SIR EDMUND P. HILLARY - TYPED LETTER SIGNED 05/22/1996 - HFSID 281015

EDMUND HILLARY
He signs a typed 1996 letter, on stationery of the Himalayan Trust
Typed Letter signed: "E. P. Hillary", 1 page, 8½x11. Auckland, New Zealand, 1996 May 22. On letterhead of the Himalayan Trust to Steve Keyser, El Cajon, California. In full: "I would be happy to sign three of your hardback books if you can send them to me." On May 29th, 1953, Edmund P. Hillary (1919-2008) stood poised atop the highest mountain peak on earth (29,028 feet). Together, Hillary and a Sherpa mountaineer, Tenzing Norgay, as members of a British expedition, were the first men ever to surmount the forbidding Mount Everest of the Himalayas. As a result of his achievement, Hillary, the beekeeper from Auckland, New Zealand, was knighted Sir Edmund. In 1955, he published High Adventure, which detailed his climb. Hillary then guided a New Zealand group, in support of the British Commonwealth Trans-Arctic Expedition, to establish a base and lay out depots towards the South Pole, a grueling three-year ordeal ending successfully in March of 1958. In 1977, he led the first jet-boat expedition up the Ganges, eventually climbing to its source in the Himalayas. In 1960, Hillary created the Himalayan Trust, aimed at improving the lives of the Sherpa people by addressing basic infrastructural needs: education, health services, reforestation, etc. He was also President of the Volunteer Service Abroad, a patron of the Race Relations Council and has been active in conservation campaigns. His autobiography, Nothing Venture, Nothing Win, was published in 1975. Fold creases affecting "E H" of signature. Fine condition.