Blog

Support for Layton Kor’s Family

• April 2013
• Climb Travel

(photo from Cameron Burns)
On April 21, Layton Kor died peacefully among his family in Kingman, Arizona, at age 74. It was too young, and though he’d been struggling with health problems for several years, I was not expecting him to leave so soon. His lengthy illness generated significant medical expenses.

A lot of Layton’s medical expenses were not covered by insurance, something which made his last years more difficult than I wish they had been. Now his wife, Karen, and son, Arlan, are both grieving and trying to figure out how to pay those bills. I hope the climbing community will rally around Layton’s family, and help them to handle their enormous loss. We’ve set up a youcaring donation site in order to allow the community to help with the costs they are confronted with, and to honor Layton’s legacy by helping his family–and quite simply, to say thanks to one of the greatest pioneers of the sport we love so much.

As a young climber, passionate about the Utah desert, the Longs Peak Diamond, Yosemite, and later on, the Italian Dolomites, the stories and photos I saw of Layton Kor inspired me like no one else ever had or has since. I was fortunate enough to become friends with him a few years ago, and he was every bit as passionate, thoughtful and simply lovely as I could have dreamed he would be. I made a habit of calling him on my cell phone whenever I was on top of Castleton Tower, and we would talk about climbing, the places we both loved, and Layton’s recollections of his adventures. Though I knew his health was bad, it was hard to get him to talk about how he was feeling–he was always positive, always thinking about the future as much as the past. I’m crushed that he is gone, but will always be thankful for the little time I had to know him.

Words can’t really say enough of how special Layton was to so many people, both as a friend and as a legend. Everyone who met Layton, read his writings or climbed his routes, holds him in a special, reverent place. He was one of the great personalities and legends of our sport and a gracious and bright spirit to the end.

(photo from Pat Ament)

Arlan captured some of Layton’s most beloved qualities when he wrote shortly after his dad’s death: “Rock climbing to my father was a passion which he loved and held dear ‘til his older years, sharing many experiences and adventures with close friends and making great friendships along the way within the climbing community which are displayed in many publications. He always treated each and everyone he met with respect and took an interest in them not for what they accomplished but rather for who they were as a person.”
(photo from Jim Herrington)

It has been said that if Layton had a dollar for every time a climber repeated one of his routes he would have been a wealthy man. Layton always felt that he was rich beyond measure in the friends that he had and the life that he felt so fortunate to have lived. Even if a single dollar is as far as your budget extends, I think it’s a beautiful symbolic gesture to add that for him now.