Bradford and
Barbara Washburn on the summit of 10,000 foot Mount Bertha
(Alaska) on the occasion of its first ascent July 31, 1940.
It was their first major climb together, taking place almost
exactly three months after their wedding on April 27, 1940.
Bradford
Washburn, who will deliver a talk at the College March 7, in
Fairbanks, Alaska, 1936. He is pictured with his 53-pound
Fairchild K-6 camera at the time of the first large-format
photographic flights over and around 20,000-foot Mount
McKinley for the National Geographic Society. "Sella was definitely my
first inspiration in mountaineering photography," Washburn said in an
interview with Antony Decaneas, editor of Bradford Washburn:
Mountain Photography, published last year by The Mountaineers.
Characterized as a "roving genius of mind and mountains" by Ansel
Adams, Washburn, a native New Englander, traveled the world for eight
decades, documenting sites from the Grand Canyon to the Alps, and
from Mount McKinley to Mount Everest. He served as director of the
Boston Museum of Science for forty years and produced award-winning
maps as an expert cartographer. He is also credited with pioneering
research in the areas of aerial film, wireless communications,
cold-weather search and rescue procedures, and survival techniques
for the United States Army Air Forces. Bradford Washburn:
Mountain Photography, a striking chronicle of Washburn's
accomplishments, includes one hundred black-and-white images,
featuring aerial photographs, picture essays of early Alaskan
expeditions-- supply caches, camp conditions, and portraits of fellow
climbers and natives--and dramatic geological portraits highlighting
earth's upheavals, erosions, and the slow trek of glaciers. Washburn's father was the
dean of an Episcopal theological school in Cambridge, and his mother
was an amateur photographer who gave him his first tiny box camera
when he was thirteen. Hay fever inspired his earliest journeys into
the higher altitudes, and at sixteen, he made his first alpine climb,
on Mont Blanc. One year later, Washburn published his first book,
Among the Alps with Bradford (1927). His fascination with
alpine exploration followed the previous century's Romantic obsession
with the grandeur and danger of the Alps. Vittorio Sella's dramatic
shots of the Mount Saint Elias Expedition of 1897, led by the Duke of
Abruzzi, were some of Washburn's first inspirations. In 1926 Washburn
attended a presentation by the photographer of Mallory's expedition
to Everest, Captain John Noel, one of the last people to see Mallory
alive. Washburn remarks that this event "got me seriously interested
in Everest and in the photography of high mountains." Washburn has modestly said of
his work, "Some of my best pictures were accidents or just plain good
luck." His accomplishment as an artist, however, is well noted. As
Stan Trecker, dean and director of the Art Institute of Boston, has
said, "The depth and power of his vision and mind . . . have made him
a major fixture in twentieth-century photography." Retired since 1980 and now
nearly ninety, Washburn's energy has not waned. Within the past three
months he traveled with his wife, Barbara Washburn, to Alaska, and he
still puts in full days at the Boston Museum of Science. "In the
twilight of my life I would like to stay at the cutting edge by
constantly working with young people and offering them my assistance,
if that is possible," he said in an interview with Decaneas. "I like
dealing with young people; it keeps you looking ahead and feeling
young."
Bradford Washburn, mountain photographer and honorary director of
the Museum of Science in Boston, will give a lecture titled
"Reminiscences, McKinley--Matterhorn--Everest" Tuesday, March 7, at 7
pm, at Gamble Auditorium. The talk is part of a series of lectures in
conjunction with the Mount Holyoke Art Museum's exhibition of images
by nineteenth-century Italian pioneer Vittorio Sella, Summit:
Vittorio Sella, Mountaineer and Photographer, which runs through
March 10.
photo by Thomas
Winship
detail of photo by
Bob Reeve
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