This piece was written to commemorate the 100th Birthday of Sir Edmund Hillary.
Born 20th July 1919 in Tuakau, Sir Ed went on to enter high school two years younger than his peers, and struggled with inadequacy through these years. He subscribed to a philosophy called “Radiant Living” and presented a lecture titled “Inferiority – cause and cure”.
Sir Ed started bee-keeping in 1938, and his pacifism prevented him from fighting in World War 2 until 1944, when his desire for adventure and involvement took over, and saw him become a navigator in the Royal New Zealand Air Force.
Civilian life in 1945 saw him hone his mountaineering skills in the Southern Alps, and he was invited by Eric Shipton in 1951 to join his British climbing party at the foothills of Mt Everest. On the 28th May 1953, Sir Ed and Tenzing Norgay stood at the pinnacle, after tackling a 40 foot obstacle near the summit, a piece of rock later called the Hillary Step.
It would be almost another 3 years before Mt Everest (Sagarmatha in Tibetan, Chomolungma in Nepalese) would be conquered for the second time.
Sir Ed achieved many things after that famous summit, including many other explorations and adventures. He served as the New Zealand High Commissioner to India, Nepal and Bangladesh. His greatest personal sense of achievement came from the establishment of the Himalayan Trust in 1960, helping the Nepalese people with the construction of schools, airfields, and hospitals. His wife Louise, and daughter Belinda, were tragically killed in a plane crash near Kathmandu in 1975. Despite this, and ultimately, his advancing age, he visited the Trust’s projects every year until his death in January 2008.
I believe it is safe to dub him “The Greatest Kiwi Hero”, I can’t think that anyone would argue against that. He affected all New Zealanders and came to define who the ideal New Zealander should be. This piece only examines a miniscule portion of that great personality.
Fendall Hill 2019
Live performance of it in the Christchurch Town Hall by the Southern Cross Brass Southern Cross Brass conducted by Howard Taylor, Christchurch Town Hall June 2019
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