12 February 1960

Dear Children: - Crellin and Lucy:

I am writing to tell you what happened to me on Saturday 30 January. I have been rather upset during the days since then, so that only now have I felt that I could settle down to writing to you.

On Wednesday 27 January Mama and I drove to Asilomar. We stopped in King City at the ranger station to see Alex Campbell, but found that, because of a misunderstanding about our visit, he was away. He had suggested that we have a talk about the possibility of making a trade of some of our land for some of the Los Padres National Forest land. I left word that we would be at the ranch on Saturday and Sunday, in case that he were to come to see us.

The meeting at Asilomar was a meeting of the Western Spectroscopy Association. I gave a talk on aging and death at the banquet Thursday night, and a talk on theory of the hydrogen bond Friday morning. Then on Friday afternoon Mama and I drove to the ranch.

Saturday morning we planned to have a lunch on the beach. We also discussed the possibility that Alex Campbell would come in, probably a little before noon, as he had done a couple of months ago. I told Mama that I wanted to check some of the lines representing the bounds of the ranch, and I started off, somewhere between half past nine and ten. I said that I probably would try following a contour, but I realized that I had not told Mama exactly where I was going and I was not sure that she had seen me start off toward Salmon Cone. It turned out that she thought that I had gone up above the road, or perhaps toward Soda Spring Creek.

I walked over to China Camp and up the slope to the first ledge. I was interested to discover that this ledge is covered with a shell mound - I judge that the Indians lived here for a long period. Then I climbed up to the second ledge, elevation about a hundred feet - the horizontal pile of big rocks, on which there is a small monument of rocks.

I continued walking toward the east, along the south side of Salmon Cone. I stayed at a level approximately one hundred feet above the beach. I had tried a couple of years ago to get to the mouth of Salmon Creek by following along the beach, and I found that there is a place where the waves beat against the cliff, so that it is not possible to get around the bluff to the mouth of Salmon Creek except perhaps at extremely low tide. I had in mind a possibility that water from Salmon Creek might be brought over to China Camp at about the hundred-foot level, without having to be pumped up to three hundred or four hundred feet to get it over Salmon Cone.

After clambering across some rather big rocks I came to the place where there is a cliff about three hundred feet high rising rather steeply from the beach toward the top of Salmon Cone. I followed a deer trail for a couple of hundred feet. When the deer trail came to an end I saw what looked to be a continuation some twenty or thirty feet higher up, and I scrambled up to it, traversing some loose rock on the way. In this way I got onto a little ledge. I saw that it would be impossible to continue east from this point, because there is a very steep cliff in that direction, without much vegetation. When I looked back, I was unable to see a way of getting back safely. I was afraid to retrace my steps, because I felt that it would be dangerous to go down the slope up which I had scrambled. The loose rock seemed to me to be especially dangerous. I thought about going back and continuing upward, but it seemed to me that I was apt to be stranded in a worse place than the ledge that I was on and it turned out that I was not able to make the effort.

The ledge that I was on was about three feet wide and five or six feet long. There was a rock face behind me, and the ledge was made by a big rock below. There was some loose material on the ledge, dirt and small rock, causing it to slope down. I sat on this ledge for a couple of hours, thinking that Mama would miss me and would probably come along the beach looking for me, and that she could then get the ranger to help get me off the ledge. After a couple of hours I discovered that I could stick my walking stick, which was about four feet long, into the dirt and rock beneath me, and I felt safer when I had done this and held onto it. I then had the idea of making a seat for myself, by digging away some of the dirt and loose rock. Later in the afternoon, when I thought that there was the possibility that I might have to stay there all night, I began digging out the dirt and loose rock to a depth of about a foot, making a little hole, about two feet wide and three feet long. I piled the dirt and loose rock up around the edge of the hole, so that the rim was about eighteen inches above the bottom of the hole.

At about four o'clock I decided that it was necessary for me to leave and to get home, because I was sure that Mama would be very upset by my absence. I was sufficiently frightened so that it was difficult for me to stand up on the ledge, but I succeeded in standing up and taking the first step off the ledge, to a place where a rock about twelve inches in diameter was stuck. The next step would have been on some loose material, and the third step onto a place where the material on the face of the cliff was compacted by a growing bush. I found that it was impossible for me to take the second step, onto the loose material. I judge that I had been frightened by the realization that I had got myself into a place that was not very safe, and that for this reason I was immobilized. About every fifteen minutes, from then on until dark, I stood up and attempted to leave the ledge; but each time I found that I was unable to do so, and when it began to get dark I decided that I would have to stay on the ledge overnight.

The dirt in the bottom of the hole that I had dug was somewhat damp, and I pulled up several bushes that were growing near the ledge. I stopped pulling up bushes when I pulled on one that I could just reach, directly above me, and dislodged a large rock, about a foot in largest diameter, which then caught in the bush and remained there from then on. I broke up some of the bushes into twigs, to make a sort of mattress underneath me, and kept two or three to put over me. They turned out to be unsatisfactory, however, because they were in the main bare of leaves, and later in the night I broke them up and put them under me. During the night parts of the bushes got inside my clothes, and I pulled out some handfuls of twigs.

I decided that I should stay awake all night, I was afraid that if I went to sleep and then wakened suddenly I might fall off the ledge. Also, I decided that I should keep moving, in order to keep warm. From that time on I kept moving one arm or one leg all of the time. It was not a very cold night, and I did not get really chilled.

I lay on my back or one side in this little hole, at first with a couple of bushes over me. Then I unfolded my map of the Burro Mountain quadrangle, about twenty-four by twenty-seven inches, and placed it over me. It seemed to help considerably in keeping me warm.

Time went by very slowly. I put in much of my time watching the motion of the stars during a period of about five hours when the stars were visible. It was cloudy or foggy from sundown until about ten P.M. and from 3 A.M. until perhaps noon the next day.

In the meantime Mama had not got worried until late afternoon. At about 5:30 P.M. she went to the ranger station and telephoned Barclay. The Ranger made a tour around Salmon Cone at about 7 P.M. He was perhaps a hundred fifty feet above me. I saw his light and could hear his shout, but he did not hear my shouts. I did not have matches with me, nor any tool except my Swiss knife. I had slacks, a cotton shirt, and a light corduroy jacket on, also my corduroy cap.

At 11:30 P.M. Lieutenant E.R. Thornburn, Deputy Sheriff from Monterey, came. He said that nothing should be done until the next morning. There were some men whom the ranger had got who were looking about, but they stopped at that time. Barclay came at 2:30 A.M., and immediately looked along the cliff toward Soda Spring Creek. Then he slept from 4 to 6 A.M., and then looked along the beach toward Soda Spring Creek, and later went to the upper ranch. I did not see or hear any of the dozen men looking about until 9:45, when a young man named Terry Currence came along the beach below me. When I called to him he scrambled up to the ledge, and called to the deputy sheriff, who was coming around Salmon Cone at a level perhaps fifty feet higher than the ledge. He came over to the ledge, and sent Mr. Currence on up the cliff, to take word to Mama that I was all right. He also said to have some ropes brought over. Then, after a few minutes, he said that he thought that we should try to get out without the aid of ropes, because the cliff continues for perhaps a hundred fifty feet above the ledge. I was skeptical, but agreed to try. We moved toward the west and up the face of the cliff, following a course that I would have been afraid to tackle alone. This brought us out near the top of Salmon Cone, and we then cut across toward the cabin.

I found that Mama was very much upset by her long wait, and the uncertainty as to what had happened to me. We stayed at the cabin that day, and then drove back to Pasadena on Monday. I thought that I was in good shape, and on Tuesday I went to the laboratory, with the intention of giving my lecture on the nature of the chemical bond. I found, however, that I was unable to talk to my secretary when I arrived, and unable to give the lecture. I went home, and stayed in bed for several days. I apparently was suffering from slight shock, the after effect of my fright on the cliff. I also began to suffer from a very severe case of poison-oak dermatitis, which is still bad, two weeks after the episode.

I made several mistakes. One of them was to have rushed forward in an over-exuberant and light-hearted way, across a somewhat dangerous stretch of cliff, onto a ledge, without having considered the question of how to get back from the ledge. A second was that I did not tall Mama exactly what I was planning to do. I do not think that my staying on the ledge overnight was a mistake, because it seems to have been beyond my decision; I had got frightened enough so that I was unable to leave the ledge. I am very sorry that I caused you and Mama so much anguish and concern.

Much love from

Daddy

Congratulations on the biochem. exam.