OK - sorry everyone if I'm totally clueless, but What/Who is Putterman?

(just trying to remain one step above completely clueless)

thanks - S

I too have been trying to figure that one out.

From this link:

http://www.mountaingazette.com/art.php?uid=287&date=2004-12->>>>>

It seems Cameron Burns named routes after an old roommate.

thanks ryan - i've been wondering this for way too long now.

ahh - the miracle of the internet.

how about this one.....

what's your favorite "putterman" route?

Thanks for posting that link Ryan. It was a fun read.

In some of the more "colonial" parts of the world, for instance the Nairobi Country Club, it is still considered acceptable to have a caddy for each of your clubs. A "putterman" is simply the caddy for your putter.

Thanks for the link! I've been curious about that one when wandering around the desert....

Putterman
Basically, he was my roommate in Boulder, in the mid-1980s while I was at CU.
He was the funniest guy I ever met. He studied political science at CU, then did a master’s in Hegelian philosophy, another master’s in Rousseavian philosophy, then a Ph.d. in Rousseau.
He was not a climber, but we took him top-roping on Flagstaff once and he enjoyed it. He went to the climbing shop (the old Boulder Mountaineer) the next day to buy some shoes, but they didn’t have any in size 14 (his foot size).
In 1986, we took him to the Tetons. After we’d backpacked halfway in to the Lower Saddle, we found his pack had no gear whatsoever in it; rather, he had a load of political and philosophy books---something like ten of them!
Because CU was, at the time, filled with characters like Pat Ament (who used to hang around the student union playing chess) and Christian Griffith and other heroes, he used to make up funny anecdotes about them and us.
One story he used to share was his desire to climb the famed Gully-jump, or some such nonsense.
In 1989, Steve Porcella and did a new route on the west side of North Pal, in the Sierra Nevada. It was a horrible route. Easy, but loose, rotten, falling to bits. It was basically a chimney filled with dirt.
I had told Steve earlier how Ethan used to talk about the Gully-jump back at CU, and Steve thought that was a great name for the route. It became the Putterman Gully-jump.
There are now dozens of routes around the globe with some kind of Putterman name. Some are really good (like the East Face route on Venus Needle (www.mountainproject.com/v/arizona/navajolands/cleopatras_needle_area/106143173), which doesn't have the name attached in that post), some not so good, like the original route on the House of Putterman (http://www.mountainproject.com/v/utah/moab_area/tusher_canyo>>>>>. I later renamed that after Ethan's son, Walden. Hope this helps.
Best,
Cam