The Rucksack Club was founded in

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...

in 1902 and has a current membership of well over 500 men and women. According to the Rules, "The purpose of the Club is to encourage mountaineering, climbing and hill walking and bring together all those who are interested in these pursuits."

History

The Rucksack Club was formed in Manchester in 1902 by a group of men who responded to a letter written to a newspaper by two young men. They were invited to a meeting and resolved there and then to form a club with the object "To facilitate walking tours and mountaineering expeditions, both in the British Isles and elsewhere, and to particularly to initiate members into the science of rock climbing and snowcraft". The Club has long been active in

Mountain Rescue Mountain rescue refers to search and rescue activities that occur in a mountainous environment, although the term is sometimes also used to apply to search and rescue in other wilderness environments. This tends to include mountains with tech ...

, Eustace Thomas designing the Thomas Stretcher which was in use by Mountain Rescue teams for many years. Members

Fred Pigott Alfred Sefton "Fred" Pigott (1895 – 28 July 1979) was a leading English rock climber of the 1920s and 1930s. Personal life Fred Pigott attended Manchester Grammar School and in World War I joined the Royal Fusiliers. While serving as a sniper ...

and Noel Kirkman received OBEs for services to mountain rescue.

Huts

The Club owns three huts: Beudy Mawr at the heart of the Llanberis Pass, High Moss in the Duddon Valley at the foot of the

Walna Scar Walna Scar is a hill in the English Lake District, lying just south of a pass of the same name in the Coniston Hills. Its summit at is only slightly higher than the pass. Walna Scar is the highest of Wainwright's '' The Outlying Fells of Lak ...

track over to Coniston, and Craigallan looking out over Loch Linnhe within easy reach of Glencoe.

Notable members

* Eustace Thomas * Ernest A. Baker *

Chris Brasher Christopher William Brasher CBE (21 August 1928 – 28 February 2003) was a British track and field athlete, sports journalist and co-founder of the London Marathon. Early life and education Born in Georgetown, British Guiana, Brasher went t ...

Dennis Davis Dennis Davis (August 28, 1949 – April 6, 2016) was an American drummer and session musician best known for his work with David Bowie, playing on ten albums - including seven successive studio albums - during the singer's classic mid- and lat ...

* J. Rooke Corbett * John Sumner

Notable "firsts" by members

*First Briton to climb all alpine 4000m peaks: Eustace Thomas *First ascent of

Nuptse Nuptse or Nubtse ( Sherpa: नुबचे, Wylie: Nub rtse, ) is a mountain in the Khumbu region of the Mahalangur Himal, in the Nepalese Himalayas. It lies two kilometres WSW of Mount Everest. Nubtse is Tibetan for "west peak", as it is the ...

1961: Dennis Davis

Bibliography

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External links

Rucksack Club homepage

Rucksack Club Blog

References

Climbing clubs in the United Kingdom Climbing organizations 1902 establishments in England Organisations based in Manchester {{Climbing-stub