'Blush Noisette' was the first recurrent Climbing Rose. (The word for climbing in French and Italian is: Grimpant and Rampicanti...)

[From, Climbing Roses, by Stephen Scanniello, p. 2:] Before the nineteenth century… there were only a limited number of rose varieties in the West with canes long enough to be trained on… supports: two European wild roses -- the eglantine (Rosa eglanteria) and the dog rose (Rosa canina); and two naturally occurring varieties -- the alba (Rosa alba) and the musk (Rosa moschata), both of which are capable of sending out ten- or twelve-foot canes.

[Ibid, p. 7-8:] 'Dr. W. Van Fleet' and other Van Fleet hybrids… differ from ramblers because they have heavier, stiffer canes. ['Dr. W. Van Fleet'] produced a sport (mutation)… 'New Dawn', introduced in 1930, [that] marks a turning point in the history of climbers, for it is everblooming.

[From Gardening with Old Roses, by Alan Sinclair and Rosemary Thodey, p. 41:] It is generally accepted that climbers differ from ramblers in that they grow stiffly upright, eventually forming thick, woody trunks rather like trees, whereas ramblers arch out from the base with pliant, supple shoots that roam over the ground if left to themselves...

[From Shrub Roses and Climbing Roses, by David Austin, p. 85:] It was only after the Rambler Rose 'Dr. W. Van Fleet' sported to produce 'New Dawn' in 1930, that any definite move was made towards breeding Climbing Roses, and even then nothing happened until the 1950s.

[From In Praise of Roses, by Harry Wheatcroft, p. 17:] Climbers have much stiffer stems and far fewer canes coming from the base of the plant than ramblers... climbers generally have bigger flowers, though fewer of them to the truss, than ramblers.

[From Growing Old-Fashioned Roses, by Trevor Nottle, p. 11:] The climbers are a group that appear superficially to be very widely divergent from each other... Most noticeable feature is their habit of growth...

[From Growing Old-Fashioned Roses, by Barbara Lea Taylor, p. 88:] The practical difference between climbers and ramblers is that climbers are bred to goupwards whereas ramblers can easily be trained up but, left to themselves, they will ramble in all directions and can therefore be used to cover banks, tree stumps, and so on.