Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay

Almost as soon as they got back, there was the question. Who got to the top of Everest first? Of course today, you'll read with satisfaction that both men were above such as petty squabbling. They were a team. Each helped the other. One couldn't have done it without the other. One for all and all for one. Keep a stiff upper lip and all. Recently a newspaper reported that although Edmund actually had reached the summit first, he never said so while Tenzing was alive. He didn't want to to detract from the accomplishment of his Sherpa comrade.

You do sometimes wonder about the research time expended by modern journalists. About the same time another newspaper printed the famous picture of - quote - "Hillary on Everest" - unquote. Of course, there were no photos of Hillary at the top of Everest. That photo was of Tenzing taken by Edmund as the reporter would have known if he had taken the trouble to dip his nose into one of the earliest Time-Life Books. More to the point, in 1955 a freelance journalist interviewed Tenzing at his home in Darjeeling. Even at that early date it was acknowledged by all participants that Edmund had in fact reached the summit first.

But it's also true that all was not a happy brotherhood of the peaks. It was inevitable no doubt, but almost as soon as the men were back nationalism began raise its divisive head. Once in England, Edmund and expedition leader, John Hunt, received their knighthoods, went on lecture tours, and were wined and dined and honored. Although Tenzing did visit England and was treated with great respect by Hillary, afterwards Tenzing largely stayed in India, and although he received plenty of recognition, it always seemed (at least to his fellow countrymen) that people thought he played second fiddle to Edmund.

Soon there was the story circulating that it was Tenzing who first reached the top. Not only that, the story went, but he tossed down a rope and pulled Edmund up. Although Tenzing had never said any such thing, and the story was an elaboration of the time (as told in public by Hillary) when Hillary slipped into a crevasse and was pulled up by Tenzing, it led to some irritation among the English. Edmund and the expedition leader John Hunt fired back a bit overhasty rebuttal that wasn't particularly generous to Tenzing. Tenzing, they implied, was scarcely more than a paid guide and was ready to back out until Edmund had cleaned up his iced up oxygen line.

Realizing that such public bickering wasn't doing anyone any good, the men formally agreed not to divulge who set the first foot on the summit. Still the questions kept coming and Tenzing, soon tired of it all, told James Ramsey Ullman, his early biographer, that Edmund had in fact reached the top first. What did it matter, he asked. All this happened within two years of their ascent, so the answer as to who was first has been around if anyone wanted to find the answer.

Of course, anyone who really read about the climb could have figured all that out for themselves. Although not explicitly stated, from Edmund's account (written a few weeks after the ascent) you can tell that Edmund was foremost, so to speak. So simply from the logistics of the climb, he would have been the first to set foot on the top. After all, along the final approach the climbers do not link arms and go happily skipping up along the ridge so all can reach the top together.

Naturally on the day of the ascent - since no one had climbed the moutain before - Hillary and Tenzing found no ladders or ropes placed on the slopes for the climbers to use. The first part that Hillary thought was really dangerous was moving up what's called the Lhotse Face, a steep incline where the snow was deep, loose, and dangerous. Far from Tenzing "wanting to back out", Edmund put the question whether they should go on. Tenzing just said what Edmund decided was fine with him. The hairiest part of the whole climb was when they hit the forty foot sheer vertical cliff now known as the Hillary Step. Hillary found a place where the snow had fallen away from the rock and where a man could squeeze his frame in, but there was still enough ice to dig in his crampons. After Edmund chimneyed his way up the wall, Tenzing followed. From then on it was the tiring tedious work of hacking steps in the snow covered ridge and taking it one step at a time. Then Edmund looked up and realized he could see into Tibet. A couple of more steps and they were at the summit.

References

The Conquest of Everest, With a Chapter on the Final Assault by Sir Edmund Hillary, Sir John Hunt, Dutton, 1954. From reading the last chapter you can tell Edmund reached the summit first.

Tiger of the Snows: The Autobiography of Tenzing of Everest, Tenzing Norgay and James Ramsey Ullman, Putnam, 1955. Tenzing's story where (if the author of CooperToons remembers from reading the book decades ago), Tenzing says Hillary did, in fact, reach the top first.

Jadoo, John A. Keel, Messner, 1957. Subtitled: "The Astounding Story of one Man's Search into the Mysteries of Black Magic in the Orient", John A. Keel later achieved fame with the UFO crowd and his writing about - yes - "Men in Black" - decades before the popular movie. But at the time of the publication of this book, he was a free lance writer who made his daily bread by writing "true life" adventure articles for the men's magazines like Argosy which were popular the 1950's. When in India, John, among other things, interviewed Tenzing, and the book confirms that Tenzing said that Hillary was first to reach the summit.