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Americans on Everest [VHS]

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This is the story of the first American ascent of Everest in 1963. Jim Whittaker and Nawang Gombu made the summit via the south col route on May 1. Barry Bishop and Lute Jersted followed on May 21, with Lute taking the first moving pictures from the summit, which appears on this video. Barry and Lute then waited for Dr. Tom Hornbein and Willie Unsold, who were coming up the unclimbed west ridge, but left the summit around 3pm. Tom and Willie reached the top at around 6pm, stayed for 15 minutes, then headed down the south col route following Barry's and Lute footsteps. They joined forces around 9pm, continued down the ridge until around midnight when darkness and exhaustion forced a halt. On all but a handful of nights in a whole year, they would have died in the wind. But this night was calm and still, and they survived. Tom and Willie made the first traverse of Everest after reaching a point of no return on their ascent of the west ridge. This climb is now part of mountaineering history and the film is a classic.

This is the film of the first American ascent of Everest in 1963, and features the very first film footage taken of Everest's summit. More than that, it chronicles not only Whittaker and Gombu's reaching the top, but Tom Hornbein and Willie Unsoeld's historic and brave ascent of Everest's difficult West Ridge. Old, and sometimes dated, but from a time when climbing was much less commercialized, and seemingly much more daring and dramatic. Narrated by Orson Wells.