Starting in the mid-19th century, mountaineering began to take off in the Alps.

“Clubs,” “clubs” were founded—at both the national and local levels: the Alpine Club (London, 1857), the Swiss Alpine Club (1863), the French Alpine Club (1874), and the Dauphiné Tourist Society (1875). These groups oversaw and developed the practice of mountaineering—organizing excursions, mapping out routes, building mountain huts, recruiting guides, and so on—and helped popularize the activity.

In France, it appears that mountaineers came primarily from educated urban backgrounds—professionals, notaries, civil servants—from the upper middle class and the petty bourgeoisie. Women are significantly underrepresented (4 women out of 600 members in the C.A.F. as of late 1874, 300 out of 6,000 in 1900)—although they are more numerous and better represented in provincial clubs than in national ones.

The Lac Noir mountain hut was established in 1884 by the Isère chapter of the CAF, at an elevation of about 2,800 meters, at the western foot of the Mont-de-Lans glaciers. Situated in a location highly exposed to the wind, it was renovated in 1893, then moved and rebuilt in stone in 1895.