Glen Dawson received his life membership in Sierra Club in 1921 as a gift from Aurelia Harwood, the Club's first female president and an ardent environmentalist. He was just 9 years old.
He remained the longest-tenured life member in the Club up until his death March 22 at a retirement home in Pasadena. He was 103.
Dawson's connection to the Sierra Club started at birth. His father, Ernest Dawson, was president of Sierra Club from 1935 to '37. The names the elder Dawson chose for his children -- Glen, Muir, Fern and June -- reflected his love of the outdoors and the environmental movement.
Learn more about Glen Dawson in this Sierra Club appreciation.
At 19, Dawson snagged a "first ascent" with a dream team of classic climbers on the East Face of Mt. Whitney on Aug. 16, 1931.
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The first climbers to ascend the East Face of Mt. Whitney (from left): Jules Eichorn, Norman Clyde, Robert L.M. Underhill and Glen Dawson, who was 19 years old. Credit: Francis Farquhar/Glen Dawson Collection, Sierra Club-Angeles Chapter Archives. |
Back-country photographer Ansel Adams snapped this portrait of Dawson (note the Sierra Club pin on his lapel) in Tuolumne Meadows during a 1930 trip to Yosemite National Park.
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Glen Dawon portrait by Ansel Adams, circa 1930. Credit: Glen Dawson Collection, |
In his younger years, Dawson went rock climbing in the local mountains and on high trips to the Sierra Nevada with Sierra Club and honed his skills.
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Glen Dawon leaps a gorge at Soney Point north of Los Angeles in a photo shoot for a Lipton Tea advertisement in 1937. Bill rice (left) and his brother Muir Dawson look on. Credit: Howard Gates/Glen Dawson Collection, Sierra Club-Angeles Chapter Archives |
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| Glen Dawson as a young boy atop a summit cairn on Crafts Peak near Big Bear Lake in 1919. Credit: Glen Dawson Collection, Sierra Club-Angeles Chapter Archives | Dawson climbing Tahquitz Rock in the San Jacinto Mountains circa 1937. Credit: Glen Dawson Collection, Sierra Club-Angeles Chapter Archives |
Dawson went on to have a brilliant career in antiquarian books, another passion he inherited from his father. He and his siblings ran Dawson's Book Shop, once the oldest continuously operating bookstore in L.A. It specialized in rare books on California history, Western Americans and photography as well.
He retained his connection with the Sierra Club Angeles Chapter to the end, recounting stories of his early climbing days and his adventure in the Sierra at numerous events.
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| Glen Dawson, at his retirement home in 2009. |