Boldering Forums

night bouldering right now. somewhere right now it's nighttime. somewhere there's something to climb.

slater won again today.
it was daytime.

it's good for the sun to seeing you winning. nightime everything goes, no one sees.

woohoo! luvs it.

training on pinches. a little bit robot, a little bit flow.

apparently light is no longer the benchmark.

the theory of relativity may be kaput.

Einstein wept.

amazing eh?

Fall is here. Good temps in daytime.

What is up with that kelly sharma dude?

fall time is school time- so at the desk in the dark, and meetings most evenings and weekends. daylight missions denied.

the night time birds are squawking, bats flap by at the edge of the spotlight. it's an uncanny atmosphere in that little cone of artificial light and intensity.

these MFs keep me from nightbouldering



The Legend of the Mysterious Jackson Whites

FOR MANY YEARS NOW THERE HAVE BEEN STORIES of a degenerate race of people who live an isolated existence in the Ramapo Mountains. As far back as the Revolutionary War, New Jerseyans have heard tales of a group of outcasts who take refuge in the northeastern hills of the state and inbreed to the point of mutation. The group has come to be known as the Jackson Whites.

Most commonly associated with the Ramapo Mountain peoples of Mahwah, Ringwood, and the southern New York state towns of Hillburn and Suffern, the moniker “Jackson Whites” has always been used as a derogatory name. Who the term refers to, and how it has endured until the present, is most likely due to some less than scholarly texts that have transcribed legends as fact.

The document that was probably responsible for solidifying the Jackson Whites’ legend was a 1936 book entitled The Origins of the Jackson Whites of the Ramapo Mountains by John C. Storms. Relying more heavily upon the day’s prevailing mythology than on personal investigation, Storms, a newspaper editor, exercised his penchant toward over embellishment and romanticism. It was Storms’ contention that Tuscarora Indians were the first ingredient in a racial stew of people that would come to be known as Jackson Whites.

The second strain in the Jackson Whites’ bloodline, according to Storms, was contributed by Hessian mercenaries fighting for the British during America’s Revolutionary War.

“With no interest in the outcome of the military struggle, unfamiliar with the theory of ‘liberty’ for which the Americans were fighting, it is not to be wondered at that they proved unfaithful, and deserted the army at every opportunity.

In the fighting that took place in the vicinity of New York City, from the camps scattered throughout this region, and at the marches across New Jersey, these men, known by the general name of Hessians, fled to the nearest place of safety – the Ramapo Mountains. There was no possibility of escape, no opportunity to return to their native land, so they made for themselves homes in their retreat, mated with those they found already there, and reared families.”

The third supposed element in the Jackson Whites’ lineage was derived from English and West Indian Women who were forcibly brought to New York to serve as concubines for British soldiers. In 1783, the stockade of women was evacuated and the prisoners beat a hasty retreat along with British soldiers and Tories.

“Across the Hackensack Meadows, up the Saddle River valley, these derelicts made their way on foot....Pillaging of orchards and deliberate raids on fields and gardens provoked the farmers, who drove the wanderers on with hard words and often with harder blows, all of which was retaliated. No one wanted these unfortunates...

At last, with Oakland past, the crowd entered the Ramapo Pass and soon found itself in a country that, while wild and inhospitable in character, yet offered the boon of peace; there was no one to drive them away.”

It would be escaped slaves, who, according to Storms, would contribute the final piece to the Jackson Whites’ ancestral puzzle.

“…it frequently happened that these escaped slaves would seek their own freedom, and the most accessible place and most secure was the fastness of the Ramapos...These people carried with them names of former masters, white acquaintances, or those that they had adopted. Thus we sometimes find family names among them that are borne by prominent and socially acceptable white persons.”

Subsequent literary references to the Jackson Whites only reinforced the mythology. The famous canine story writer Albert Payson Terhune of Pompton Lakes vilified his mountain dwelling neighbors in his 1925 book, Treasure. And in his epic 1947 poem, "Paterson," William Carlos Williams concocted his own version of the Jackson Whites legacy, drawing obvious inspiration from the Storms history.

The Ramapough Mountain people will tell you a variety of stories to explain their own ancestry, intertwining elements of the Dutch, Hessian, and Tuscarora Indian sagas into their legacy. Most insist they are members of the Ramapough Lenape Indian Nation. They have been petitioning the Federal Government to be recognized as a legitimate American Indian tribe. They have been recognized by the state governments of New Jersey and New York as such, but the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs has denied their petitions.

It is almost certain that the legends of the Jackson Whites were started by the white neighbors of the Ramapos to stereotype the mountain people. While the Ramapough show a fierce pride in their unique identity, you would be hard pressed to find a person in Mahwah, Ringwood, or Hewitt that would call him or herself a Jackson Whites. “Those people,” it would seem, are always to be found just over the next mountain.

Working Dark Fighter. Tis the season.

go night-bouldering now.

<but it's so cold>

<winter is coming>

<climb in the day time instead>

go night bouldering now.

<ok>

oh my i'm going climbing!

first snow falling, just taking its time falling, all the smallest hints of winter.

ok going back out

its rocktober bitch

november- night climbing is still on. so dark right now before the snow falls. some things are constant.

bats have warmer ideas in their minds. they're sleeping. bears are still out and about here.

several dry days still to go.

It's all about night trad climbing. If you can light it up with your lantern(s) you may as well be climbing during the day.