ExcitableBoy:
You may well be right about 1938 being a landmark year in climbing history. 1953 and 1963 also might be considered landmark years. in 53 Hillary and Tenzing climbed Everest and Hermann Buhl made the first solo ascent of Nanga Parbat. In 63 Willi Unsoeld and Tom SHorbein made the first technical route on a 8,000 peak by traversing Everest by the new West Ridge Route and down the South Col after surviving the first overnight above 28,000'.

Matt:
I had heard that Lincoln PK on Mt Baker had lots of rock fall, but I personally had not scouted that area of Baker. Perhaps why I didn't include it. Most of the others I have at least viewed from vantage points on other peaks. Good pick.

I suspect there are peaks in the Olympics that rival many on Murph1's list for object hazards, but I have not done much over there so I can't say for sure.

ExcitableBoy:
Have been unavailable to answer posts for the past two weeks. I grew up in Tacoma and attended Olympic College in 1958-60 when George Martin was the Registrar there. Got my start hiking and climbing in the Olympics and can't recall any peaks other than Olympus, Mt. Constance, Warrior, and Mt Anderson that have any routes of the seriousness of the ones on the Cascade Peaks I mentioned in the original list. Most of the more difficult climbs in the Olympics are on routes of short duration like Mt Cruiser, Mt Constance and Warrior Peak.
Off subject but maybe of interest, I remember hiking in to Royal Basin in the 1960's to climb Mt. Deception. My climbing partner and I camped near the cave rock in the upper end of the basin. In three days we saw exactly three people. Two hikers and the Backcountry Ranger. Sometime in the mid 1980's I returned to the same area and was amazed and saddened to count over forty people camping in the basin and in two days double that number marched in and out of the area. It was the second to the last time I ever went back to the Olympics. In 1991 I went back with my son to climb in the Sawtooth Range where I had made some early ascents in the 50's Was shocked to find that the 4.5 mile hike to Flapjack Lakes from Staircase had become an eleven mile slog up the old road we use to drive. When we arrived at Flapjack Lakes the two cabins were gone, and the area trees were all stripped of their lower limbs. There were five parties of people at the lake and a ranger.
Have not been back since. I don't like hiking 10 to 20 miles in to the backcountry to be with a campground full of people! I liked the Olympics when you saw no one for days!

I would not be sad about people out enjoying their park. Maybe it is just me but I think that is good. Maybe that is why there is a quota at Royal Basin and Flapjack Lakes now at certain times of the year.

If you do want to avoid the crowds there is a good chance of doing that if you go after Labor Day mid week. A few years back I had the whole place to myself on a hike in October.

Murph1, was Floyd Armstead still teaching math at Olympic College when you attended there? When I was at Olympic College we had an outdoor club called the packrats and Floyd Armstead was the advisor.

I wouldn't say that the toughest from a certain age were tougher or wimpier than any other era. Look at Steck today running the Eiger like its childs play and then takiung that attitude to the greater ranges. Read the book "Freedom Climbers". A whole era of Polish climbers pushed the impossible, and the death rate of their audacity reflected it. Or look at the Britih during the 1970's and 80's. Take most Doug Scott routes, especially the Ogre. How many people would have survived. Lets not be xenophobic or egocentric (I should say regio-centric about our list.

If we take the best climbers of an era and compared them to any other era, they are probably comparable, its just the climbers of today have stood on the shoulders of those who have come before them.

Please excuse my typing, after my accident I can no longer feel my hands which sucks for typing, but is REALLY great for climbing (in a perverted sort of way)

Murph1 wrote:ExcitableBoy:
can't recall any peaks other than Olympus, Mt. Constance, Warrior, and Mt Anderson that have any routes of the seriousness of the ones on the Cascade Peaks I mentioned in the original list. Most of the more difficult climbs in the Olympics are on routes of short duration like Mt Cruiser, Mt Constance and Warrior Peak.

I agree, the Olympics do not have the long, technical climbs that the Cascades offer, but I thought the remoteness and poor rock quality of many of the peaks were noteworthy.