Rodney Lanier - A History
written by Ron Funderburke
Rodney Lanier first began to climb in North Carolina in 1970's, when the sport was still in its general infancy, the lone prerogative of an isolated clan. Mentors were hard to come by, and rambunctious locals might have been as likely to blast beer cans off fence posts as rock climb. Rodney's pastimes were as inauspicious as the next young man's until he tried rappelling, getting a precocious glimpse of the way an adequately audacious character could dangle himself from a precipitous place. One might call it fortuity or serendipity that led him to Crowders Mountain to 'go rappelling', because he barely left that cliff for the next five years. The baking cliffs were the fires that forged him, where he met his first climbing partners, pushed difficulty climbing, dialed in the Burn Crack, and climbed his first 5.12. Crowders attracted more than just locals; the inimitable Doug Reed arrived on the scene, asking why no climber had bothered to lead any of the steep quartzite faces they had been toproping for years. As he would do in every area in the Southeast he visited, Reed challenged the prevailing standards, climbed harder than the world had ever seen anyone climb anything, and supercharged Rodney Lanier and others to take the sharp end to new stone. Rumbling Bald was one of the first places they starting doing so.
The Bald was plumb virgin territory in the early 80's when Rodney made his first forays through the steep duff, poison ivy, and boulder fields. He wandered up gritty faces, pushing untrod lines, tottering through loose blocks, hanging vegetation, and nests of unsavory fauna. It is hard for the modern climber to understand those pioneering ascents. There were no rap stations to make it to, no trails to follow, no chalk on any holds for a 50 mile radius. Climbers stomped through dense forest and thicket to reach the boulder field, warming up on problems a decade before the first manufactured-pad-toting-boulderer would begin to claim 'first ascents'. The slope to the base of the climbs was crumbling scree, leaf debris, and a coven of vampiric chiggers. Climber's were psyched just to arrive at the rock, and pushing first ascents was a sojourn from the dust, and the dander, and the duff, a way to sit in the breeze and just breath some fresh air.
As the years trickled by, climbers like Rodney filled in the gaps in the crag, pounded down reliable trails, scribbled topos and route descriptions. A visit to Rumbling Bald became less of an ardor and more of a pleasure. Even though his climbing ticklists at Crowders and Rumbling Bald suggest the contrary, Rodney never had an appetite for difficulty climbing or first ascents. Climbing was, and remains, about special friendships, camaraderie, and the joy of moving over the stone. So, the years and climbs and crags are peppered with Rodney's deeds and first ascents, but he's the most prolific climber no one has ever heard of. He's unflappably self-assured and "credit" for the climbs has never concerned him. But all climbers at Rumbling Bald can rest assured, before the first guide book authors collated data, and drawings, and topos, Rodney wrote his own guidebooks, circulating them among friends. Before the first boulderers started naming problems, Rodney was goofing around and warming up in the boulderfield. And long before modern climbers claimed the crag, Rodney and his partners had been pushing obvious lines of weakness from the very bottom to the very top.
Today, Rodney is a local climbing instructor and still an avid climber. But, his values are the same as they were thirty years ago. Above all, he values companionship, the incomparable bond in a climbing partnership. He's had many partners over the years, and it has always been the partners and the friendships that mark the epochs of his career. He remembers first ascents like Guppies in the Mist, Friday the 13th, and Call of the Wild, with the same fondness as Bee Line. It would never matter to Rodney that a climb is 5.11hard or R/X bold or 5.5 easy or PG/G casual. The line never has been, and never will be, the most important thing to Rodney. His friendships were the remarkable parts of each of those climbs, an insatiable desire to enjoy great rock climbs with great companions; it just so happens that some of those rock climbs are the most remarkable and audacious first ascents at the crag. For Rodney, the faces of friends shine in his memory, with historic vividness, while the faces they climbed together blur into a seamless mash of exhilaration, natural beauty, and an inexplicable desire to get back to the mountains as frequently as possible.
Ron Funderburke, 2012
Tick off these Lanier-pioneered lines:
Lanier Solo, 5.4X
Waiting for Ben, 5.5
I’m Gumbie Damnit, 5.6
Return of the Snark, 5.7
Dirty Jugs, 5.7
Ivy League, 5.7
Paul’s Boutique, 5.8
Seven and Seven, 5.9+
Nameless Face, 5.9+
Beeline, 5.9+
Gumbies in the Roof, 5.10
Trick or Feet, 5.10a
Guppies in the Mist, 5.10d
R and B Bulge, 5.10d
Seven Year Itch, 5.11a
Call of the Wild, 5.11b
Friday the 13th, 5.11c