When the first Philadelphia Rock Gym opened in February of 1994, it was not only the first climbing gym in the Philadelphia metropolitan area but one of the first in the United States.

In the early years, like many gyms of that time, it wasn’t founded by wealthy, business-minded people with deep pockets or corporate groups looking to hop on the bandwagon for the next big thing. Back then, indoor climbing wasn’t considered a big thing, let alone a lucrative one. Building a gym was primarily a labor of love. In line with the proud and ancient climbing tradition of ‘dirt-bagging,’ it was almost always done on a shoestring budget by people who knew a hell of a lot more about carabiners, cams, and the melting point of braided nylon than they did about money.

The PRG was no different. Founded by two friends from college less than a year after their graduation, the entire original gym was built for less than what some modern gyms make in a month. It was funded by an eclectic combination of personal money, micro-loans from various family members, and a $50,000 inheritance. And, of course, sweat equity. Lots and lots of that!

At the time, I was part of a group of young twenty-somethings trying to establish ourselves in a small but robust community of climbers in the Philly area. The ‘old guard’ – our occasional mentors and the ones we tried to impress – were mostly traditional climbers. Among them were a few notable first ascensionists, with their names attached routes from the New River Gorge to the White Mountains.

Back then, the concept of training to climb was still new. It involved dropping a top-rope on a difficult route at a local crag after work or on weekends, then running a few laps with your friends. A few people were playing around with small home walls often referred to as ‘woodies.’ Additionally, the idea of bouldering as a standalone activity was just beginning to catch on.

There was a gym in Allentown, PA, called Climb On, where a few of us (mostly younger) guys went occasionally for the novelty. However, the routes were generally painful and awkward. While it was amusing to watch the local Boy Scouts repeatedly face-plant in the gravel beneath the indoor rappel tower – because they inexplicably insisted they go down face-first, Australian-style – the concept wasn’t taken too seriously. Climbing indoors was seen as a cool idea, especially to avoid the rain and snow, but there were home walls available for those who were truly interested. We doubted there would ever be enough climbers to keep a gym in business for long. Apparently, we were wrong.

The first any of us heard about the new Philadelphia Rock Gym was, in fact, at our most local crag – Livesey Rock in West Fairmount Park just outside of Philadelphia. Livesey was the local hangout spot for Philly climbers. It consisted of two schist boulders that had actually been excavated from the surrounding hillside to install a storm sewer and then a trail to go over it. The two boulders – Main and Small Face, as they were called – were about twenty-five and eighteen feet high, respectively. And they were mainly used for top-roping by the after-work and weekend crowd. However, a few of us had started to boulder on the steeper side of the Main boulder, setting eliminates and playing add-on with only carpet squares for pads.

We were part of a newer generation that viewed sport climbs and, increasingly, boulder problems as goals in their own right, not merely stepping stones to a truly committing traditional route. We aimed to get stronger, build endurance, and learn to dyno. Our focus was on climbing harder, sending more routes, and then unwinding with a few beers and lying like fishermen about our escapades.

We wanted to climb 5.12. Ha.

When we first spotted the ad for a new Philadelphia Rock Gym on the bulletin board at Livesey, we couldn’t help but be curious about what was going on. If my memory serves me right (which, I’m confident it probably doesn’t), the ad appeared late in the fall, which worked in their favor. Livesey was a great little nugget of rock (and let’s not forget the secret projects at the Bridge), but on a cold and damp November afternoon, the idea of climbing in a warm and dry environment was undeniably appealing. We entertained the thought of checking it out if they ever managed to get the place up and running. It didn’t help that the “ad” was nothing more than a typed-out announcement thumb-tacked to a piece of plywood on a bulletin board that, to my knowledge, had never been used before. To top it off, it was soaking wet.

Nevertheless, the climbing community was small and addicted to gossip in a way that was almost, but not quite, entirely unhealthy. So, a few months later, when we heard they were actually building the walls, we couldn’t resist the urge to take a look.

One of the first pieces of gossip was that the Philadelphia Rock Gym wasn’t in Philadelphia or even near it. No, the first gym in Philadelphia was located forty miles outside the city in a small suburban town that no one we knew had ever heard of.

“Oaks,” my buddy Terry said.

“Where?” we asked.

“No idea.”

In the era before pocket GPS, it actually took a bit of research to figure out where the gym was being built. In the end, we had to stop by a gas station to purchase a fancy piece of technology—a map. Armed with the map, the four of us drove to the town of Oaks to see what we could find.

The original Philadelphia Rock Gym was tucked into an old industrial center formerly owned by B. F. Goodrich, the tire manufacturer. By 1994, the factory had ceased operations, leaving the sprawling complex — close to a million square feet— populated by a hodgepodge of businesses. These included an indoor Go-kart facility, owned by a former race car driver, several discount furniture stores, an indoor flea market, and its newest addition—The Philadelphia Rock Gym.

As we pulled into the enormous, sprawling parking lot, the first thing that caught our attention was an eight-story blue building that soared fifty feet above the roof of the surrounding complex. It stood like a beacon, guiding itinerant climbers to the promised land—an indoor cliff where the weather was always perfect, and fresh routes dangled from the walls all year-round.

“That’s gotta be it!” said John (known to us as “the world’s most dangerous man”), pointing at the giant blue building.

It wasn’t.

It turned out that building wasn’t a building at all – at least not in the strict sense. As Matt, one of the two owners, explained to us, it was a giant machine for making tires. The entire structure, all eight stories of it, was crammed from wall to wall, floor to ceiling, with an arcane collection of metal, tubes, and wiring packed so tight that it would make more sense to knock it down than to attempt emptying it out. We called it the Vulcanizer.

“I know,” he said, “because we asked.”

The Philadelphia Rock Gym itself was situated in a more modest three-story space just to the right of the Vulcanizer. In hindsight, our initial disappointment was somewhat unfounded. While some gyms have grown taller over the years, the economic constraints of construction have typically limited heights to considerably less than that mouth-watering eighty feet. So, with our expectations tempered, we parked our car and ventured inside to see what the fuss was about.

When we stepped inside, any lingering disappointment vanished instantly. I can’t quite explain it, but in those early days, simply seeing an indoor climbing wall for the first time filled us with excitement. Perhaps it was the anticipation of being able to climb even when the weather was terrible. Or maybe it was the idea of having the freedom to set new routes whenever we wanted – after all, in southeastern Pennsylvania, if you wanted a new route, you either had to embark on hours-long drives or resort to less savory methods, like vandalizing a bridge.

Or, perhaps, it was the sheer silliness of the whole endeavor. Climbing rocks was, as we all understood, was at its heart a strange, if not foolish, pastime.

When a “normal” person looks at a sheer cliff face and says, “I wonder what’s on top,” their next step is to find the easiest way up, typically by walking around. Yet for a climber, the “easy” way holds no magic. They would rather go straight up, often choosing the hardest (or scariest) route up that sheer wall. Clinging desperately to tiny crimps, slapping at greasy slopers, they pray for their special – almost magical – sticky shoes to keep their toes attached to the sea of quarters and dimes which pass as foot- holds.

And falling? Not just part of the process but part of the fun of it all. It keeps you humble, serves as a reminder that you are trying hard, and a reason to come back and try again. And again. Why do we do it? For some inexplicable reason…it’s incredibly fun. And, to quote Fred Beckey, “I figure if I think too hard about it, I’ll stop doing it.”

So, the fact that climbers had figured out a way to build artificial walls indoors was simply another addition to the long list of crazy, silly ideas that climbers have had over the decades. And like many of those ideas, we found it fascinating and hilarious. We wanted to be a part of it.