Mount George Davis

[tekewin]

Mount George Davis (12,691') is the high point between the north fork of Bishop Creek and Wonder Lakes in the John Muir Wilderness. It's on the south side of the Piute Pass Trail across from Mount Emerson. I noticed it recently when my wife and I hiked to Piute Pass and when I looked it up, I found a wild and ongoing fight over the name. More on that later. I went back last week to climb it, starting at the North Lake trailhead outside of Bishop. I started on the Lamarck Lakes trail and reached Lower Lamarck Lake in about 2 miles. Mt. George Davis was visible from there. I followed a fisherman's trail around the north side of the lake, then other informal trails to the Wonder Lakes. At the third Wonder Lake, I crossed over to find a way through low cliffs. Above the cliffs, I started up a difficult scree slope. It had a 40-50 degree angle and I tended to the stay near boulders and trees that could assist.






From the third Wonder Lake


Scree slope, steeper than it looks here


Final approach

After a slog up the scree, I took a break below the final scramble to the summit. I ascended the most prominent gully. With minimal route finding, it stayed class 2. At the top, the summit was a short hop. With perfect weather, views were sublime. I had a front row view of Mt. Humphries and Mt. Emerson. Most of the Wonder Lakes were visible as well as the lakes along the Pass trail. The Sierra Club has called this peak George Davis since the 1940s. I located the register in a metal box and found it titled Mt. Thoreau. Inside the front cover was an excerpt from a book written by a group of mountaineers to argue for the name change. I found it quite interesting, though I have no preference on the name.

Here is what various entities call it as of 9/6/2024:
USGS: Peak 12691
Sierra Club: Mt. George Davis
Garmin: Mt. Thoreau
Mountaineers for Thoreau: Mt. Thoreau
Peakbagger: Mt. George Davis
Summitpost: Mt. George Davis
Open Street Map: Mt. Thoreau

After signing in, I took photos and flew the drone at the highest elevation I had attempted. With little wind, it performed admirably. I spent about 30 minutes total on the summit. It looked like the side to Piute Pass might also go as class 2, but I couldn't see all the way down. When I got off the summit, my pole was standing right where I left it. The descent was uneventful, though I stumbled down a slightly different way on the low cliffs and around the lakes. I was back to the trail before I saw anyone else.


Humphries from George Davis summit












Mt. Emerson (gray) and Piute Crags (red)

[Sean]

Thanks for the report! There's always the third, and least controversial option for a name. We could call it "Mount Marilyn Monroe." Wouldn't that be something?

[tekewin]

Here is Bob Burd's report: https://www.snwburd.com/bob/trip_report ... vis_1.html

He was clearly on the side of the Sierra Club, but he got a long comment from one of the group who lobbied for the name change so you can get both perspectives.

I like this peak whatever the name, haha.

[dima]

OSM has gone back/forth a few times too: https://www.openstreetmap.org/node/7931873046/history

It looks like there's one person that's pushing the "Thoreau" thing: Stan Robinson. He wrote a long email about it, posted to Bob Burd's report. And the OSM change to rename it to Mt Thoreau references separately his book and his trip report as justification. AND due to the fact that Thoreau was a dilettante hermit, I'm on team George Davis!

And oh yeah, cool trip and photos

[dima]

And the book in the register (in your photo) references the same dude's website! I'm not sure this effort has quite the wide grassroots support that appears at first glance.

[tekewin]

I uncovered this comment on summitpost.org that takes Bob Burd to task for defacing the register. Hiker drama.

https://www.summitpost.org/mount-thorea ... 91/1047112

[David R]

This guy takes it over the top calling destroying registers a crime. There are plenty of people that argue the registers are the crimes and have no business being in wilderness areas. The Sierra Club registers are bolted to the rock quite often. I don't care either way and most of these peaks named after people is a vanity project anyway. I would be fine if every peak was just named by its elevation.

[HikeUp]

Nice trip. Nice pics. Thanks!

Reminds of the days (15-20 years ago) when "Georgey Porridgey" was roaming the San Gabriels posting nasty notes in the registers. He apparently wasn't a fan of the Sierra Club. Though he didn't seem to mind the actual registers since he used them to get his message (whatever that was) out.

This was in the Bighorn Peak register July 2008...

[David R]

I remember the Mars Bonfire and George Wysup controversy. There was a lot of conversation about what constituted sumitting a peak as some HPS peaks required third class climbing. They were so worried about finishing lists and the conventional opinion was getting to the bottom of a climb was a summit in order to allow certain elderly or scared hikers to finish the list. I think Mars was a bit warmer and fuzzy when leading and there may have been a bit of jealousy as he was on his way to hiking every peak on HPS 25 times.