![One of the oldest eastern white cedars on the cliffs of the Niagara Escarpment. This tree germinated in the year 1134, making it 883 years old today. Climbers likely trimmed the branches on its northern side to make way for a climbing route in 1992. At the time of the photograph, two living branches on the south side of the tree were keeping it alive, though scientists haven't been back to survey whether it survives today. [Photo] Peter Kelly](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/alp58-wired-2.jpg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
Early expeditions often combined the exploration of new heights with a search for rare botanical specimens. More than a century after both natural history and mountaineering fractured into subdisciplines, Associate Editor Paula Wright explores the impacts of climbing’s science gap and the need for a more unified focus on conservation in this Wired story from Alpinist 58.
![Conrad Anker delivers the University of Utah's graduation commencement speech on May 3. [Photo] University of Utah-Marketing and Communications](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/anker-commencement-speech-1.jpg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
Renowned alpinist Conrad Anker delivered the University of Utah’s graduation commencement speech and received an honorary doctorate on May 3, 2017. This is a copy of his speech, which considers the current and future challenges faced by Earth’s citizens, and the responsibility we have to address these global problems.
![Alex Honnold reenacts his Moonlight Buttress (5.12+, 1,200') free solo in Zion. [Photo] Celin Serbo](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/alp35-alex-honnold-profile-1-scaled.jpg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
This profile of Alex Honnold first appeared in Alpinist 35 (Summer 2011). In this piece, Alex Lowther cover’s Honnold’s sudden rise to fame, from his childhood and the death of his father, to how he balances the demands of his professional climbing career with his personal priorities.
![[Painting] Craig Muderlak](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/in-the-bears-lodge-1.jpg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
Many climbers observe the voluntary climbing ban at Bear Lodge (Devils Tower) during the month of June as their way to show respect for local Native American cultures. In this Climbing Life piece from Alpinist 57, Nick Mott speaks with Milo Yellowhair from the Oglala Lakota and Arvol Looking Horse, Chief of the Nakota, Dakota and Lakota, and others to learn more about their views on the history.
![[Illustration] Andreas Schmidt](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/alp58-full-value-1.jpg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
In this Full Value story from Alpinist 58, Rick Accomazzo tells the story of a mission he participated in as a member of Yosemite Search and Rescue in July 1975 that has haunted him ever since–its memory compounded by the loss of his friend and climbing partner Tobin Sorenson in 1980. Illustrations by Andreas Schmidt.
![(Book cover) Found: A Life in Mountain Rescue. Bree Loewen. Mountaineers Books, 2017. Paperback, 203 pages, $17.95. [Photo] Courtesy of Mountaineers Books](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/found-book-review-1.jpg?resize=793%2C620&ssl=1)
Bree Loewen’s brilliant memoir, Found: A Life in Mountain Rescue, is a compelling tale of life and death, motherhood and wilderness, rescue and recovery–and a must-read for anyone who travels in the backcountry.
Tommy Caldwell’s autobiography, The Push, is as daring as his multitude of world-class climbing accomplishments, which range from 5.14 and 5.15 sport routes around the world, and towering free ascents on Yosemite’s El Capitan–including the first free ascent of the Dawn Wall (VI 5.14d) in January 2015 with Kevin Jorgeson–to the first completion of the Fitz Roy Traverse in Patagonia with Alex Honnold in 2014. Caldwell’s writing is honest and vulnerable, which makes his moments of triumph even more inspiring.
![The author as a girl on top of Mt. Azimiyeh, a peak she climbed many times with her dad. [Photo] Shirin Shabestari collection](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/tea-song-1.jpeg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
In this Climbing Life story from Alpinist 58, mountaineer Shirin Shabestari writes about her childhood in Iran, where her dad introduced her to snowy peaks that inspired the dreams she continues to follow.
![Leslie Hsu Oh is pictured here with her family at the cliffs of red Lockatong argillite and Brunswick shale along the Tohickon Creek, Pennsylvania. [Photo] Joe Forte](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/saying-something-alp58-1.jpg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
In this Climbing Life story from Alpinist 58, Leslie Hsu Oh takes her kids climbing and observes them learning lessons that took her a lifetime to learn. After Oh lost her birth mother and brother to cancer, her adoptive mother had encouraged her to seek a sense of kinship in the mountains.
![A view of Cerro Trono from the east side of the Cordillera Sarmiento. [Photo] Whitney Clark](https://i0.wp.com/alpinist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/cordillera-sarmiento-5.jpg?resize=930%2C620&ssl=1)
Last March Americans Whitney Clark, Jon Griffin and Tad McCrea ventured into a notoriously wet and seldom-visited coastal region of South America–Patagonia’s Cordillera Sarmiento–in hopes of climbing a peak called Alas de Angel Sur. The approach to their main objective proved too difficult to decipher in the time and weather that they had, but the team still managed to climb another peak by a route they dubbed Estoy Verde (M6 200m). Clark recounts their rain-soaked adventure.
