The Final Spire: ’Mystery Mountain’ Mania in the 1930s

In 1934, four mountaineers from Manitoba piled into their Plymouth and pointed its headlights west to Tatlayoko Lake in British Columbia. Their goal? To conquer B.C.’s tallest mountain. These young adventurers were following in the footsteps of the courageous, sometimes tragic, attempts made by other climbers to summit ＂ Mystery Mountain.＂ But one tantalizing challenge remained: the main tower. This central spire was a nightmarish image for any climber; a sheer column of barren rock encased in ice. But the irresistible allure of ＂ Mystery Mountain＂ electrified the public and the race was on.

While riding a motorcycle across BC for over a decade, Trevor Marc Hughes began writing about the history of his home province. He then developed naturalist Hamilton Mack Laing’s account of his 1915 motorcycle travels across the US for Riding the Continent. In Capturing the Summit, he looked into Laing’s expedition career while he was ＂tail of the kite＂ during one of his greatest adventures, accompanying the mountaineers who made the first ascent of Mount Logan, Canada’s tallest peak. Hughes is currently the non-fiction editor and video segment producer for The British Columbia Review.