Sir Edmund Percival Hillary was a New Zealand mountaineer, explorer, and philanthropist. On 29 May 1953, Hillary and Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers confirmed to have reached the summit of Mount Everest. They were part of the ninth British expedition to Everest, led by John Hunt. From 1985 to 1988 he served as New Zealand's High Commissioner to India and Bangladesh and concurrently as Ambassador to Nepal.
Tenzing Norgay, born Namgyal Wangdi, and also referred to as Sherpa Tenzing, was a Nepali-Indian Sherpa mountaineer. He was one of the first two people known to reach the summit of Mount Everest, which he accomplished with Edmund Hillary on 29 May 1953. Time named Norgay one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.
The Himalayan Trust is an international non-profit humanitarian organisation first established in the 1960s by Sir Edmund Hillary, who led the trust until his death in 2008. The Himalayan Trust aims to improve the health, education and general wellbeing of people living in the Solukhumbu District. The Himalayan Trust is headquartered in New Zealand where it is a registered charity through the Charities Commission. The Trust has charitable and donee status being a member of the Council for International Development (CID).
George Christopher Band was an English mountaineer. He was the youngest climber on the 1953 British expedition to Mount Everest on which Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay made the first ascent of the mountain. In 1955, he and Joe Brown were the first climbers to ascend Kangchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world.
Thamserku is a mountain in the Himalayas of eastern Nepal. The mountain is connected by a ridge leading eastward to Kangtega. Thamserku is a prominent mountain to the east of Namche Bazaar and lies just north of Kusum Kangguru.
Cho Polu is a mountain in the Khumbu region of eastern Nepal. Southern neighbors include Num Ri and Baruntse while Imja Tse lies immediately to the west.
The Hillary Step used to be a nearly vertical rock face with a height of around 12 metres (40 ft) located near the summit of Mount Everest, about 8,790 metres (28,839 ft) above sea level. Located on the southeast ridge, halfway between the "South Summit" and the true summit, the Hillary Step was the most technically difficult part of the typical Nepal-side Everest climb and the last real challenge before reaching the top of the mountain. The rock face was destroyed by an earthquake that struck the region in 2015.
Elizabeth Hawley was an American journalist, author, and chronicler of Himalayan mountaineering expeditions. Hawley's The Himalayan Database became the unofficial record for climbs in the Nepalese Himalaya. She was also the honorary consul in Nepal for New Zealand.
Peter Edmund Hillary is a New Zealand mountaineer, philanthropist and writer. He is the son of adventurer Sir Edmund Hillary, who, along with mountaineer Tenzing Norgay, completed the first successful ascent of Mount Everest. When Peter Hillary summited Everest in 1990, he and his father were the first father/son duo to achieve the feat. Hillary has achieved two summits of Everest, an 84-day trek across Antarctica to the South Pole, and an expedition guiding astronaut Neil Armstrong to land a small aircraft at the North Pole. He has climbed many of the world's major peaks, and on 19 June 2008, completed the Seven Summits, reaching the top of the highest mountains on all seven continents, when he summited Denali in Alaska.
The Mount Everest Committee was a body formed by the Alpine Club and the Royal Geographical Society to co-ordinate and finance the 1921 British Mount Everest reconnaissance expedition to Mount Everest and all subsequent British expeditions to climb the mountain until 1947. It was then renamed the Joint Himalayan Committee; this latter committee organised and financed the successful first ascent of Mount Everest in 1953.
Kunde Hospital is a hospital in the town of Kunde, Nepal, that serves 8,000 people from Khumbu district. It is situated 3,840 metres (12,600 ft) above sea level and was founded by Sir Edmund Hillary in 1966. The hospital was funded and operated by The Himalayan Trust until 1976 and is now supported by the Sir Edmund Hillary Foundation.
Wallace George Lowe, known as George Lowe, was a New Zealand-born mountaineer, explorer, film director and educator. He was the last surviving member of the 1953 British Mount Everest Expedition, during which his friend Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay became the first known people to summit the world's highest peak. Sir Edmund was his fellow Briton and served as his mentor.
Led by Edouard Wyss-Dunant, the 1952 Swiss Mount Everest expedition saw Raymond Lambert and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay reach a height of about 8,595 metres (28,199 ft) on the southeast ridge, setting a new climbing altitude record, opening up a new route to Mount Everest and paving the way for further successes by other expeditions.
The 1953 British Mount Everest expedition was the ninth mountaineering expedition to attempt the first ascent of Mount Everest, and the first confirmed to have succeeded when Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary reached the summit on 29 May 1953. Led by Colonel John Hunt, it was organised and financed by the Joint Himalayan Committee. News of the expedition's success reached London in time to be released on the morning of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation, on the 2nd of June that year.
The Sir Edmund Hillary Mountain Legacy Medal is awarded every one or two years to an individual "for remarkable service in the conservation of culture and nature in mountainous regions." The medal both recognizes the service of Sir Edmund Hillary on behalf of mountain people and their environment and also encourages the continuing emulation of his example. The Hillary Medal is a project of Mountain Legacy, a Nepalese non-governmental organization ; the president is biologist Kumar P. Mainali. The Hillary Medal was personally authorized by Sir Edmund in 2002, and ratified by the Namche Consensus, the declaration resulting from the 2003 Namche Conference: "People, Park, and Mountain Ecotourism."
The South Summit of Mount Everest in the Himalayas is a subsidiary peak to the primary peak of Mount Everest. Although its elevation above sea level of 8,749 metres (28,704 ft) is higher than the second-highest mountain on Earth, K2, it is not considered a separate mountain as its prominence is only 11 meters.
The 1951 British Mount Everest reconnaissance expedition ran between 27 August 1951 and 21 November 1951 with Eric Shipton as leader.
Norman David Hardie was a New Zealand climber who was one of the climbers on the 1955 British Kangchenjunga expedition who first reached the summit of the 8,586-metre (28,169 ft) mountain, the third-highest mountain in the world.
The 1952 British expedition to Cho Oyu the Turquoise Goddess was organized by the Joint Himalayan Committee. It had been hoped to follow up the 1951 Everest expedition with another British attempt on Everest in 1952, but Nepal had accepted a Swiss application for 1952, to be followed in 1953 with a British attempt. So in 1952, Eric Shipton was to lead an attempt to ascend Cho Oyu, and Griffith Pugh was to trial oxygen equipment and train members for 1953. But the expedition failed both aims; that plus Shipton’s poor leadership and planning resulted in his replacement as a leader for the 1953 expedition.
