thousand years before christ walked the earth, all of which appealed to a certain tree hugger from back east, an adventure lover, an adrenaline junkie, a big river by the name of douglas thompkins. dropped out of high school, went west to climb the 70s rocks and fell in with a group called the fun hogs. summer of 1968 they climb under climed into a van in san francisco and skied, and climbed their way all the way to pat gonia. so bill, just the fact that thompkins was a foreigner to come in and buy up all this land, it obviously is going to be controversial. tell us how this all unfolded. so they re sort of the founding fathers of the
douglas thompkins. dropped out of high school, went west to climb yosemite s rocks and fell in with a group called the fun hogs. summer of 68 they climb under h climed into a van in san francisco and skied, kayaked and climbed all the way to patagonia. all you x-gamers, you red bullers, these are your founding fathers. but he turned out to be a hell of a businessman. he started northface that age of 21. even got the grateful dead to play the grand opening. remember espree in the 80s, doug designed it all and by 40 was on top of the fashion design world. buddies with steve jobs, the
west to climb yosemite s rocks and fell in with a group called the fun hogs. summer of 68, they climbed into a van in san francisco, surfed, climbed, skied, kayaked their way all the way to patagonia. oh my gosh, i m ready to get a plane ticket right now see all of that. but wait, i can see it on tv and then later i ll get the plane ticket. the wonder list airs tonight. such extraordinary images. no wonder tompkins was so enamored and said, wait a minute, i want to preserve this as best i can. right. right. he s a guy who was an accidental multimillionaire in his 30s and had this sort of midlife realization that his art collection didn t mean as much to him as these volcanos and fjords and valleys and the most wildest corners of the planet so he s tried he gave everything, you know, sold all of thinks collections, cashed
big river rafter, big mountain skier and big moneymaker by the name of douglas thompson. he dropped out of school went west and joined a group called the fun hogs. they climbed into a van in san francisco, surfed, climbed, kayaked their way all the way to patagonia. bill weir is with us now. bill, a beautiful point of the globe. that s the point, right? exactly. doug, after the adventure, he gets frustrated that he can t find good sleeping gear so he starts a company called north face. and his friend starts a company called patagonia. millionaires by the time they re in their 30s. they re sold in their art
group called the fun hogs. summer 68, they climbed into a van in san francisco, surfed, climbed, skied, kayaked their way all the way to patagonia. interesting. bill weir is joining us live. tell us about the work you saw in patagonia and why it was so controversial. imagine if a chinese national or saudi prince said i want to buy south dakota and take out all the farmers and let it go wild for your own benefit. people would be suspicious, right? this powerful fashion couple, doug and chris tompkins, fell in love late in life, what they wanted to do was save wild places. they started buying up gigantic chunks of land in chile and