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G. INESTINE B. ROBERTS AGE 88 YEARS WHO DIED AT TIMBERLINE AFTER HER FOURTEENTH ASCENT OF PIKES PEAK KINNIKINNIK CHAPTER DAUGHTERS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION |
Part I
On Sunday, September 4th, 1955, Inestine B. Roberts took a bus across town to the Manitou Springs Incline. She rode the Incline and then proceeded to hike to Barr Camp where she made it in time for a steak dinner after which she spent the night. The following morning (Labor Day) she continued up the mountain where she spent the night in the summit house. The next morning she started back down the mountain but arrived at the Incline 15 minutes too late to get a ride down. Not wanting to hike down in the dark she spent her 3rd night on the mountain before arriving back at her home. Thus ended the 13th ascent of Pikes Peak for Mrs. Roberts.
No doubt some of you are thinking, “wait a second, Mrs. Roberts died while climbing Pikes Peak.” If you have been on the Barr Trail just few switchbacks past the A-frame and you were still remotely cognoscente while being exposed to such thin air you have no doubt seen the Roberts’ memorial:
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G. INESTINE B. ROBERTS AGE 88 YEARS WHO DIED AT TIMBERLINE AFTER HER FOURTEENTH ASCENT OF PIKES PEAK KINNIKINNIK CHAPTER DAUGHTERS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION |
To me what makes Mrs. Roberts’ story so interesting is that much of what is known about her we know from before that fateful trip because she was a well known and remarkable individual. Her 13th ascent, which this story opened with, took place just 5 days before her 86th birthday. Mrs. Roberts was born in 1869 in Smethport, Pennsylvania. She was the daughter of a lumberman and saw mill operator and often hiked with her father thru the woods and foothills of the Allegheny Mountains which started her passion for hiking and climbing. She was 5 feet tall and weighed 89 pounds. She was a member of the Bird society, the Historical society, the Mineralogical society and was a member of the DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution). She was also a hike leader and member of the Colorado Mountain Club. She was an expert on plant life and knew about 200 different trees. She pointed out that at her age that just meant learning 2 or 3 trees per year.
She claimed to have been sick only one day in her life and that was “way back during the World War I.” She had been living in Colorado Springs for 30 years and during that time had gained quite the reputation as a climber. When she was 78 she scaled Mt. Lincoln and at the age of 82 she scaled the rugged Arapahoe Glacier near Boulder, Colorado. She had four daughters one of whom lived with her. However she was out of town and that is why Mrs. Roberts took off on her 13th climb because as she put it, “there wouldn’t be any objections.” She felt being on the mountain was safer than being on the highways and she “had never been lost more than five minutes in her life.” One of the more interesting things mentioned about her 13th ascent of Pikes Peak was that while at the summit house she said she was given an invitation to spend the night there the following year. “But you know,” she said, “I’m 86 and something can happen anytime.” She was also quoted as saying, “if I live 3 more years I will have a year for every pound.”
Two years later her 14th trip up the mountain at the age of 87 started just like all the rest. It should be noted that Mrs. Roberts was actually 87 when she died, not 88 as listed on the memorial. It gets confusing because her 13th hike was reported after her 86th birthday. However she even wrote in the Barr Camp registry at around 5:45 pm on Saturday, August 3rd, 1957, “Will be 88 September 10, am hiking for the fourteenth time to the top of Pikes Peak.” The story of that hike and of her death will be covered in part two. It’s a story that as one paper put it had “created interest beyond that of ordinary news.”
