Yvon Chouinard (born November 9, 1938) is an American rock climber, environmentalist, philanthropist and outdoor industry businessman. His company,

Patagonia Patagonia () refers to a geographical region that encompasses the southern end of South America, governed by Argentina and Chile. The region comprises the southern section of the Andes Mountains with lakes, fjords, temperate rainforests, and gl ...

, is known for its commitment to protecting the environment. Chouinard is also a surfer, kayaker, and falconer and is particularly fond of '' tenkara'' fly-fishing.''Fly Rod and Reel'' magazine, "Simple Gifts", by Yvon Chouinard, Oct/Nov '09 He has written about climbing issues and ethics and on mixing

environmentalism Environmentalism or environmental rights is a broad philosophy, ideology, and social movement regarding concerns for environmental protection and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seek ...

and business.

Early life

Chouinard's father was a

French-Canadian French Canadians (referred to as Canadiens mainly before the twentieth century; french: Canadiens français, ; feminine form: , ), or Franco-Canadians (french: Franco-Canadiens), refers to either an ethnic group who trace their ancestry to Fr ...

handyman, mechanic, and plumber. In 1947, Yvon and his family moved from

Lewiston, Maine Lewiston (; ; officially the City of Lewiston, Maine) is List of cities in Maine, the second largest city in Maine and the most central city in Androscoggin County, Maine, Androscoggin County. The city lies halfway between Augusta, Maine, August ...

to Southern California. They were

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

. His early climbing partners included

Royal Robbins Royal Robbins (February 3, 1935 – March 14, 2017) was one of the pioneers of American rock climbing. After learning to climb at Tahquitz Rock, he went on to make first ascents of many big wall routes in Yosemite. As an early proponent of bolt ...

and

Tom Frost Thomas "Tom" M. Frost (June 30, 1936 – August 24, 2018) was an American rock climber known for big wall climbing first ascents in Yosemite Valley. He was also a photographer and climbing equipment manufacturer. Frost was born in Hollywood, Cal ...

.Yvon Chouinard, , Outside Online
A

Sierra Club The Sierra Club is an environmental organization with chapters in all 50 United States, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. The club was founded on May 28, 1892, in San Francisco, California, by Scottish-American preservationist John Muir, who be ...

member, in his youth he founded the Southern California Falconry Club, and it was his investigations of

falcon Falcons () are birds of prey in the genus ''Falco'', which includes about 40 species. Falcons are widely distributed on all continents of the world except Antarctica, though closely related raptors did occur there in the Eocene. Adult falcons ...

aeries that led him to rock climbing. To save money, and make adaptations for the way he was climbing, he decided to make his own climbing tools, teaching himself blacksmithing, and eventually started a business.

Yosemite rock climber to leading alpinist

Chouinard was one of the leading climbers of the "Golden Age of Yosemite Climbing." He was one of the protagonists of the film made about this era: ''

Valley Uprising Sender Films is an American film production company based in Boulder, Colorado. Productions include outdoor adventure films, television shows, and commercials. Company Sender Films integrates action with story-telling to create climbing ...

'' (2014). He participated in the first ascent of the North America Wall in 1964 (with

and Chuck Pratt), using no fixed ropes. The next year, his and TM Herbert's ascent of the Muir Wall on El Capitan improved the style of previous first ascents. Chouinard became the most articulate advocate of the importance of style, the basis of modern rock climbing. In 1961, he visited Western Canada with

Fred Beckey Friedrich Wolfgang Beckey (14 January 1923 – 30 October 2017), known as Fred Beckey, was an American rock climber, mountaineer and book author, who in seven decades of climbing achieved hundreds of first ascents of the tallest peaks and best ro ...

, and made several important first ascents, including the North Face of

Mount Edith Cavell Mount Edith Cavell is a mountain located in the Athabasca River and Astoria River valleys of Jasper National Park, and the most prominent peak entirely within Alberta. The mountain was named in 1916 for Edith Cavell, a British nurse executed ...

(

Rockies The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico in ...

), the Beckey-Chouinard Route on South Howser Tower in the Bugaboos (

Purcell Mountains The Purcell Mountains are a mountain range in southeastern British Columbia, Canada. They are a subrange of the Columbia Mountains, which includes the Selkirk, Monashee, and Cariboo Mountains. They are located on the west side of the Rocky Mounta ...

), and the North Face of

Mount Sir Donald Mount Sir Donald is a mountain summit located in the Rogers Pass area of Glacier National Park in the Selkirk Mountains of British Columbia, Canada. Its good rock quality and classic Matterhorn shape make it popular for alpine rock climbers, ...

(

Selkirk Mountains The Selkirk Mountains are a mountain range spanning the northern portion of the Idaho Panhandle, eastern Washington, and southeastern British Columbia which are part of a larger grouping of mountains, the Columbia Mountains. They begin at Mica Pe ...

). These climbs opened his eyes to the idea of applying Yosemite big-wall climbing techniques to mountain climbing, and his advocacy was important to modern, high-grade alpinism. Also in 1961, he visited

Shawangunk Ridge The Shawangunk Ridge , also known as the Shawangunk Mountains or The Gunks, is a ridge of bedrock in Ulster County, Sullivan County and Orange County in the state of New York, extending from the northernmost point of the border with New Jersey ...

for the first time, freeclimbing the first pitch of Matinee (the hardest free climb done at Shawangunk Ridge at the time); and introducing

chrome-molybdenum steel 41xx steel is a family of SAE steel grades, as specified by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE). Alloying elements include chromium and molybdenum, and as a result these materials are often informally referred to as chromoly steel (common va ...

pitons to the area, which revolutionized climbing protection. In 1968, he climbed Cerro Fitzroy in

by a new route (The Californian Route, 3rd overall ascent of the mountain) with Dick Dorworth, Chris Jones, Lito Tejada-Flores and

Douglas Tompkins Douglas Rainsford Tompkins (March 20, 1943 – December 8, 2015) was an American businessman, conservationist, outdoorsman, philanthropist, filmmaker, and agriculturalist. He co-founded the North Face Inc, Esprit and various environmental grou ...

. Chouinard has also traveled and climbed in the European Alps and in Pakistan.

Chouinard Equipment, Ltd.

In 1957, he bought a second-hand coal-fired forge, and started making hardened steel

piton A piton (; also called ''pin'' or ''peg'') in climbing is a metal spike (usually steel) that is driven into a crack or seam in the climbing surface using a climbing hammer, and which acts as an anchor for protecting the climber against the ...

s for use in

Yosemite Yosemite National Park ( ) is an American national park in California, surrounded on the southeast by Sierra National Forest and on the northwest by Stanislaus National Forest. The park is managed by the National Park Service and covers an ar ...

Valley. Between time spent surfing and climbing, he sold pitons out of the back of his car to support himself. The improved pitons were a big factor in the birth of big-wall climbing from 1957 to 1960 in Yosemite. The success of his pitons caused him to found Chouinard Equipment, Ltd. In the late 1960s, Chouinard and business partner

began studying ice climbing equipment, and re-invented the basic tools (

crampons A crampon is a traction device that is attached to footwear to improve mobility on snow and ice during ice climbing. Besides ice climbing, crampons are also used for secure travel on snow and ice, such as crossing glaciers, snowfields and ice ...

and ice axes) to perform on steeper ice. These new tools and his book ''Climbing Ice'' (1978) started the modern sport of ice climbing. Around 1970, he became aware that the use of steel pitons made by his company was causing significant damage to the cracks of Yosemite. These pitons composed 70 percent of his income. In 1971 and 1972, Chouinard and Frost introduced new aluminum chockstones, called Hexentrics and Stoppers, along with the less successful steel Crack-n-Ups, and committed the company to the advocacy of the new tools and a new style of climbing called "

clean climbing Clean climbing is rock climbing techniques and equipment which climbers use in order to avoid damage to the rock. These techniques date at least in part from the 1920s and earlier in England, but the term itself may have emerged in about 1970 dur ...

." This concept revolutionized rock climbing and led to further success of the company, despite cannibalizing the sales of pitons, formerly his most important product. They applied for a U.S. patent on Hexentrics in 1974, and it was granted on April 6, 1976. These are still manufactured by

Black Diamond Equipment Black Diamond Equipment is a manufacturer of equipment for climbing, skiing, and mountain sports, based in Utah, United States. The company also has a global office in Innsbruck, Austria. The company is owned by Clarus Corporation, which also o ...

. In the latter 1960s, Chouinard attempted a number of significant technological and technique changes to ice climbing after trips to the Alps in Europe and Sierra Nevada ice gullies in autumn. He removed the flex from crampons, making them more rigid for front-pointing. He drew the taper of a rock hammer into a point for better ice purchase. He increased the cross section of ice screws while also using lighter materials. He experimented with pick and blade issues with ice axes. Prior to this, much of ice climbing was seen as mere step cutting. He attempted to replace hand ice picks (climbing type) with a small ice axe head called a Climaxe. In 1989, Chouinard Equipment, Ltd. filed for bankruptcy protection in order to protect it from liability lawsuits. The hard assets of Chouinard Equipment, Ltd. were acquired by its employees through the

Chapter 11 Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code (Title 11 of the United States Code) permits reorganization under the bankruptcy laws of the United States. Such reorganization, known as Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is available to every business, wheth ...

process, and the company was reestablished as

, Ltd.

Patagonia and environmentalism

Chouinard is most known for founding the clothing and gear company

. Chouinard started to sell clothes by chance as a way to support his moderately profitable equipment business. In 1970 on a trip to Scotland, he purchased some rugby shirts and sold them with great success. From this small start, the Patagonia company developed a wide selection of rugged technical clothing. According to Chouinard, the intent of Patagonia is to make clothes for people under the rugged, southern Andes/Cape Horn conditions of places like Patagonia. Recognizing that the financial success of the company provided the opportunity to also achieve personal goals, Chouinard committed the company to being an outstanding place to work, and to be an important resource for environmental activism. In 1984, Patagonia opened an on-site cafeteria offering "healthy, mostly vegetarian food," and started providing on-site child care. In 1986, Chouinard committed the company to "

tithing A tithing or tything was a historic English legal, administrative or territorial unit, originally ten hides (and hence, one tenth of a hundred). Tithings later came to be seen as subdivisions of a manor or civil parish. The tithing's leader or s ...

" for environmental activism, committing one percent of sales or ten percent of profits, whichever is the greater. The commitment included paying employees working on local environmental projects so they could commit their efforts full-time. In the early 1990s, an environmental audit of Patagonia revealed the surprising result (at the time), that corporate

cotton Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus ''Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor perce ...

, although it was a natural material, had a heavy environmental footprint. In 1996, Chouinard committed the company to using all organic cotton. In 2002, Yvon Chouinard founded 1% for the Planet and Patagonia became the first business to commit 1% of annual sales to the environment. In 2014, Patagonia supported the advocacy documentary film ''

DamNation Damnation (from Latin '' damnatio'') is the concept of divine punishment and torment in an afterlife for actions that were committed, or in some cases, not committed on Earth. In Ancient Egyptian religious tradition, citizens would recite th ...

'', which is about changing attitudes in America towards its dams. Chouinard was the executive producer of the film, and he was also featured in the film commenting about dams. In 2018, in acknowledgment that sustainability and responsible practices are core to Patagonia, Yvon Chouinard was recognized with the

's top award, the John Muir Award. In 2022, Chouinard announced that he was donating ownership in Patagonia to a

trust Trust often refers to: * Trust (social science), confidence in or dependence on a person or quality It may also refer to: Business and law * Trust law, a body of law under which one person holds property for the benefit of another * Trust (bus ...

to ensure profits are used for addressing

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

Personal life

In 1971, Chouinard met and married his wife, Malinda Pennoyer, who was an art and home economics student at

California State University, Fresno California State University, Fresno (Fresno State) is a public university in Fresno, California. It is one of 23 campuses in the California State University system. The university had a fall 2020 enrollment of 25,341 students. It offers bachelo ...

. They have a son (Fletcher) and a daughter (Claire). In 2021, Yvon Chouinard received an honorary degree from Bates College.

Publications

* * * *Chouinard, Yvon; Mathews, Craig; Mazzo, Mauro (2014) ''Simple Fly Fishing: Techniques for Tenkara and Rod & Reel.'' Patagonia Books.

Notable ascents

* 1961 ''North Face'',

Canadian Rockies The Canadian Rockies (french: Rocheuses canadiennes) or Canadian Rocky Mountains, comprising both the Alberta Rockies and the British Columbian Rockies, is the Canadian segment of the North American Rocky Mountains. It is the easternmost part ...

(First ascent with

and Dan Doody). * 1962 ''Northeast Face'', Disappointment Peak,

Teton Range The Teton Range is a mountain range of the Rocky Mountains in North America. It extends for approximately in a north–south direction through the U.S. state of Wyoming, east of the Idaho state line. It is south of Yellowstone National Park and ...

, Wyoming. (IV 5.9 A3) First ascent with

. * 1964 ''North American Wall'',

El Capitan El Capitan ( es, El Capitán; "the Captain" or "the Chief") is a vertical Rock formations in the United States, rock formation in Yosemite National Park, on the north side of Yosemite Valley, near its western end. The El Capitan Granite, granit ...

Yosemite Valley Yosemite Valley ( ; ''Yosemite'', Miwok for "killer") is a U-shaped valley, glacial valley in Yosemite National Park in the western Sierra Nevada (U.S.), Sierra Nevada mountains of Central California. The valley is about long and deep, surroun ...

– (VI 5.8 A5 3000') – First ascent with

and Chuck Pratt. * 1965 ''Muir Wall'', El Capitan, Yosemite Valley – (VI 5.10 A3) – First ascent with TM Herbert, June 1965. * 1968 ''Southwest Ridge'' aka ''California Route'', Cerro Fitzroy,

First ascent of route with

Doug Tompkins Douglas Rainsford Tompkins (March 20, 1943 – December 8, 2015) was an American businessman, conservationist, outdoorsman, philanthropist, filmmaker, and agriculturalist. He co-founded the North Face Inc, Esprit and various environmental grou ...

, Lito Tejada-Flores, Chris Jones and Dick Dorworth, 3rd ascent of peak. * 1975 ''Diamond Couloir'' (direct finish)

Mount Kenya Mount Kenya (Kikuyu: ''Kĩrĩnyaga'', Kamba, ''Ki Nyaa'') is the highest mountain in Kenya and the second-highest in Africa, after Kilimanjaro. The highest peaks of the mountain are Batian (), Nelion () and Point Lenana (). Mount Kenya is locat ...

Kenya ) , national_anthem = "Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"() , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Nairobi , coordinates = , largest_city = Nairobi , ...

. First ascent of direct finish with Michael Covington, January 1975.

References

Other sources *

External links

Outdoor Business Pioneer Yvon Chouinard (NPR interview with Yvon Chouinard)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chouinard, Yvon Living people American billionaires American mountain climbers American rock climbers American environmentalists American people of French-Canadian descent Stanford University alumni 1938 births People from Lewiston, Maine Sportspeople from Maine American company founders American Catholics