The Mystery of the Gray Needle and Some Secrets Revealed, 1953

[Anima]

Two days ago my partner and I found the bolts on Gray Needle placed during the 1953 ascent. They are on the summit block of “The Bishop” (the western most tower seen prominently from Noname Creek). Given where the bolts are located, deemed by the first ascensionst a “false summit,” the tower between BoggyB’s Gray Needle (the third tower) and the Bishop would likely be what they deemed the true summit. For reference, Jim (danceatmoonrise) was correct in his diagram (from the 2012 trip report) with a label of “likely location of aid bolts.” They are in fact located on that face.

Some preliminaries:
The bottom two bolts do not have hangers, but the top two bolts seem to be completely intact. I was able to reach up to the first one and what remained of it seemed solid.

Our route to the bolts involved wrapping around the needle from the south to the north side, where we aided a 20ft crumbling crack that would likely go free at 5.12. Above that I was able to lead 40 more feet of disintegrating rock that felt in the 5.9 - 5.10 range. Hard to give it a proper rating because most of the handholds broke off as I climbed passed them and my partner pulled on gear given the lack of holds I left him. This placed us at the highest point on the bishop that could be free climbed on the west face. The bolts loomed above. Our route was not the 1953 route, which is likely located just to the west of our route.

Having now inspected the area, I question how there were “400 feet” of climbing as noted in the first ascent trip report. We rappelled a mere 150 feet to reach a ledge on the north side that is a continuum of the grassy approach ledge (it wraps around the needle) which is easily walked too.

Needle #4 (the second western most needle) or possibly the “summit” reached by the 1953 party is only a 40ft 5.4 pitch which is accessed by class 4 crumbling ledges (reminiscent of Jagged’s standard route) on the north side—also accessed by the continuum of the grassy approach ledges that wrap around from the south. It’s also possible that the first ascent party may have climbed Boggy’s Gray Needle as Needle #4 could easily be bypassed in favor of the obviously higher third needle.

Also, I must thank everyone who contributed to this forum and speculation about the Gray Needle and its first ascent, especially BoggyB for this first hand accounts of the area and GoreGalore for the trip report find. These were instrumental in helping us narrow down search areas.
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[Boggy B]

I'm so stoked to see this, great work!

This validates Steve Gladbach's and Jim DiNapoli's instincts on their reconnaissance years ago. It seems to solve the puzzle completely, except for which point they actually regarded as the summit.

What do you make of this paragraph from the 1953 report?

"The thrill of success was cooled slightly by the fact that we were on a false summit. A fixed rope got the others up the wall and together we moved on to the summit. Dropping down 50 feet, a courte echelle put Barry within striking distance and at exactly 6:30 we reached the top."

Referring back to Amy's photo below, was there a point on The Bishop higher than the top of the bolted slab that required a 50ft downclimb/rappel to access? If not, I would tend to agree that it's Needle #4 (between the USGS Gray Needle and The Bishop) which they ultimately summited via shoulder stand and called the top. Else to access the USGS Gray Needle from the north I think would be complicated enough to warrant a few more words.

needles.jpg

[gore galore]

Amazing work Anima in finding the 1953 Gray Needle bolts placed by the Barry Bishop party and to BoggyB for his explorations in adding to the knowledge for solving the mystery of the 1953 Gray Needle. I wrote the OP not expecting to generate much interest much less having some to actually search for those bolts. So, now the final chapter has been written in solving the mystery of the 1953 Gray Needle.

[Esturtz]

Hey guys, I was Clint's (Anima's) partner for this trip, here are my two cents about what the 1953 team actually summited. As Clint mentioned, we considered the possibility that the 1953 team simply walked right around the base of Tower 4 and proceeded to climb the USGS Gray Needle. This possibility is made further probable by the fact that from the summit of Tower 4, the USGS Gray Needle towers above, undoubtedly a much higher summit. It is clear from that vantage point that Tower 4 is another false summit.

However, I'd have to agree with Boggy that if they did climb the USGS Gray Needle from the base of Tower 4, it would have been a serious and significant enough undertaking that it would have merited a description. Furthermore, the sentence stating "a courte echelle put Barry within striking distance" makes me more confident that Tower 4 is what they deemed their summit. About half way up the one pitch we did to climb Tower 4, there is a ~15 foot vertical/slightly overhanging section composed of three or four very loose, disintegrating, refridgerator sized boulders. Below this section is a large, grassy ledge, where three men could stand comfortably— the perfect staging spot for a courte echelle. I'd imagine they did the courte echelle there, and once on top of those boulders, you're in "striking distance," as an easy move to turn a small corner puts one on the summit.

Obviously a courte echelle could work in many many places, especially within a set of towers composed of so many tiered ledges like the Gray Needle Massif. However, 9 times out of 10, standing on someone's shoulders on the edge of a cliff feels illogical and unfeasible for a number of reasons (ie. exposure, lack of standing room, lack of trust in the choss that you're standing on, the height of the obstacle, etc). Yet, on this pitch, in this particular spot, it seems as though the courte echelle would have felt comfortable and logical. As such, I think this may be another point to consider as evidence that they climbed Tower 4 in 1953, not the USGS Gray Needle.

[Skimo95]

Two days ago my partner and I found the bolts on Gray Needle placed during the 1953 ascent. They are on the summit block of “The Bishop” (the western most tower seen prominently from Noname Creek). Given where the bolts are located, deemed by the first ascensionst a “false summit,” the tower between BoggyB’s Gray Needle (the third tower) and the Bishop would likely be what they deemed the true summit. For reference, Jim (danceatmoonrise) was correct in his diagram (from the 2012 trip report) with a label of “likely location of aid bolts.” They are in fact located on that face.

Some preliminaries:
The bottom two bolts do not have hangers, but the top two bolts seem to be completely intact. I was able to reach up to the first one and what remained of it seemed solid.

Our route to the bolts involved wrapping around the needle from the south to the north side, where we aided a 20ft crumbling crack that would likely go free at 5.12. Above that I was able to lead 40 more feet of disintegrating rock that felt in the 5.9 - 5.10 range. Hard to give it a proper rating because most of the handholds broke off as I climbed passed them and my partner pulled on gear given the lack of holds I left him. This placed us at the highest point on the bishop that could be free climbed on the west face. The bolts loomed above. Our route was not the 1953 route, which is likely located just to the west of our route.

Having now inspected the area, I question how there were “400 feet” of climbing as noted in the first ascent trip report. We rappelled a mere 150 feet to reach a ledge on the north side that is a continuum of the grassy approach ledge (it wraps around the needle) which is easily walked too.

Needle #4 (the second western most needle) or possibly the “summit” reached by the 1953 party is only a 40ft 5.4 pitch which is accessed by class 4 crumbling ledges (reminiscent of Jagged’s standard route) on the north side—also accessed by the continuum of the grassy approach ledges that wrap around from the south. It’s also possible that the first ascent party may have climbed Boggy’s Gray Needle as Needle #4 could easily be bypassed in favor of the obviously higher third needle.

Also, I must thank everyone who contributed to this forum and speculation about the Gray Needle and its first ascent, especially BoggyB for this first hand accounts of the area and GoreGalore for the trip report find. These were instrumental in helping us narrow down search areas.
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That’s super rad! Keep killing it man

[shepherdkyle]

Thursday I was in a meeting discussing patients and I received this inreach message from Anima: “Found the bolts on gray needle. In case I die, they are located on the first tower that is obvious from the valley. It is the one Steve and Jim theorized about inreachlink.com/HKZL7JB (37.6469, -107.5902) - Clint Carafelli”

[14erFred]

A marvelous thread on the intriguing mystery of the Gray Needle! Kudos to gore galore for weaving a fascinating narrative of the history of this obscure alpine puzzle and laying down the gauntlet for future detective work. Much gratitude to Boggy B and everyone else who contributed pieces to the puzzle, providing solid clues that helped guide and motivate the search for answers. And congratulations to Anima and Esturtz for threading the (Gray) Needle to discover the missing bolts that the Bishop party placed in 1953. Gotta love a great historical mystery with a fun ending!

[Anima]

I'm so stoked to see this, great work!

This validates Steve Gladbach's and Jim DiNapoli's instincts on their reconnaissance years ago. It seems to solve the puzzle completely, except for which point they actually regarded as the summit.

What do you make of this paragraph from the 1953 report?

"The thrill of success was cooled slightly by the fact that we were on a false summit. A fixed rope got the others up the wall and together we moved on to the summit. Dropping down 50 feet, a courte echelle put Barry within striking distance and at exactly 6:30 we reached the top."

Referring back to Amy's photo below, was there a point on The Bishop higher than the top of the bolted slab that required a 50ft downclimb/rappel to access? If not, I would tend to agree that it's Needle #4 (between the USGS Gray Needle and The Bishop) which they ultimately summited via shoulder stand and called the top. Else to access the USGS Gray Needle from the north I think would be complicated enough to warrant a few more words.

needles.jpg

Thanks again for all your work in the area Boggy! And for the lovely poem you left in the summit register on the USGS Gray Needle!

I believe that paragraph does describe what the climb would be like between the Bishop and Needle #4. There is a point slightly higher on the Bishop than the bolted slab, but I cannot imagine it requiring a 50ft drop. The highest point on the Bishop is difficult to distinguish in pictures, but I'll attach a lidar rendering of it. Given that the slab is about 20ft tall, the highest point on the Bishop is likely only 5ft - 7ft higher and reachable from the top of the bolted slab.

We only had two days of climbing up there. On the first we spent the majority of the day looking for the bolts. Once we found them we moved on to Needle #4 and got within 40ft of the summit when a storm blew up out of nowhere, sending us running down the mountain as the Needles buzzed above us. On the second day we returned to Needle #4, summited it, and then returned to the south side and climbed the USGS Gray Needle via the 5.6 route before another developing storm pushed us down. We were unable to explore a route between Needle #4 and the Bishop, but from what we could see, it would be fairly straight forward given the large ledges present on the Northside. Given that I had to orphan Noname Needle, I will likely go back at some point and will attempt to summit the Bishop then too. On Needle #4, we saw no evidence of previous parties—no pins, pitons, bolts or other gear to indicate the presence of the 1953 party.

Another interesting note—at the base of the Bishop on the south side where we roped up, we came across a single nut sitting on a rock (black diamond, not too old, but looked like an older version than the ones they sell these days). So someone at some point not too long ago considered climbing the Bishop from the south. Perhaps Peter's party? Unfortunately I used it for a rappel anchor on the North side of the Bishop.

[Boggy B]

Awesome! Really appreciate all your effort and thoughts on this.

By 1953 Noname Ridge, despite its intimidating appearance from the west, should also have been mapped from the north (Jagged Pass, Peaks Five, Six, etc.) and south (Peak Ten)--though maybe inaccurately, at least to the extent that it was known there were multiple pinnacles on it. What I could not wrap my head around was that early climbers, who were largely peak-baggers, would identify the blunt end of a ridge with higher points as an object of climbing aspiration--this is why I doubted Jim's and Steve's conclusion.

Your finding the bolts has put that question to rest. So, considering the bolts are on the Bishop, I believe they considered that feature to be Gray Needle. I wonder then if they cared at all that there are higher points on the ridge.

I realized I have a ton of photos of these features from various angles and found a few that could help. From the south (approach meadows I think), here's the top of the Bishop:

bishop_s.jpg

Here it is from the north (somewhere around lake 125xx I think):

bishop_n.jpg

Be it 5 or 10 feet, it looks pretty tough to reach the true summit from the top of the bolted slab. I think this is the descent and court echelle, even if the dimensions (50ft?) are off:

bishop_n2.jpg

What do you think?

[Anima]

Yes it seems odd that they chose the Bishop as the "Gray Needle." It's too bad no one else found interest in the area sooner when the first ascent party was still around too be questioned. Although the Bishop is the most prominent needle seen from Noname Creek, the USGS Gray Needle can also be seen from the basin and upon closer inspection its obvious that every eastern needle is higher in succession. Given this, I think you are correct: they considered the Bishop to be the Gray Needle, otherwise they would have needed to traverse all the way to Noname Needle. Stopping short would have put an ascent in doubt given the higher points nearby. That picture taken from the north is illuminating. Comparing the length of the bolted section (which is well seen in the photograph) and comparing it to the actual summit block, the actual summit may a be at least 10 feet higher, something they may not have been able to reach or "courte echelle" too. Thus they may have needed to drop down on the north side as drawn in your picture. Knowing that other vertical distances have been exaggerated in the report, it would be no surprise for the "50 feet" to be incorrect. I would be curious to see if they left any signs of them up there. I doubt they carried any sort of register, but perhaps there are some old pitons they used for their rappels. Any sort of item would solve the summit mystery completely.

[Boggy B]

Yesterday Jonny Zaugg, Amy (blazintoes) and I summited the Bishop, putting to rest any question in my mind that it is in fact the 1953 Gray Needle. If it weren't for the discovery of the FA bolts earlier this summer by Clint (Anima) and Elan we would not have made this trip, so credit goes to them for driving this thing forward.

In brief, we climbed the north side chimney and descended the FA route. About 40 feet of the climbing was difficult, which Jonny led free at around 5.10b. On descent we reversed the FA route to the top of the bolted slab, rapped down the bolt line, then rapped the FA chimney (replete with pitons).

bishop_n3.jpg

Red=roped portion of our route
Green=piton line

From the top of the bolted slab, the true summit mostly blocks the view up ridge and itself would have been the target of further venturing on the FA. The ledge 20 ft. below the summit is the obvious site of the courte echelle--had we employed one it would have been much faster and easier than the crack we ascended. There wasn't any evidence of the FA on the summit, but they used a shoulder stand and would have rappelled the same as us, by slinging the capstone.

I'll post a mini TR with further approach and route details.

[bdloftin77]

Nice!! Thanks for posting!