Social Studies: Reaching the summit of Everest.

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Mount Everest from the south.

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Named after George Everest a Surveyor-General of India, the summit of Everest is the highest point on the earths crust. There have been many attempts to reach it not all on foot. Here are some:

• George Mallory discovered the northern approach in on his exploratory mission (unprepared to reach the summit.) climbed 7,007 metres (22,989 ft) in 1921.

• A 1922 expedition under General Charles Granville Bruce and climbing leader Lt-Col. Edward Lisle Strutt. Climbed at 950 feet (290 m) per hour, and reached an altitude of 8,320 m (27,300 ft), the first time a human climbed higher than 8,000m.

• On 8 June 1924 George Mallory and Andrew Irvine made an attempt on the summit from which they never returned.

• Lady Houston, a British millionaire, funded the Houston Everest Flight of 1933, which saw a formation of airplanes led by the Marquess of Clydesdale fly over the summit in an effort to deploy the British Union Jack flag at the top.

• Using conventional open-circuit oxygen, the summit was eventually reached at 11:30 a.m. local time on May 29, 1953 by the New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay from Nepal climbing the South Col Route.

• On May 16, 1976, Junko Tabei of Japan became the first woman on the crest.

• In 1978 Reinhold Messner (Italy) and Peter Habeler (Austria) reached the summit, the first climbers to do so without the use of supplemental oxygen.

• In 1980, a team from Poland on an expedition led by Andrzej Zawada made the first winter assent.

• In 1999, on the North side of the mountain, as part of the Eric Simonson and Jochen Hemmleb's search expedition, Conrad Anker discovered the body of George Mallory at 8160m on the North Face.

There were countless more expeditions before and after the succesful climb by Hillary and Norgay, these are just a few, to see more click the source.

Source: Wikipedia