{"id":200615,"date":"2025-08-15T09:57:57","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T16:57:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/?p=200615"},"modified":"2025-08-25T08:37:13","modified_gmt":"2025-08-25T15:37:13","slug":"jim-whittaker-everest-legend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/climb\/jim-whittaker-everest-legend","title":{"rendered":"Jim Whittaker: Reflections from a Mountaineering Legend"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Ascents still involve planning, preparation and willpower for Jim Whittaker, arguably the most famous American climber of the 20th century: first American to summit Mount Everest, vacationer with presidents, first paid full-time employee of REI, and then the co-op’s second CEO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But at 96, the scale of the climbs has changed. Today\u2019s challenge: the 17 stairs from Whittaker\u2019s basement to the main floor of his Port Townsend, Washington, home, where guests await to hear him share stories of his mountaineering adventures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou ready, Jim?\u201d says Dianne Roberts, his wife of 50 years. Locking her arm in his\u2014a climber\u2019s three-points of contact still in play\u2014they begin the march to the family room with its panoramic view of the Puget Sound, so he can tell his larger-than-life story one more time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Mountaineer Jim Whittaker photographed holding an ice axe with his initials carved into it. (Photo by Dan DeLong)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A Childhood Outside<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Whittaker was born in Seattle on Feb. 10, 1929. Twin brother, Louie, followed a few minutes later. In the Whittaker household, only the eldest, Barney, was called by his given name. Jim and Louie were simply \u201cthe Twins.\u201d \u201cWe were inseparable,\u201d Whittaker tells Uncommon Path.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1931, the Whittakers\u2019 parents, Hortense and Charles, moved the young family to the West Seattle neighborhood after building a two-bedroom house for $350 on a lot with a view of Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains. Charles and Hortense loved the outdoors. Family trips often involved camping with the boys in the Cascades or on a beach near the sound. To the twins, West Seattle seemed like the edge of civilization. They explored nearby groves or the beach. They joined the Boy Scouts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBack then, there was hardly a better place to be a Boy Scout than Seattle,\u201d Whitaker writes in his book, A Life on the Edge<\/em>. \u201cOut the front door we had the Olympic Mountains and out the back door, the Cascades.\u201d (Their troop once got so lost that it returned home nearly a day late, to panicked parents.) These experiences would shape the direction of both boys\u2019 lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Climbing Adventures<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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A wall of memories at the home of Jim Whittaker. (Photo by Dan DeLong for REI)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By the 1950s, now in their late teens, all three brothers moved from the Boy Scouts to the Mountaineers Club, where they learned rock climbing and alpine climbing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The thrill\u2014and peril\u2014of their new pastime came to a head for the trio one day above Snoqualmie Pass, on a climb called the Tooth, a rite of passage for Seattle-area climbers even today. The Tooth isn\u2019t a long climb. The upper part is easy, with decent handholds. Lower down, though, climbers must inch around a corner to a ledge that\u2019s less than a foot wide. Below the ledge? A drop. “The gap lay in shadow. I stepped up to its edge, began to move out over it to the cliff a few feet away, glanced down past my left foot and\u2026froze solid,\u201d Whittaker recalls in his memoir, \u201cThe cliff plunged straight down for what looked like 1,000 feet. I was terrified.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The brothers completed the climb, but all three vowed never to climb another mountain. Barney kept his promise. Jim and Louie \u201cspent the rest of our lives breaking it,\u201d Whittaker writes. \u201cThat day, only moments apart, we each crossed a gap within ourselves and, in the process, had been exposed not just to danger but to our destinies.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After college, and with the Korean War raging, luck intervened to keep Jim and Louie out of combat, which neither wanted. (Both were already in the Army.) Both had worked as climbing guides on Mount Rainier before the war. The Army\u2019s Cold Weather Training Command at Camp Hale, Colorado (original home of the 10th Mountain Division) needed instructors to teach special forces soldiers to ski, climb and navigate in snowy wilderness. Friends made an introduction, and the Army transferred the twins to Colorado to work as instructors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking back years later, Whittaker says <\/mark>teaching those gung-ho soldiers prepared him to navigate big egos on international climbing expeditions and in the corporate world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

General Manager of REI<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In 1954, released from the military, Whittaker picked up a call from Lloyd Anderson, a former climbing instructor who had known him since his Boy Scouts days. The downtown Seattle cooperative that Anderson had co-founded with wife Mary<\/a> was then a climbing gear importer simply known as the co-op. It had grown to 600 members, and Anderson couldn\u2019t keep up with demand. He needed help. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whittaker became the first full-time paid employee of the co-op in 1955\u2014earning $400 a month, plus a bonus from sales. And so “began the twenty-four years in which he would gain fame as the biggest bum in Northwest mountaineering history, and then ruin things by making bumming respectable,” writes author and hiking advocate Harvey Manning in REI: 50 Years of Climbing Together<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The co-op occupied a tiny space at the corner of 6th Avenue and Pike Street. Across the hall was the Mountaineers Clubhouse, which meant a steady stream of customers who were excited to handle the new pitons and ice axes that had arrived from Europe. Whittaker got to work organizing the 10-by-20-foot room. He created mailing lists and compiled a rolodex of gear suppliers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the second full-time employee was hired six months later, the co-op added a ski shop. Business boomed. The company moved to larger space and soon changed its name to Recreational Equipment, Inc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rainier and Denali Ascents<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, Jim and Louie were gaining reputations as exceptional mountaineering guides for the growing number of people taking up mountaineering. Many came for the pull of 14,411-foot Mount Rainier, practically in the Whittakers\u2019 backyard. The peak offers something for climbers of all abilities with its crevasse fields, violent weather changes, significant exposure and cold. In fact, it often serves as a training ground for climbers eyeing Himalayan and Andean summits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The brothers’ regular Rainier ascents led in 1960 to a successful expedition to Alaska\u2019s Denali\u2014North America’s tallest mountain. The trip didn\u2019t go all smoothly; a significant fall on the descent required one injured climber to be rescued by helicopter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, the expedition helped prepare Whittaker for a call that would come the following year\u2014one that would change his life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The World\u2019s Tallest Peak<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Mountain climber Jim Whittaker photographed in Port Townsend, Wash., September 18, 2024. (Photo by Dan DeLong for REI)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By the early 1960s no American had made it to the top of Mount Everest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Swiss filmmaker Norman Dyhrenfurth contacted the Whittaker, hoping to recruit them for an Everest expedition. Louie declined the trip, whereas Jim became an instrumental member of the team. (Louie, who founded the climbing company Rainier Mountaineering Inc., died in March 2024<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With his REI expertise, Jim selected, arranged and shipped tons of gear for the four-month expedition. He also secured sponsorships from Seattle-based companies Eddie Bauer and Rainier Beer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On May 1, 1963, the team summited, with Whittaker reaching the top alongside Sherpa Nawang Gombu<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Jim
Jim Whittaker picked up a black stone from Everest’s summit and made a ring. (Photo by Dan DeLong for REI)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

At home in Port Townsend, Whittaker shows off a gold ring he still wears. It’s set with a simple, black, heart-shaped stone. He picked up the stone on Everest\u2019s summit. When he returned to Seattle in 1963, he handed it to a jeweler. \u201cI told [the jeweler] \u2018Don\u2019t lose that S.O.B or you’re dead,\u2019\u201d Whittaker tells Uncommon Path, laughing at the memory.<\/mark><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But he did lose something after the trip: his anonymity. \u201cBack then, everyone paid attention to these climbs,\u201d climber Ed Viesturs, tells Uncommon Path. \u201cIt was a very nationalistic thing\u2026. The president took notice,\u201d says Viesturs, one of a handful of people to summit the world\u2019s 14 highest peaks and only one of few to do so without supplemental oxygen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere was a huge parade through the streets of Seattle with confetti and bands playing,\u201d Whittaker writes in A Life on the Edge<\/em>. \u201cI was given keys to the city. I kept thinking, \u2018Look, all we did was climb a mountain.\u2019 (But) it began to dawn on me that my life had changed forever.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

REI also was turned upside down, Manning writes in his book, as media outlets mentioned the co-op along with Jim’s achievement; “the free advertising catapulted REI from obscurity to fame.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Friendship with the Kennedys<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"Whittaker,
President John F. Kennedy presents the National Geographic Society Hubbard Medal to members of the American Mount Everest Expedition Team on July 8, 1963. Abbie Rowe, White House Photographs. Courtesy John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

About a month later, the climbing team, Sherpas included, met President John F. Kennedy at the White House. The visit sparked a decade-long friendship between Whittaker and the Kennedy family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1965, Whittaker guided Sen. Bobby Kennedy, the late president\u2019s brother, to the summit of Mount Kennedy in the Yukon of Western Canada, a previously unclimbed peak named for JFK. Whittaker and Bobby became close friends. Their families often vacationed together, taking skiing or rafting trips. Whittaker chaired the Washington state campaign for Bobby\u2019s 1968 presidential bid. And Whittaker mourned with the family when Bobby was assassinated in 1968.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, Whittaker continued climbing, running REI, raising three sons (Carl, Scott and Bobby), and drifting apart from his wife, Blanche. His travel and very public life\u2014Life Magazine photo spreads, business trips, Sun Valley ski trips with the Kennedy clan and other celebrities\u2014widened a gulf between them, he writes in his book. They divorced in 1971.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Second CEO of REI<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"Jim
Whittaker pictured in his home with wife Dianne Roberts, who joined him as team member and photographer on the 1975 attempt of K2. (Photo by Dan DeLong for REI)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By 1971, \u201cafter 15 years being groomed for the position,\u201d according to Manning, Whittaker had taken on duties as CEO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At a 1972 meeting of the U.S. National Parks Board in Calgary, Whittaker heard a woman across the room in an animated conversation with his friends. He walked over. \u201cIt was love at first sight,\u201d he writes in his memoir. Roberts, a professional outdoor photographer, had the same adventurous <\/mark>mindset as Jim. They were engaged a year later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roberts would become central to the next stage of Whittaker\u2019s career: an American attempt to summit K2, the world\u2019s second-tallest mountain. Climbers often say that K2 and Annapurna are harder to climb than Everest\u2014with more complicated approaches, unpredictable weather and perpetual avalanche danger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whittaker’s 1975 expedition to K2, aided by Roberts as team member and official photographer, ended without a summit. Three years later, Whittaker led another attempt. Although he didn’t reach the top, climbers Jim Wickwire<\/a>, an REI board member and part of the 1975 expedition, and Lou Reichardt summited. It marked the third ascent of K2 and the first by Americans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That successful K2 summit partly led to his departure from REI in 1979, which had been building for years, he says. He felt disconnected from upper management, who to him seemed more in touch with commerce than the outdoors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was taken aback by the somewhat chilly reception after I returned from our successful assault on K2,\u201d Whittaker writes in A Life on the Edge<\/em>. \u201cNone of my board members climbed and as a consequence seemed able to appreciate what our American team has accomplished.\u201d He retired from REI in 1979. During his last decade at REI, the co-op grew from under 200,000 members to over 900,000 members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conservation Trailblazer<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

While at REI, Whittaker led conservation efforts long before the co-op became synonymous with movements like #OptOutside. He saw a need for the co-op to protect the environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even before he assumed the duties of CEO, he secured board approval in 1968 to testify in D.C. on behalf of REI for the creation of the North Cascades National Park and Pasayten Wilderness, both in Washington state, and Redwood National Park in California.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The 1973 issue of View Point, an REI newsletter, helped educate members about packing it in and packing it out. Courtesy of REI Co-op Living Archive.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Under Whittaker\u2019s leadership, the co-op organized cleanups and trail improvements; donated to environmental organizations; and promoted the message, \u201cIf you pack it in, pack it out\u201d in its catalogs. Whittaker also personally advocated to protect wilderness areas and other wild places, testifying at hearings in D.C. and in his home state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Retirement from REI didn’t mean slowing down. In 1990, he led the Everest International Peace Climb, uniting American, Soviet and Chinese climbers. The Peace Climb was less about mountaineering and more about showing the world that cooperation and collegiality weren’t dead. \u201cOn the Peace Climb, I got a chance to watch how good Jim was at these large-scale expeditions,\u201d says Viesturs, then a young guide invited to work on the expedition. Logistics, politics, language barriers and egos complicated everything, he said. Tensions grew. \u201cJim stepped in and became the leader, as he typically did,\u201d Viesturs tells Uncommon Path. \u201cHe got everyone organized and he made it clear that members from every country would summit, or no one would summit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Full Life<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Back in Port Townsend, Whittaker mentioned still more stories\u2014the interlocking pieces of what he called his \u201cfull life.\u201d He helped a blind climber reach the summit of Mount Rainier. He recounted a tale about a late famous astronaut who, after a few drinks at a black-tie dinner, threatened to \u201cmoon\u201d the audience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whittaker wanted to keep going, but Roberts signaled it was time to wrap up. Twenty years his junior, she runs the routine of Jim\u2019s life these days. \u201cHe\u2019s always pushed himself so hard,\u201d she says<\/mark>. \u201cSo it\u2019s up to me to remind him [when it\u2019s time to rest].”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Whittaker knows his lack of an off switch is, in essence, why he has a story to tell. \u201cThere is still more to say,\u201d he says, with a grin. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re done quite yet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Jim
Mountaineer and former REI CEO Jim Whittaker photographed in Port Townsend, Wash., September 18, 2024. (Photo by Dan DeLong)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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