The majority of Squamish residents know what Ed Cooper accomplished in 1961, but what about the last 50 years?This past Saturday, Cooper gave a presentation for the Squamish Mountain Festival as part of the 50th year anniversary of the first ascent of the Stawamus Chief the historical feat Cooper accomplished with his climbing partner Jim Baldwin.At the time, Cooper was just 24-years-old and still not sure what his future held.After earning an engineering degree from the University of Washington, he decided to move away from that career path and start following his passion for climbing.I could never see myself doing that, I just was not interested in that kind of work even though I did OK. Basically every weekend I was climbing it was my avocation when I was going to school. Then when I finally got the degree, I was just going to designate all my time to climbing, Cooper said.By the time he made it to Squamish, climbing wasnt his only interest. Another passion had begun growing.At that point in my life, I was trying to figure out what I was going to do, he said. I was becoming interested in photography and that interest started paralleling my interest in climbing.One year after climbing the Chief, Cooper and Baldwin completed the first outside ascent of El Capitan, a now notorious climb located in Yosemite, California.We were supposed to be at the bottom of the totem pole when we went in there to climb, but I just didnt accept that, said Cooper. They heard about the Chief but we didnt know any of the Yosemite climbers, so we were really kind of the outsiders but that didnt bother me.In time his successful climbs brought some notoriety, landing him commercials with the cigarette company Camel. Cooper rode the wave of success for a couple of years until financial problems caused him to re-think his climbing career.Eventually the money ran out and I got in real dire financial straits. I decided I wasnt going to do any more difficult climbs, I was going to try and sell my photography but it wasnt successful at first, said Cooper. At that point I decided to throw in the towel for a couple of years.Cooper then moved to New York to work at a brokerage firm where he spent two years saving money before moving to San Francisco where he continued to work for the same company for another year. The money he saved and the income brought in by his wife Debby then allowed Cooper to leave his job and get back to what he loved.Finally I decided I cant take this, Im going to quit so I resigned, said Cooper. I had some money saved and I never looked back.From then on I devoted myself to photography, specifically mountain photography.Cooper continued his photography until the recession of the 80s when the Coopers decided they would need a little more income than what the mountain photography could provide. That was when they moved to wine country and started a new business venture.We started our own postcard business of the wine country and became the largest distributor of postcards in the wine country it provided a good living, said Cooper.The Coopers ran the postcard business for 12 years before selling it and retiring, though they kept the photography alive by selling stock photography and, yet again, mountain photography.Coopers focus may have strayed from technical climbing a few years after climbing the Chief, but mountains were always a mainstay whether it was through his photography or just a matter of getting out there.I love what John Muir said, Going to the mountains is going home, he said, so at various times in life I would take off and go to the mountains by myself.For more on Ed Coopers photography, visit www.edcooper.com.
