Certain people in life fascinate me. Those who are here now and those who have long passed from this Earth, physically.
One of those individuals is George Mallory.
George. I imagine him as little guy George, climbing on everything inside and outside his childhood home. Getting scolded at every turn.
And his mother would ask:
“George, why were you climbing on the sofa again?”
Ah, yes. We know his famous words.
“Because it’s there.”
Those three simple words have become one of the most famous quotations in the history of exploration. And we know they were spoken by English mountaineer George Mallory, who was once asked why anyone would want to climb Mount Everest. His answer was unforgettable.
I have often wondered if he was born that way.
A little reading led me to this.
Mallory came into this world in 1886 in the English village of Mobberley, where his father served as the local rector. From an early age, he couldn’t quite keep his feet on the ground. He climbed trees, walls, rooftops, church buildings, and just about anything else that could be climbed. He climbed, and he climbed.
One childhood story captures his spirit quite well, I think. After being sent to his room as punishment, young George reportedly climbed out onto the roof of the family church instead. A great example that showed how his curiosity often outweighed his better judgment.
His love of climbing really took shape while he attended Winchester College. It was then that a teacher introduced students to rock climbing and expeditions in the Alps. Mallory immediately discovered his talent. Or maybe I should say that he discovered his passion. Climbing mountains. And that would define the rest of his life.
He joined the first British reconnaissance expedition to Mount Everest in 1921. He was 35 years old at the time. They explored the mountain’s northern approach through Tibet, which was way before Nepal was open to Western climbers.
A year later, he returned as part of another expedition that climbed to nearly 27,000 feet, an astonishing achievement for the era, before severe weather forced the team back.
Then came 1924.
Mallory made one final attempt, this time with fellow climber Andrew “Sandy” Irvine. The pair were last seen only a few hundred meters below Everest’s summit before disappearing into the clouds. They were never seen alive again. No one knows if they ever made it to the top. I sure hope so.
For seventy-five years, their fate remained one of mountaineering’s greatest mysteries. George Mallory’s body was found an astonishing 75 years after he disappeared on Mount Everest. The discovery was made by the Mallory and Irvine Research Expedition. The climber who actually first spotted the body was Conrad Anker, an American mountaineer.
Mallory was found on May 1, 1999, at about 26,760 feet (8,157 meters) on Everest’s north side. His body was remarkably well preserved by the freezing conditions.
There was no way to tell whether they were going up or coming back down.
Whether he stood on the highest point on Earth may never be known.
I don’t know exactly why he intrigues me, but he does.
One thing is for sure. He loved climbing. And so he did it with reckless abandon. Sadly, it killed him in the end. He was a very young 37 years old.
I suppose some people spend their lives searching for what they love. Maybe most people. We all want to find what is true to ourselves.
George Mallory found what was true to him. He climbed toward it, and never looked back. Ever.
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“Because it’s there.” — George Mallory
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“It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.” — Edmund Hillary
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“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.” — T. S. Eliot
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