Vincent "Vince" Richards Lee (born 7 November 1938), now retired, has served as a Marine Corps officer, founder and chief instructor of his own mountaineering school, western residential architect, Andean explorer, scholar of megalithic monuments, avocational Southwest archaeologist, and author of several books on many of those subjects.
Early life and education
Although born in Gainesville, Florida, Lee and his older brother Claude Jr. were raised in New York. His father, Claude Francis Lee, was an owner and manager of several Paramount movie theaters in 1930s Florida, and then manager of Paramount's newly formed East Coast public relations division in New York City. The Lees were long time friends of Claude Pepper, the redoubtable Florida Senator and Congressman of the Roosevelt and Truman years. Recognizing Claude Lee's influence, Pepper named him to his "band of brothers" who advised him at critical times in his career.
Lee attended North Tarrytown High School, then selected Princeton University and entered its Regular Naval ROTC program during 1956–60, incurring a three-year obligation for military service. He elected duty with the U. S Marine Corps and went through the Officer Candidates School at Marine Corps Base Quantico in his junior year. Enrolled in the School of Architecture, he graduated in 1960 with a BA in Architecture and was commissioned a US Marine Corps 2nd Lieutenant. After Marine Officer Basic School, again at Quantico, he was assigned as an Infantry Officer in the 2nd Marine Division, Camp Pendleton, California. He married Danielle (Dani) Hayn just before his transfer to Fleet duty (Mar, 1961). They soon had identical twin sons, James Scott and Jon Richard, and some years later, a third son, Christopher Tobin. They eventually divorced in 1977.
US Marine Corps service
Lee served with the 3rd Marine Division on Okinawa, and on deployments in the Western Pacific, Philippines, South Korea and Japan. With a year remaining in his 3-year obligation, he transferred to the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center (MWTC) in California's Sierra Nevadas After completing the courses, he became an Instructor/Guide in the Mountain Leadership School.
While assigned to the MWTC, Lee applied his knowledge of civilian professional mountaineering techniques to improve the school's techniques, as recounted in the Marine Corps history of the MWTC that provided a brief summary of his contributions to its mission, stating, "Over time he (Lee) skillfully modernized the syllabus of the Mountain Leadership Course by introducing the latest climbing techniques and lightweight equipment that he believed would have equal application in military mountaineering". In the same publication, the chief instructor at the center, Orlo K. Steele, a subsequent Marine 2-star General, placed him in its "list of superb mountain leaders". Lee applied for entrance to Princeton's Graduate School of Architecture, and in the Fall 1964 began his graduate studies when released from active duty.
Mountaineer
In the interval between his Marine Corp discharge and the start of graduate school at Princeton, Lee began a long association with the Outward Bound program. Starting as a mountaineering instructor at the Colorado School in Marble, where he became friends with famed Teton guide, Paul Petzoldt — then teaching climbing at Maine's Hurricane Island School — and continuing during the summer between his graduate school years. Following graduation, while still involved with the startup North Carolina Outward Bound School (NCOBS), Lee became friends with its founding director, Jim (Pop) Hollandsworth, an outdoor educator at the Asheville School.
In 1968, Lee and Hollandsworth conducted the first of what became three seasons of Asheville School mountaineering expeditions. While maintaining his architectural practice in Jackson Hole, he developed the Asheville School program into what became 'High Country West (HCW), Wilderness Expeditions', with several three-week sessions each summer for the next 23 years, as described in his book, Old School. He taught climbing skills to hundreds of beginning climbers, leading parties to nearly 500 peaks in the Rockies, Canada and overseas. As advertised in the local newspaper, HCW's expeditions offered 30-day trips varying in degree of difficulty from "mellow outing" to "strenuous".