Charles Hessey and David Brower Mountain Films

Is there a way for a non-member, non-historian to view the films? I'm very interested.

<br><br>I assume that Sky checked out the videotapes from the Mountaineers Library. Is that right Sky? Did you have to become a member to do that?<br><br>Chuck and Marion Hessey are important characters in the history book I'm working on. By today's standards, their ski trips were pretty tame. But they shared their experiences on film and devoted themselves to protecting the North Cascades in wilderness areas and parks. Hardly anybody knows about them, but we owe them and their contemporaries a huge debt.

Lowell,<br><br>I did not get the videos from the library. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to watch them with the Hesseys' nephew, Phil. Maybe they are tame in some respects, but it seemed rather clear to me that they were doing something spectacular and quite extraordinary for their time. The video camera they used probably weighed 35 pounds or something like that, right?<br><br>I would certainly agree that we owe them a huge debt, especially considering a few of those videos were produced to show to congressmen and others during the efforts to establish North Cascades National Park and Glacier Peak Wilderness. Thanks Charles and Marion, and all the other folks who helped in such a great effort!

... it seemed rather clear to me that they were doing something spectacular and quite extraordinary for their time.  The video camera they used probably weighed 35 pounds or something like that, right?

<br><br>Chuck used a 16mm film camera. I doubt that any private individuals had video cameras in the 1950s. The videos you saw were transferred from the original 16mm film using funds from the Mountaineers Foundation through a grant to the Mountaineers History Committee. It took me a while to gain Marion's confidence in order to borrow the films and take them to a lab in Seattle. With Phil's help, we finally got it accomplished. Eventually, I hope we can make them more available for viewing, but this is a long and ongoing project.

If you have video tapes of these films, I can transfer them to computer and DVD formats and make a small number of DVD copies for club use. No charge.

I'd buy a set.<br><br>They probably had at least a 15 lb camera, heavy film stock, maybe filters and spare lenses. If the films have sync sound (i.e. not laid-over narration, but what was being heard during filming) then in that era they would have had a beefy "portable" tape deck (synced to the visual with a clapper of some sort - presumably smaller than in the movies, maybe just banging two pieces of gear together), and possibly more impedimentia. Documentary gear didn't get terribly portable and convenient until the early '60s, and even then was nothing like the teeny DV cameras people carry today. Definitely dedicated filmakers - we owe a debt for their sweat.<br><br>In 1956, Ampex was just coming out with it's first giant desktop videotape machine, I'm assuming for reel-to-reel 1" tape but am not positive about that. Lowell is right that you wouldn't have seen one outside of a studio.