Ogul is the Washoe Native American word for mountain bighorn sheep. The Washoe Tribe hunted this agile mountaineer in both the Sierra Tahoe Region and the Basin and Range to the east. Though now extinct in the area, this once great mountain sheep is a fitting symbol for our Tahoe Ogul List.

The Ogul list was created in the early 1980s by a group of hikers and climbers in Northern California, who were members of the Peak and Gorge Section within the Mother Lode Chapter of the Sierra Club.  They decided to create a list of the most notable and worthy peaks in the area around Lake Tahoe, all which could be done as day hikes from their base in Sacramento.  This served to encourage others to enjoy these climbs as well as themselves and promoted the discussion of useful and interesting information about these climbs.

Harry Erl, Howard Steidtmann, along with other members of the former Peak and Gorge Section, compiled the original hardcopy version of this peak list.  Within a few years, this list successfully led to many more climbs, and a few members of the group to reach the summit of every peak on it.  In the 1990s, when several core members moved out of the area, interest in this and other Peak and Gorge Section activities faded to the point that its members voted (in 1998) to disband this Section. The Mother Lode Chapter consequently designated the Peak and Gorge Section as “Inactive”. To preserve this institutional knowledge and make it generally available to the public, former member John Sarna designed a set of web pages with the Ogul and other peak lists that were previously maintained by the Section.  Included were the Section’s recognition lists and an offer to continue to recognize climbs online for their achievements.  Since this was better done in coordination with others, in 2000, John Bees and John Sarna formed the “Western States Climbers” (WSC) with Steve Eckert providing technical support and sponsoring it under the Climber.Org website.  To improve access to these lists and promote the diverse hiking and climbing experiences these peaks offer, the web pages were updated then and several times since, with more climbers requesting recognition for their achievements courtesy of Climber.Org.  In 2013, with the unfortunate loss of John Bees to cancer, former Peak and Gorge member, Howard Steidtmann, joined John Sarna in forming an Executive Committee to oversee operation of the online lists.  Finally, in 2016, Mike Ranta more thoroughly updated these Ogul web pages to further promote climbs in the Tahoe area.

While these web pages will continue to evolve, the goal remains the same — to encourage others to enjoy mountaineering activists and promote the discussion of useful and interesting information about these climbs.