Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada

"Represents...the high-water mark of early Far West writing...his greatest moment." -San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 8, 1981
"King's high-altitude exploits...rightly considered a minor classic of American literature." -LA Times, Jul. 12, 1987
"Splendid bit of descriptive writing...must ever remain a fascinating volume for everyone." -Chicago Tribune, Dec. 12, 1902

When Clarence King joined the California Geological Survey it was one of the most ambitious geological surveys ever attempted. What King wrote in his 1874 book "Mountaineering in the
Sierra Nevada" of his explorations in the Sierra Nevada mountains has continued to capture the imagination of Americans for generations.

In introducing his book, King writes:

"The western margin of this continent is built of a succession of mountain chains folded in broad corrugations, like waves of stone upon whose seaward base beat the mild, small breakers of the Pacific.

"By far the grandest of all these ranges is the Sierra Nevada, a long and massive uplift lying between the arid deserts of the Great Basin and the Californian exuberance of grain-field and orchard; its eastern slope, a defiant wall of rock plunging abruptly down to the plain; the western, a long, grand sweep, well watered and overgrown with cool, stately forests; its crest a line of sharp, snowy peaks springing into the sky and catching the alpenglow long after the sun has set for all the rest of America."

About the author:

Clarence Rivers King (January 6, 1842 December 24, 1901) was an American geologist, mountaineer and author. He was the first director of the United States Geological Survey from 1879 to 1881. King was noted for his exploration of the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

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