Jim Bridwell

This is pretty special: the last interview of the Bird, conducted by John Long.

Below is our annual tribute to Climbers We Lost, here honoring those who left us in 2018. The climbers range in age from 20 to 96. Some people broke our hearts by leaving much too soon. Some lived long and at least died naturally. Climbers We Lost has in the six years since inception become an affirmation of how meaningful our endeavor is and how important our identities as climbers are to us. This year one young contributor, Danika Hill, in contacting us about her friend Haley Royko, 25, wrote, "Climbing was her life's joy, and she told me in 2015 that when she passed, she wanted to be included in your annual tribute. It is actually the only dying wish she made of me, and I want to make sure it happens." Each year we are concerned to think that we will inadvertently leave out some people. We encourage you to use the comments field to add photos and remembrances of others.

A select (not exhaustive!) timeline of many of the major moments in the history of free climbing on the Big Stone.

R&I Editor Francis Sanzaro introduces the El Cap Free issue with a look at why El Cap still matters.

The Bird looks back on growing up, the Valley and bigger things.

On February 16, Jim “The Bird” Bridwell, captain of numerous El Cap voyages of physical and psychological expansion, inventor, writer, thinker and fashion setter died of complications from hepatitis C. He was 73.

Cast by chance into the frenzy of a dramatic Yosemite rescue, the author confronts his youthful fears head-on.

No one has helped shape climbing more than Jim Bridwell. Now nearly 70, the pioneer has turned his creative ambitions toward something even loftier.

I had never kissed a girl, so when a naked one came up to me and started asking questions about the climb I had just tried, I was a little thrown. Painfully shy, I’d always wondered how I would ever ask a girl to go climbing, and now a naked one was here asking me if I knew of a place where she could learn.