Hans Kraus - Personal Life

Personal Life

Kraus was born in Trieste, Austria and taught English as a youth by James Joyce. In 1938 the Kraus family fled Europe, just ahead of World War II, this time to the United States. They settled in New York. Kraus was not allowed to enlist in the U.S. military because he had been born in Trieste, which had belonged to the Habsburg Empire at the time of Kraus' birth. Therefore, he was technically considered an "enemy alien", even though he was a legal immigrant, and a Jew. He became a U.S. citizen in 1945.

Sometime in the late 1930s (precise date unknown; pre-1938), Kraus married Susanne Simon. The marriage was apparently not a happy one, and they separated in 1944 and were divorced in the 1950s.

In 1951, Kraus made the acquaintance of Jim McCarthy, a young Princeton University undergraduate and up and coming climber. The two soon became fast friends and climbing partners, and McCarthy would go on to be Kraus' personal lawyer.

In 1959, Kraus married Madi Springer-Miller, a champion skier and the first woman to ski the "Lip" of Tuckerman's Ravine on Mount Washington. They had two daughters, Ann and Mary.

In 1984 at the age of 79, Kraus stopped climbing completely, due to arthritis, and the cumulative effects of various injuries. His last climb was Easy Overhang, a route he had done the first ascent of in 1941.

In 1995 Kraus was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He died peacefully on the morning of March 6, 1996 in his New York City apartment, holding his daughters hand. His ashes were carried up the High Exposure buttress by an old friend and scattered into the air at the top.