Robert L. M. Underhill
American mountain climber (1889–1983)
Robert Lindley Murray Underhill (March 3, 1889 – May 11, 1983) was an American mountaineer best known for introducing modern Alpine style rope and belaying techniques to the U.S. climbing community in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
Family and early life
His father, Abram Sutton Underhill (1852–1942) was an attorney, banker and prominent Quaker. His sister Ruth Murray Underhill (1883–1984) earned her PhD from Columbia University and was a social worker, anthropologist and author. Underhill's full name combined his maternal grandfather's name plus his father's surname. He received an A.B. degree from Haverford College in 1909. At that time, Haverford was an elite Quaker college for men. He received a PhD from Harvard in 1916. He was an instructor in mathematics at Harvard in 1918, and a tutor and then instructor in philosophy at Harvard from 1925 to 1931. During that period, he was an active member of the Harvard Mountaineering Club. He began climbing in the Alps about 1910.
The public source identifies “Robert L. M. Underhill” as american mountain climber (1889–1983). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Robert, Underhill and American.
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The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 24, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q7346596. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1889, 1983, 1852 and 1942.
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This entry incorporates text from “Robert L. M. Underhill” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.