Climber’s Paradise: Making Canada’s Mountain Parks, 1906–1974

By PearlAnn Reichwein, University of Alberta Press

This fascinating, well-researched and engagingly-written book is one of the few attempts to put climbing in a broader cultural context. We’re al l used to reading climbing epics, jour nals, guidebooks and instr uctional manuals and coming up with a r ich picture of mountaineering. Using the case of the Alpine Club of Canada’s role in the founding of the western Canadian park system, Reichwein shows that mountaineering and not just mountain appreciation led to the for mation of Parks and contr ibuted to a national view of nature and ecolog y. There’s a lot of enter taining detail here (when the Alpine Club volunteered to train Canadian mountain troops, members had to use their own equipment) and some intr iguing commentar y about how social change altered the Rockies. It would have been interesting, however, to hear Reichwein discuss how Parks Canada came to be decided ly anti-climbing east of the Rockies. In any case, this is a highly infor mative, entertaining and attractive volume recommended for anyone who wants more insight into the histor y of Canadian climbing.–