1906, after which he claimed to have achieved the first summit of its peak with one other expedition crew member. Other members, including Belmore Browne, whom Cook had left on the lower mountain, immediately but privately expressed doubt. Cook's claims were not publicly challenged until 1909 when the dispute with Peary over the North Pole claim erupted, with Peary's supporters claiming Cook's Denali ascent was also fraudulent. Unlike Hudson Stuck in 1913, Cook had not taken photographs from atop Denali. His alleged photo of the summit was found to have been taken on a small outcrop on a ridge beside the Ruth Glacier, away. In late 1909, Ed Barrill, Cook's sole companion during the 1906 climb, signed an affidavit saying that they had not reached the summit. In the late 20th century, historians found that he had been paid by Peary supporters to deny Cook's claim. (Henderson writes that this fact was covered up at the time, but Bryce says that it was never a secret.) Up until a month before, Barrill had consistently asserted that he and Cook had reached the summit. His 1909 affidavit included a map correctly locating what came to be called Fake Peak, featured in Cook's "summit" photo, and showing that he and Cook had turned back at the "Gateway" (north end of the Great Gorge), 12 horizontal bee-line miles from Denali and below its top. Climber Bradford Washburn gathered data, repeated the climbs, and took new photos to evaluate Cook's 1906 claim. Between 1956 and 1995, Washburn and Brian Okonek identified the locations of most of the photographs Cook took during his 1906 Denali foray and took new photos at the same spots. In 1997 Bryce identified the locations of the remaining photographs, including Cook's "summit" photograph; none was taken anywhere near the summit. Washburn showed that none of Cook's 1906 photos was taken past the Gateway. A 1910 expedition by the Mazama Club reported that Cook's map departed abruptly from the landscape at a point when the summit was still distant. Critics of Cook's claims have compared Cook's map of his alleged 1906 route with the landscape of the last . Cook's descriptions of the summit ridge are variously claimed to bear no resemblance to the mountain and to have been verified by many subsequent climbers. In the 1970s, climber Hans Waale found a route that fitted both Cook's narrative and descriptions. Three