance, Conrad Kain and Byron Harmon slipped away from camp and made the first ascent of Mt. Resplendent, the beautiful horned twin of Mt. Robson. The photographs Harmon took that day were captured in snow and cloud. In 1913, at Wheeler’s long anticipated Mt. Robson A.C.C. camp, better weather will prevail. The second ascent of Mt. Resplendent, and what will prove to be the first ascent of Mt. Robson, will both be led by Conrad Kain and photographed by Byron Harmon; these are some of the most dramatic photographs of his long career.
An artist at Maligne Lake, then home through snow
After completing the circuit of Mt. Robson, the party moved on to survey the area around Maligne Lake where they encountered American sculptor, Phimister Proctor, painting the lake.
The main party then left by train but Donald Phillips, George Kinney, Conrad Kain and Byron Harmon returned through autumn snows, past Columbia Icefield, then followed Bow River to Banff. Harmon photographed all the way.
* The Canadian Alpine Journal, Volume IV, 1912, The Alpine Club Of Canada’s Expedition To Jasper Park, Yellowhead Pass And Mount Robson Region, 1911.