K2 The Savage Mountain (Part 2)

Date1953 – 1954

AbstractK2 The Savage Mountain is a film produced by the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) about the Third American Karakoram Expedition to K2 in 1953, sponsored by the American Alpine Club and led by Charles S. Houston. The expedition also included Robert H. (Bob) Bates, George Bell, Robert Craig, Arthur K. (Art) Gilkey, Dee Molenaar, Peter Schoenning, Capt. H.R.A. Streather and Colonel M. Ata-Ullah. The program is hosted by Houston and Bates. The film includes footage contained on other reels of the Charles S. Houston Collection, narrated by Houston himself. Part 2 of the film begins with the team leaving Camp 1 and continuing their ascent, including footage of the team using an A-Frame with a pulley to get their gear up the mountain, the first mountaineering team to do so, climbing up House’s Chimney, encountering remnants of the failed American expedition up K2 in 1949 and digging out from snowstorms at Camps 6 and 8, where they were trapped for ten days. Here, the film shows Houston and Bates listening to a taped account of themselves and expedition members Capt. Streather, Robert Craig, George Bell and Peter Schoenning recounting the accident that took the life of fellow climber Art Gilkey on their descent and the team’s attempts to save him. This is intercut with pictures of the team members. The remaining footage, narrated by Bob Bates, shows footage of the remaining expedition members dedicating a memorial to Gilkey at Base Camp, George Bell being carried off the mountain on a stretcher, placed on a medical plane home and taken off the plane in New York and Houston getting off a plane and being greeted by his family. The film concludes with Houston and Bates in the studio discussing why they did not bring oxygen on the trip, an interview with George Bell reminiscing about the expedition and Houston and Bates discussing the magnetism of K2 for climbers. K2 The Savage Mountain (Part 2) is Reel 39 of the Charles S. Houston Collection.