Between 1911 and 1913, before ultramarathons and extreme endurance sports captured worldwide attention, civic leaders in northwest Washington sought to showcase the region through an unprecedented competition: a grueling race from Bellingham to the 10,781-foot summit of Mount Baker and back. The mostly amateur athletes attempted the almost unimaginable feat armed with little more than handheld lanterns, determination, and raw grit. The Mountain Runners: America’s First Adventure Race, 1911–1913, reconstructs the thrilling story.

Mount Baker Marathon contestants pushed through darkness, savage storms, hidden crevasses, jagged glaciers, and near-impossible terrain. Only five of the fourteen who started the grueling inaugural race summited. Competitors endured broken bones, torn ligaments, twisted ankles, hypothermia, snow blindness, and intense exhaustion. With astonishing times of less than eleven hours, the final two in contention were a logger and a mule packer at a local coal mine.

Thousands gathered to watch the spectacle as ambitious regional boosters sought to promote tourism, development, and civic pride, often at the expense of participants’ safety. The races also reflected a changing America, where Iron Horse locomotives competed against new-fangled automobiles and small mountain towns Deming and Glacier vied for recognition and economic opportunities in a friendly rivalry.

Drawing from descendants’ oral histories, archival documents, newspapers, and firsthand accounts, Emmy-nominated filmmaker and historian Todd Warger—who also produced a related documentary with the same title—rescues this forgotten Pacific Northwest story from obscurity. Warger is the recipient of the Washington State Historical Society’s David Douglas award for the documentary film Shipyard, creates historical exhibitions for museums, and is the author of a book series about homocides in Washington State during the 19^th and early 20^th centuries.