John Randall Durrance (July 20, 1912 – November 7, 2003) was a pioneering American

rock climber Rock climbing is a sport in which participants climb up, across, or down natural rock formations. The goal is to reach the summit of a formation or the endpoint of a usually pre-defined route without falling. Rock climbing is a physically and ...

and

mountaineer Mountaineering or alpinism, is a set of outdoor activities that involves ascending tall mountains. Mountaineering-related activities include traditional outdoor climbing, skiing, and traversing via ferratas. Indoor climbing, sport climbing, an ...

. He learned to climb while attending high school in Germany, and later founded the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club in 1936 while attending

Dartmouth College Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native A ...

. Some of his classic first ascents include the North Face of the

Grand Teton Grand Teton is the highest mountain in Grand Teton National Park, in Northwest Wyoming, and a classic destination in American mountaineering. Geography Grand Teton, at , is the highest point of the Teton Range, and the second highest peak in t ...

and the "

Durrance Route The Durrance Route is a climbing route on Devils Tower in Wyoming, United States. First pioneered by Jack Durrance and Harrison Butterworth in September 1938, it was the second free ascent of Devils Tower, following the first ascent led by Fritz ...

" on

Devils Tower Devils Tower (also known as Bear Lodge Butte) is a butte, possibly laccolithic, composed of igneous rock in the Bear Lodge Ranger District of the Black Hills, near Hulett and Sundance in Crook County, northeastern Wyoming, above the Belle F ...

. His successful completion of the Grand's Exum Ridge and West Face, along with his contributions to the development of

bouldering Bouldering is a form of free climbing that is performed on small rock formations or artificial rock walls without the use of ropes or harnesses. While bouldering can be done without any equipment, most climbers use climbing shoes to help sec ...

, stand among his other climbing achievements. On the

1939 American Karakoram expedition to K2 The 1939 American Karakoram expedition to K2 was the unsuccessful second attempt by American mountaineers to climb the then-unclimbed second-highest mountain in the world, K2, following the 1938 reconnaissance expedition. Fritz Wiessner, the l ...

he attempted to climb K2, the second tallest mountain in the world. He became embroiled in controversy after four members of the expedition died and the expedition leader,

Fritz Wiessner Fritz Wiessner (February 26, 1900 – July 3, 1988) was a German American pioneer of free climbing. Born in Dresden, Germany, he immigrated to New York City in 1929 and became a U.S. citizen in 1935. In 1939, he made one of the earliest att ...

, blamed Durrance. A book seeking to shed light on the event, ''K2: The 1939 Tragedy'', was published in 1993. The authors, William Putnam, a former president of the Alpine Club, and Andy Kauffman, a former director, relied on a Durrance diary that surfaced for the first time fifty years after the event to place responsibility for the deaths on Wiessner.

Ed Viesturs Edmund Viesturs (born June 22, 1959) is a high-altitude mountaineer, corporate speaker, and well known author in the mountain climbing community. He is the only American to have climbed all 14 of the world's eight-thousander mountain peaks, and ...

, in his book "K2: Life and Death on the World's Most Dangerous Mountain", revisits all the available documentation and suggest instead that the unplanned decision to decommission all lower camps played a major role in the tragedy. During the 1939 climb, Durrance saved the life of Chap Cranmer who was suffering from

pulmonary edema Pulmonary edema, also known as pulmonary congestion, is excessive edema, liquid accumulation in the parenchyma, tissue and pulmonary alveolus, air spaces (usually alveoli) of the lungs. It leads to impaired gas exchange and may cause hypoxemia an ...

. Mr. Cranmer's family thanked Durrance by getting him an internship with Dr. James J. Waring, an international expert on tuberculosis. Durrance took the internship and later became a pulmonary

physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...

at a

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

hospital. In addition to climbing and medicine another passion of his was hybridizing irises. Durrance died on November 7, 2003, aged 91, survived by his widow, Stella Coulter Durrance and their five children.

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Durrance, Jack 1912 births 2003 deaths American rock climbers American pulmonologists Dartmouth College alumni People from Ocala, Florida American expatriates in Germany