W ILLIAM W. HOOKER

1934-1974

The Peruvian Andes were a familiar mountain range for Bill Hooker. I first met him there in 1972 when we were climbing together from a base camp in the Quebrada Santa Cruz. It was his second trip to Peru— having been in the Cordillera Vilcanota in 1957 with a small group from Harvard. I was surprised to learn that Bill had first started climbing in the Washington, D.C. area, where I live. We began a good friendship by recalling old friends and climbing areas. We climbed together a lot that summer, and before our expedition was finished, Bill and I were talking of returning to the Cordillera Blanca.

Bill was a graduate of Harvard magna cum laude in 1956, where he climbed extensively with the H arvard M ountaineering Club. In 1956 he and others made the first ascent of the popular Dike Route on the Middle Teton; but they bypassed the Dike Pinnacle on their way to the summit, leaving the complete first ascent to another party that followed a week later. I ran into Bill in Garnet Canyon in August, 1973 as he was taking his two young sons up the Grand Teton on their first climbing trip. At that time Bill and I started to make definite plans for our own expedition to Peru, for summer 1974. It was to be Bill’s last “big” mountain trip— he was looking forward to spending the summers in the future climbing and hiking in the Sierras with his sons.

Our expedition materialized after much hard work on the part of Bill, and we all managed to meet in H uaraz in June. We had plans for

new routes on Nevado Santa Cruz and Huandoy Norte. Our climb on Santa Cruz failed due primarily to illness and bad weather. A week later, on July 15, Bill Hooker and Glenn Converse were killed instantly in a massive ice avalanche while approaching our high camp at 19,000 feet on the northwest side of Huandoy Norte. It was all over in just a few horrifying seconds, and although we were trying to save our own lives we knew that there was no possible way that Bill and Glenn could have survived.

When Bill and I were climbing the east ridge of Artesonraju in 1972, he remarked that climbing Artesonraju had been a dream and desire for him for 30 years. When he was a small boy he saw the photo of “the great South Face” of Artesonraju in the Kinzl-Schneider book on the Cordillera Blanca. At that young age Bill felt the desire to climb that mountain. Shortly before the avalanche he and I stood together on the glacier and admired the south face of Artesonraju, seemingly alive in the warm glow of the afternoon sun. I was proud to have been with Bill when he finally satisfied his dream to climb that mountain.

Bill is only one of three close friends I have lost to climbing accidents this year. There is at least some solace in the fact that he died a proud, happy climber in a place he loved so much … and that his body lies buried in the nieve blanca of the Cordillera Blanca.

T h o m a s A . M c C r u m m