Mallory and Irvine

A few days before Queen Elizabeth II's coronation in 1953, two members of the British Mount Everest Expedition, led by Lord Hunt, reached the summit of Mount Everest: the highest peak in the world. It had previously been called Peak 15, but was then named after the surveyor George Everest.

Commemorative stamp

Here's a Public Service Broadcasting song to get you in the mood...



However, there are some who think that Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay may not have been the first people to reach the summit.

This is a transcript of a film made by PBS on the mystery of whether George Mallory and Sandy Irvine may actually have got to the summit first.

We will feature this tale near the end of the Adventure Landscapes unit, and draw (as we have before this term) on the work of Matt Podbury, a teacher in Toulouse, France.

If you have a chance to read around the mystery of Mallory and Irvine before then that would be good...