The Stettner Way
The Life and Climbs of Joe and Paul Stettner
by John D. Gorby
Brothers Joe and Paul Stettner were legends
within the early mountaineering community,
putting up some of the most difficult routes
in North America during a career that spanned
the beginnings of modern rock climbing in
the 1920s, to well into the big-wall climbing
era of the 1950s. Often considered the first
true sport climbers in America, contemporary
and fellow climbing legend Paul Petzoldt called
them "the human flies" for their
bold and acrobatic style.
But this is a story of not only climbing
adventure, but of lives touched by many
of the great dramas of the 20th Century.
Born in Germany before the First World War,
the brothers experienced wrenching social
and political upheaval after the war, as
Germany descended into near chaos. With
a father who was politically active, the
family was under threat as violent factions
clashed for power. The boys found at outlet
in adventuring in the nearby Austrian Alps,
quickly honing their skills. This was an
era of great climbing innovation in Europe.
The carabiner was only introduced to climbing
a few years before the war, in this same
region, and new mountaineering techniques
were being perfected to take advantage of
the new tools.
When their father was brutally murdered
by predecessors of the Nazis, the Stettners
brothers were faced with the awful reality
of what Germany was becoming. Making a fateful
decision, they left their family and escaped
to America, bringing their advanced skills
and new techniques to the virgin rock walls
of this country. Soon it was apparent how
advanced their skills were over what was
happening here in the 1920s. In America
at that time, only a handful of largely
European-trained climbers understood the
principles of modern roped climbing. It
would be another decade before Robert Underhill
made his famous trip to the Sierra Nevada
to introduce up-to-date concepts to Sierra
Club members. In the meantime, the Stettners
were establishing routes far beyond what
anyone had attempted before. Their bold
lead of Stettner Ledges on Colorado's famed
Longs Peak in 1927 established a benchmark
for two decades.
Bob Godfrey and Dudley Chelton, in their
book Climb! Rock Climbing in Colorado, had
this to say about the significance of the
climb:
"Stettner Ledges became, and has remained,
a classic ascent. In 1927 it was the most
difficult Colorado high mountain rock climb
and probably the most difficult in the United
States . . . No other climbs were to occur
in Colorado until the mid-1940s surpassing
them in daring and technical difficulty."
The Stettners quietly continued their remarkable
ascents in the Rockies, with important climbs
in Colorado and Wyoming's Tetons. But the
gathering storm in Europe once more caught
up with their new lives. As their adopted
country went to war with their birth country,
the Stettners helped to free their homeland
from the Nazis. Joining the renowned Tenth
Mountain Division and training at Camp Hale
in the Colorado mountains, they served with
valor, with Paul earning a Silver Star for
bravery against a German gun emplacement.
In their service with the Tenth, the brothers
befriended many of the famous American mountaineers
of that age, like Paul Petzoltd, who were
drawn to that unit.
After the war, the brothers again returned
to the mountains to put up big climbs. The
1947 climb of the spectacular East Face
of Monitor Peak in Colorado, by Joe Stettner,
Jack Fralick, and John Speck was the first
big-wall climb in America, several years
before the flowering of big-wall climbing
in Yosemite. In their adopted home of Chicago,
they were instrumental in starting the small,
but influential Chicago Mountaineering Club
and they became mentors for several important
climbers of our age.
The Stettners were famously modest, even
secretive about their accomplishments. For
many years, rumors circulated around campfires
in climbing camps about the brothers and
their routes. Fritz Weiss traveled to Colorado's
Longs Peak after hearing about the Stettners'
climb and left totally frustrated, unable
to locate the elusive and difficult route.
The Stettner Way is an important book as
it finally sets the record straight about
two pioneer American climbers, answering
several climbing questions from an age when
few bothered to write it down in a guidebook.
Written in an "as told by Joe"
style, The Stettner Way is full of interesting
stories and personal anecdotes by Joe as
he recounted his long, adventurous life
to the author just prior to his death at
age 95 in 1997. Vintage photographs, route
maps, and a list of their significant climbs
from 1920-1977 are a treat for active climber
or arm-chair mountaineer alike.
A Foreword by Jim Detterline, head climbing
ranger for Rocky Mountain National Park
in Colorado, puts perspective on the Stettners'
remarkable legacy, as he recounts how as
a "hot" young climber with several
5.11 ascents under his belt in the 1980s,
he was still humbled and inspired by the
Stettner Ledges.
Author and mountaineer, "Jack"
Gorby has thirty years of climbing experience
with significant ascents in Alaska and the
Alps. He guided for Colorado Mountain School
in Rocky Mountain National Park for fifteen
years. He's written several climbing stories
for the publications of the Chicago Mountaineering
Club from his home in that city and was
an intimate of the Stettners for nearly
20 years.
208 pages, 6" x 9", 75 B&W
photos, 3 maps, paperbound, $14.95, ISBN
0-9724413-0-1
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