Description
The first edition of The Mountain Of My Fear by David Roberts, inscribed by his father, Walter Orr Roberts, to Secretary of State, Robert S. McNamara. Walter Orr Roberts was the founder of the National Center for Atmospheric Research.
Octavo, [4], 157pp. Blue cloth, blindstamp on front cover, title in white on spine. The first printing, with no additional printings noted. Light soiling to cloth, internally clean. Complete with black and white photographs, and three maps (one foldout). In the publisher’s first state dust jacket, $5.95 retail price on the front flap, light sunning to the spine, a near fine example. (Neate, R45)
Signed on the front free endpaper: “To the McNamaras / in appreciation for a memorable evening / Walter Orr Roberts / August 1969.”
The Mountain of My Fear is Roberts’ account of the first ascent of the West Face of Alaska’s Mount Huntington in 1965.
Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara had a lifelong passion for mountaineering. In the 1940’s, he ascended Mount Whitney in California and made it to 18,000 feet on Mount Everest in the 1980’s. His support of the 1963 American Expedition to summit Everest, along with the support of President John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy, was critical to the team’s success.
