History of the Olympic Mountains

The Olympic Mountains were originally called "Sun-a-do" by the Duwamish Indians, while the first European to see them, the Spanish navigator Juan Perez, named them "Sierra Nevada de Santa Rosalia" in 1774. But the English captain John Meares, seeing them in 1788, thought them beautiful enough for the Gods to dwell there, and named them "Mount Olympus" after the one in Greece. Alternate proposals never caught on, and in 1864 the Seattle Weekly Gazette persuaded the government to make the present-day name official. Though readily visible from most parts of western Washington, the interior was almost entirely unexplored until the 1890s. Mount Olympus itself was not officially ascended until 1907, one of the first successes of The Mountaineers, which had been organized in Seattle just a few years earlier.

Mountain men

Pioneering settlers came to the north Olympic Peninsula as early as the mid-1800's -- but the rugged mountainous interior remained unexplored. Local Native American tribal factions felt that was where the spiritual forces were most dominant, and revered them with various degress of both fear and immense respect. The 'mountain men" were mostly local settlers or homesteaders in either the Port Angeles area or the heavily forested foothills and river valleys nearby. These men raomed the country partly to hunt and fish, and partly just due to the sheer magnetism provided instinctively by these challenging routes and unlimited natural resources.

One of the better known "mountain men" was Billy Everett, who was born in 1868 to Peninsula pioneer John Everett. Billy's mother was a Clallam Indian who died in childbirth, and his father was out hunting most of the time. So Billy was raised by his uncle, Clallam Indian Boston Charlie, until he was of age to be hunting with a rifle. He became an exceptional hunter, explorer and mountain man. Before the O'Neil party began exploring the Olympic interior 1885, Billy had discovered the Catwalk and penetrated as far as Cream Lake in the Bailey Range. The earliest unconfirmed accounts of an ascent of Mount Olympus are by two white men and two Native Americans from Cape Flattery in 1854. There was a subsequent expedition led by Melbourne Watkinson in 1878. In 1894, a Port Townsend party made it as far as Queets basin by way of Dodwell-Rixon Pass.

The first well documented exploration of the Olympic Mountains occurred in the summer of 1885. Army Lieutenant Joseph P. O'Neil led a small party of enlisted men from Vancouver Barracks and civilian engineers on a reconnaissance of the Olympic Mountains. O'Neil chose the tiny waterfront community of Port Angeles (forty inhabitants, one hotel, one sawmill, and two general stores) as his starting point because of its proximity to the mountains. On July 17, the party headed south into the foothills following a route similar to the present-day Hurricane Ridge Road, making slow ProgresS [...] a trail through dense forest and windfalls. It took them AbOUT a month to access Hurricane Ridge on foot. From there part of the group began to explore the Elwha River valley while O'Neil and the others headed southeast towards what is now the Obstruction Point trailhead area. The O'Neil Party continued southeast along the divide, exploring almost as far south as Mount Anderson before a messenger reached him with orders to report to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and the expedition was cut short.

Press Expedition

A second assault legendary on the deep Olympic interior was made in the winter of 1889-1890. During the fall of 1889 (the same year that Washington became a state) the Seattle Press newspaper called for "hardy citizens . . . to acquire fame by unveiling the mystery which wraps the land encircled by the snow capped Olympic range." The Press Party consisted of six men whom the Press described as having "an abundance of grit and manly vim". The group included four dogs, two mules, and 1500 pounds of supplies. This group entered the Olympic Mountains in December 1889, in the midst of one of the harshest and snowiest winters in the history of the Olympic Peninsula.

The team was assembled by a foolhardy Scottish explorer named James Helbold Christie. Christie wanted to make a name for himself, and he knew if he waited to make the crossing until spring that he would be competing against A bevy of similar teams. The first two mistakes came in quick succession. The team rented a wagon to carry lumber to the Elwha River. The wagon couldn't make it through the thick undergrowth to the river, and so the men bought two mules named Dolly and Jenny and cut a trail to the river. [...] the trail took two weeks. Once there, they set about building a boat, which turned out to be total disaster. Once the boat was built and launched, it immediately sank. The men dredged it out, dried it out, and spent two more weeks rebuilding it. When they launched it for the second time, it wouldn't go. Or rather, the only way they could get it to go was to pull it by man or mule power. By January 24, more than a month into the trip, they were only five miles up the river. The boat was abandoned.

The party spent the first three months of 1890 exploring the Elwha River Valley. In mid-March the explorers discovered and named Geyser Valley, where they heard sounds they thought were bubbling geysers (although there are none in the valley). James Christie predicted Geyser Valley would make "a young paradise for some venturesome squatter". Indeed, and ten years later Will and Grant Humes homesteaded in the valley. The Humes Ranch cabin can still be visited today, about 2.5 miles from the Whiskey Bend trailhead.

The rest of the trip was plagued by even more problems, including a blizzard that hit just after they abandoned the boat. They hauled heavy packs through thick snow -- and their poor mules, which were ill equipped for walking through snow, were cut and scraped by the sharp crust of ice. By early March, they were not even out of the Elwha watershed when Jenny the mule fell over a 400-foot ledge and had to be shot. They reapportioned her pack and set off again. A month and a half later, an injured Dolly laid down and would not get up. Christie unburdened her and set the starving mule free never to be seen again.

They forged onward, only to encounter more problems when, a week later, the dogs ate the last of their meat. As legend has it, their key to deep winter survival came by [...] and eating a full grown black bear. Luckily for the men, their dogs turned out to be good at harassing bears. After they shot their first bear, the men were so hungry that they melted and drank its fat.

In early May, the Press Party, their clothes in tatters and running dangerously low on supplies, crossed Low Divide and headed down the Quinault Valley, reaching the coast on May 20, 1890 after nearly six months in the mountains.They caught a boat from the Quinault Indian Reservation to Grays Harbor where they wired the Press to let them know they'd made it and to ask for money for haircuts and warm meals.

Then in October of 1989, Samul Gilman and his father Charles ,a former Lt. Governor of Minnesota, ascended the Quinalt River by Canoe, and continued overland to Anderson Pass before returning the way they had come in late November. This trip was reported only in passing by the media and was not GeneRally known until National Geographic published an account of the trip in April of 1896.

Undaunted and highly enthusiastic, Army Lt. Joseph O'Neil returned to the Pacific Northwest in 1887, in the same period that William Steel was organizing the Oregon Alpine Club. In 1890, O'Neil organized a hearty group consisitng of enlisted men and OAC members. After reviewieng an advanced copy of the Press Expedition report, the second O'Neil Party set off from the Skokomish River near Hood Canal and what is now the town of Lilliwap. With the help of the Hoquiam Board of Trade, who built 30 miles of trails to meet him from the coastal approach, O'Neil eventually crossed First Divide, ascended the Duckabush River to O'Neil Pass, and descended the Enchanted Valley to Lake Quinalt. The expedition is best remembered for its first (?) attempted ascent of Mt. Olympus.

Lt. O'Neil dispatched seven of his group to climb Mount Olympus. The men traveled northeast to Queets Basin, located at the southeast base of Mt. Olympus. Losing one member (who eventually found his way out), the remaining six members of the climbing party climibed to the head of the Jeffers Glacier, and made the final climb to the south on September 22, 1890. The three men in the summit party left a copper box near the top containing a record of the climb, a deck of cards, two army buttons, and various other momentos as a permanent record of the climb. But the copper box has never been located -- and just which peak was ascended by the O'Neil Party remains a mystery to this day.

National Monument

It was during that summer that O'Neil met a small hiking party led by Judge James Wickersham. As a result of their adventures, both Wickersham and O'Neil advocated the establishment of a national park in the Olympics. O'Neil wrote in his 1890 report: "In closing I would state that while the country on the outer slope of these mountains is valuable, the interior is useless for all practicable purposes. It would, however, serve admirably for a national park. There are numerous elk -- that noble animal so fast disappearing from this country -- that should be protected."

In 1897 most of the forested land of the peninsula was included in the Olympic Forest Reserve (later Olympic National Forest). Following O'Neil's recommendation, Washington State Congressmen introduced unsuccessful bills in the early 1900's to establish a national park or an elk reserve. In 1909, just before leaving office, President Theodore Roosevelt issued a proclamation creating Mount Olympus National Monument within the national forest to protect the summer range and breeding grounds of the Olympic Elk.

Mount Olympus, along with all other national monuments was transferred to National Park Service administration as part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's governmental reorganization in 1933. And with the support of national conservation organizations, Washington Congressman Monrad C. Wallgren in 1935 sponsored a successful bill for the establishment of Olympic National Park.

After a visit to the Olympic Peninsula in the fall of 1937, President Roosevelt added his enthusiastic support to the movement for a national park, and the act establishing Olympic National Park was signed on June 29, 1938. The coastal strip was added to the park in 1953. In 1976, Olympic National Park became a Man and the Biosphere Reserve, and in 1981 it was designated a World Heritage Park.

As a result of the Press Expedition, many peaks bear the names of prominent newspaper publishers and editors of the late 19th century, including Mt. Meany (named after Edmond Meany, an editor of the Seattle Press), Mt. Dana, Mt. Lawson, Mt. Noyes, Mt. Scott, and the much-ballyhooed Bailey Range high alpine traverse. Press Party blazes can still be found along the Elwha River trail in the park.

The Crislers

In the early and mid 1920s, a gergia native named Herb Crisler hiked extensively in the interior of the Olympic Mountains, building cabins and hunting shelters at strategic places in the mountains before Olympic National Park was created in 1938. Determined to make a career in wildlife photography, Crisler made making regular summer hiking expeditions into the Olympics inhe early 30's. In conjunction with his filming exploits, Crisler erected a series of backcountry shelters and caches for storing food and supplies.

Crisler married Lois Brown in 1940 -- a University of Washington English teacher and member of the The Seattle Mountaineers. Lois and Herb worked and hiked together filming Olympic wildlife. Between 1941 and 1951, Humes Ranch on the Elwha River served as their winter headquarters. In the winter of 1943, the Crislers acted as Aircraft Warning Service observers at a lockout on Hurricane Ridge. After this experience in the snow, the Crislers made regular winter ski trips into the high country. During the 1940s, the couple worked together in the production of several full length films depicting the Olympic wildlife and habitat.

Points of Interest

Olympic Hot Springs

Olympic Hot Springs was discovered in 1892 by Andrew Jacobson while out hunting. then in 1907, Billy Everett, Thomas Farrell and Charles Anderson rediscovered the hot springs. Farrell staked a mineral claim and later Everett became the legal owner. He cut a trail to connect it to the Elwha River and built a cabin and bath house. With partner Carl Schoeffel, they owned and operated the resort until Harry Schoeffel bought out Carl's interest. The Schoeffels operated Olympic Hot Springs Resort until it closed on December 31, 1966.

Hurricane Ridge

In the early 1930s, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) constructed a dirt road (the Wolf Creek Trail) from Whiskey Bend on the Elwha River to the top of Hurricane Ridge. In 1950, the National Park Service began constructing the Heart of the Hills road, a paved road which climbs Hurricane Ridge from the northeast and was opened to the public in 1958. The Hurricane Ridge Visitors Center was constructed before the Heart of the Hills road was completed, using materials hauled up the Wolf Creek Trail by truck. After the Heart of the Hills road was upgraded in 1970, the Wolf Creek Trail was decommissioned as a road, and is maintained as a trail by the National Park Service.

References

• Wood, R.L., Across the Olympic Mountains: The Press Expedition, 1889-90 (Mountaineering Books, 1989)
• Park History
• Early Explorations