This picture of Maynard Cohick had been taken during an expedition by which he reached the summit associated with the mountain that is tallest in Russia: Mount Communism at 24,595 foot. The positioning happens to be when you look at the country of Tajikistan and it is called Ismoil Somoni Peak. (Photo: presented picture)

We first ran the Cohick Half Marathon, the 12 months We relocated to Springfield. The word “Cohick” had been prominent back at my long-sleeved race top. I merely assumed “Cohick” had been a regional business that had been a battle sponsor.

I have started to discover it is really not a business. It is a guy: Maynard Cohick, a lawyer whom lived in Republic whom passed away at age 41.

He had been for an expedition to summit Annapurna we, the tenth peak that is highest on the planet at 26,545 foot within the Himalayas, as he ended up being hidden by the avalanche.

Their human anatomy continues to be here, over the clouds in Nepal. He left out a spouse and three kiddies.

Just 3 months after their death, the initial Maynard Cohick Memorial Half Marathon, 5K and run that is fun held, sponsored because of the Ozark Mountain Ridge Runners. The race that is first 176 runners. It began at Catholic Senior School.

The competition became area of the Bass Pro stores Marathon sunday. Which includes the Conservation Marathon together with News-Leader 5K.

Those events will likely be contested Sunday, Nov. 1. We shall be operating the Cohick Half Marathon once more.

Who had been Maynard Cohick?

Maynard Cohick had been an adventurer whom lived life full-throttle. He saw things handful of us will ever see. He embraced dangers handful of us would ever look for.

He scaled hills, sailed the Southern Pacific, he skydived, scuba dived across the Great Barrier Reef, surfed, did mountain climbing, went, biked and taught such as for instance a madman.

He did every thing with passion and what buddies say was a contagious passion.

To organize when it comes to agony of high-altitude climbing, he’d load a backpack with 125 pounds and trek up the 10 routes of stairs 10 times on a daily basis at Plaza Towers.

“”He said it gets.” that he desired to observe how cold”

Bill Hart, fellow climber

Before he left for Nepal, he once asked a judge for authorization to put on a set of massive hiking boots in court to simply help break them in. Movement issued.

Retired attorney Bill Hart recalls their climb up Longs Peak, 14,259 foot when you look at the Colorado Rockies. That they had started at 1 a.m. because of the heat at 20-below. Hours later on, they made camp.

Hart and Cohick and two other guys huddled inside their tent.

“He opens the tent and tosses their resting case away,” Hart states of Cohick.

“ we asked him, ‘What are you currently doing?’

“He stated it gets. which he desired to observe how cool”

He headed west for adventure

Weldon Cohick Jr., seven years older, taught their cousin Maynard to swim.

There have been three males and three girls when you look at the household. They was raised in a five-room household without electricity or operating water outside Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania, 84 kilometers west of Wilkes-Barre.

Their dad ended up being a carpenter. He additionally had been an alcoholic and an abusive spouse, based on a guide co-authored by Maynard Cohick along with his spouse, Jeanne.

Maynard’s mom sooner or later asked her spouse to go out of, that he did, in line with the guide, posted and modified by previous News-Leader reporter Susan Atteberry Smith.

“All he did ended up being stay around and smoke cigars and beverage,” Weldon claims of these daddy. “My mom had been the hero of this household.”

Weldon is going to be 88 on Nov. 5. Just he and sis Maxine survive.

Weldon informs me he shared a nature of adventure with Maynard.

He says“ I taught Maynard how to swim in a little stream about a mile from our house. “Whatever we taught myself, i might show my small bro Maynard.”

1 day, Weldon went swimming in a flow along with his friend Harry. They had been about 14. Maynard, 7, ended up being using them.

“I became stating that I experienced taught Maynard to become a good swimmer,” Weldon claims. “So Harry claims he really wants to race Maynard throughout the flow, touch a stone, and keep coming back. Harry told Maynard he could be beaten by him and Maynard said, ‘I do not think therefore.'”

“The crick had not been that wide nonetheless it had been six to eight legs deep. We told them when you should get and my buddy overcome him by around three or four supply shots. It simply tickled me that We taught my small sibling to swim therefore well.”

As a kid, Maynard learn about history’s great explorers and told their household which he, too, is an explorer, relating to a 1979 News-Leader tale.

Their very first task had been being a linotype operator in the regional paper in Pennsylvania. A linotype machine had been when utilized setting steel kind for paper publishing.

It was a ability Cohick would fall right right right right back on as a child. He’d set sail for a visit halfway all over the world, as an example, and come back to locate a task at magazines around the globe to pocket money that is enough fund their next journey.

Cohick graduated twelfth grade and remained house for per year working during the paper.

When he’d conserved sufficient, Cohick headed to Ca to become listed on their cousin Melvin.

He sought neither fame nor fortune. He had been in search of adventure.

He discovered it. He climbed every high hill in Ca, Oregon and Washington.

He sailed from Hawaii to Los Angeles.

He and a buddy bicycled 1,200 kilometers from Seattle to l . a ., sleeping in areas during the night.

He fell deeply in love with Jeanne Meyer, that has relocated from Indiana to Ca whenever she had been 6.

She told him she’d wait he had plans to set sail again — this time to New Zealand for him because, first.

Cohick had been element of a team of five for a cutter that is 52-foot sailed through tropical islands such as for example Tonga, Tahiti and Bora Bora.

In Auckland, brand brand New Zealand, he landed task during the paper. However in Sydney he payday loan store New York landed a page from their draft board.

The Army delivered him to Seoul, Southern Korea, where he served in a missile battalion for 2 years and took the full time to earn a belt that is brown judo.

Jeanne nevertheless waited. Finally, from Seoul, he proposed in a page.

They certainly were wed, in Anaheim, Ca.

Maynard Cohick and Jeanne Meyer had been wed, in Anaheim, Ca. (picture: presented picture)

Cohick worked being a policeman in Fullerton, where he signed up for university.

Their son Steven was created and child Julie.