Early ice screws were little more than fancy corkscrews. Indeed it was not unusual to see the odd bottle of wine opened with one at a climber’s party in the 1960’s. Evolution soon rendered these early versions obsolete with a variety of companies vying with each other to top the market. American climber and inventor, Yvon Chouinard, produced some pretty poor screws in the early 1960’s which he had much improved upon by 1976. The advert opposite from 1976 tells us what improvement he’d made, though some reports suggested he still hadn’t got it quite right since the thread sometimes stripped from the tube. Anyway, we are delighted to have a full set here in the collection which we acquired from our old pal, Dave Siviter.