The Hall of the Mountain King: The True Story of a Tragic Climb

By Howard H. Snyder

Book Overview

The true story of a tragic climb. Dust jacket notes: "On June 25, 1967, the twelve members of the Joseph F. Wilcox Mount McKinley Expedition began their ascent of 20,320-foot Mount McKinley, North... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• ISBN: 0684144417
• Release Date: January 1
• Publisher: Charles Scribner's Sons (New York)
• Length: 207 Pages

Customer Reviews

Blame game for the disaster??

I enjoyed reading this book by Howard Snyder which retells the story of the Wilcox Expedition to climb Mount McKinley during the summer of 1967. The climb was a total disaster as 7 out 12 climbers frozed to death, making it one of the worst climbing incidents in modern American mountaineering history. The author was one of the five survivors and he retells his side of the story on how this disaster took place and why. In doing so, he appears to put a lot of blame on Joe Wilcox, the expedition leader for making poor decisions that directly and indirectly, led to the death of seven climbers under his leadership. Of course, he also cites the Park Service for forcing him and his two friends joined Wilcox's expedition since the Park Service had a "four man team" rule. The story Snyder writes proves to be interesting, scary and quite numbing. It also cast Joe Wilcox as the main reason why the climb went bad. I think from Snyder's point of view, Wilcox was the captain of the ship and he's responsible for everything that goes on that ship (aka: expedition). This proves to be an interesting read but you shouldn't read it without having Joe Wilcox's book, White Winds nearby. White Winds is Wilcox's response to Snyder's book.