By George P. Edmonston Jr.

Willi Unsoeld atop Mt. Everest, photo from the June 1996 Oregon Stater.

The early 1960s were banner years for OSU athletics. Quarterback Terry Baker won a Heisman Trophy. The basketball team made it to the Final Four for the only time in OSU history. The cross country team won the school’s only NCAA team championship in any sport. And halfway around the world, renowned OSU mountaineer Willi Unsoeld was making history - not to mention a memorable photo op - on the world’s highest mountain. We are pleased to present this feature, which first appeared in the Oregon Stater in June 1996, as a special tribute to the 40th anniversary of this world-famous event.

It was 3:15 p.m., May 22, 1963. Lute Jerstad and climbing companion Barry Bishop could finally see the top of the mountain, clearly marked by an American flag flapping briskly in the almost hurricane-force winds that whipped across the summit.

It had been planted there three weeks earlier by expedition team member "Big" Jim Whittaker of Redmond, Wash., marking the occasion of the first successful climb of Mount Everest by an American.

Now, in just a minute or so, it would be Jerstad and Bishop's turn to stand where Whittaker had stood, plant their own flags, take a few photos, gaze at the world far below, and reflect on what it meant to be standing at the highest place on earth.

They had started their final ascent two hours before daylight, from Camp VI at 27,450 feet. The way they had chosen to the top was the one route Everest gives you, the South Col, pioneered in 1953 by the mountain's first conquerors, Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tensing Norgay. In 1956, Hillary's "path" had been retraced by a team of four Swiss climbers.

Thirty-year old Barry Bishop lived in Washington, D.C., where he was a staff photographer for National Geographic magazine. Once on top, he would have work to do: taking the photos the magazine would need for its story of the climb.

Jerstad, 26, was a doctoral student and speech instructor at the University of Oregon. His passion was mountain climbing. He had cut his teeth in the sport by tackling most of the higher stuff in the Rockies, the Cascades and Alaska's Mount McKinley.

Now on the summit, the two spent the next 45 minutes celebrating and taking photos. When they were done, there was one more assignment to complete: to wait for the others.

The plan that day was to put four climbers on the top -- teams of two using separate routes to the objective. After meeting up, they would descend together back to Camp VI. As they stood alone at 29,000 feet and watched deep shadows begin to form in the valleys below, Bishop and Jerstad looked toward the west face of the mountain, hoping to see some sign of their friends.

Nothing.

They waited.

Still nothing.

With daylight fading, the two decided to ditch the rendezvous idea and start back. To stay after dark on top of Everest was an invitation to disaster.

The missing climbers were extraordinary athletes. What separated them from everyone else was their daring, the lengths they would go to prove a point. On this expedition, they had nixed the idea of following Jerstad and Bishop up the South Col. It had been done, at least four times now, so why bother. Instead, the intrepid climbers were attempting what the experts said was impossible: conquering Everest by climbing its West Ridge.

Sheer cliffs to the top!

Raised in San Diego, Thomas Hornbein was a 32-year-old anesthesiologist who had designed the oxygen masks the four were wearing on this historic day. He had even talked the Maytag home appliance company into making the equipment at no charge.

His companion was William Unsoeld, who, at 36, was the oldest climber of the four. A year earlier, he had taken a leave of absence from his teaching position in the philosophy department at Oregon State College and had moved his family to Nepal to begin a two-year assignment as that country's deputy director of the Peace Corps.

Both Unsoeld and wife, Jolene, were Oregon Staters, he finishing in 1951 and she in '53. The two had helped start the OSC Mountain Club...had announced their engagement during a club outing...on top of Mount Hood!

Arriving at the summit of Everest some three hours after their teammates, Unsoeld and Hornbein quickly set about completing their own celebration. Then, with nightfall rapidly approaching, Unsoeld had one final ceremonial act he wanted to perform. Handing Hornbein his camera, the intrepid Beaver pulled from his pack a large, triangular flag sporting the circular logo of the OSC Mountain Club.

Jolene and classmate Jeanne Neff had hand-stitched the banner in the early 1950s as an esprit de corps item for the new club. It quickly became popular with the members and went with them on all their outings.

As Unsoeld began attracting attention for his climbing skills, he was given permission to take the flag on his travels. And so, when he joined an American-Pakistan expedition in 1960 to climb Mt. Mashabram (25,660 feet) in the western Himalayas, the flag was there. The banner's resume also included a trip in 1960 to Antarctica, the world's most southern point, carried there by Cmdr. Edward W. Donnally.

Moving off the top of the great mountain, Unsoeld and Hornbein could still see well enough to find the South Summit, a short distance below. It was 7:15 p.m. The last light had left Lhotse, Makalu and other nearby peaks. Now the sun's rays lingered finally on the summit of Everest itself.

Darkness closed in with a swiftness that caught the two veteran climbers by surprise. Up to this point, they had been loosely following the tracks left by Jerstad and Bishop. When failing light made this impossible, they were suddenly without a clue on where to go next.

A great moment of truth had arrived.

Hornbein, who was having trouble with his oxygen supply, wanted to stay put and start again at first light. Unsoeld voted no. His opinion was that they would never survive the elements at that altitude. An argument ensued. In the end, Willi got his way. His prize was a nightmare, a descent down the South Col in pitch-black darkness.

Cutting across what seemed to be a large snow slope, the two began moving in the direction of Camp VI. Having only a flashlight, and tied to one another with a 60-foot piece of rope, they groped their way downward, looking for track marks or ice ax holes left by their friends. To fight back fear and exhaustion, the two began to yodel. They were hoping the noise would arouse someone from camp.

They were heard! Off in the distance, faint shouts were somehow cutting through the frigid, howeling wind, voices, human voices, calling out to them. It was Lute and Barry!

They pushed on. Finally, figures began to emerge. The night had turned to total blackness, rendering the climbers completely blind. Jerstad had to reach out to "touch" the nearest voice to identify who it was.

"Who are you ?" he asked.

"Tom," came the answer.

Then Unsoeld arrived. The teams were together at last. It was 9:30 p.m. With their oxygen supply almost exhausted, and a weak flashlight their only source of light, their situation was serious. The four continued down the mountain.

At 30 minutes past midnight, the decision was made to bivouac. Altitude: 28,000 feet, more than 2,000 feet above the highest previous emergency bivouac in history. The temperature was 20 below.

Lying snug against an outcropping of rock, with arms, legs and bodies intertwined for warmth, the four prepared to die. But Everest was merciful. The winds stopped their raging gales and in five hours, the sun was once again touching the slopes of the great mountain.

The next day, the group was at last at base camp. For Willi Unsoeld, Lute Jerstad and Barry Bishop, a new ordeal was about to begin, the ill-effects of frostbite. After being carried a full day on the backs of Sherpas to reach a rescue helicopter, they were whisked off to the United Mission Hospital in Katmandu, where all would live to see another day -- and climb another mountain.

Unsoeld and Hornbein were particularly pleased with what they had done on the climb. In addition to helping set a world record for an emergency bivouac, they became the first climbers in history to scale the West Face of Everest. The two were also the first to "traverse" the summit of the great mountain, that is going up one way and coming down another.

Unsoeld was killed in an avalanche on March 4, 1979, while leading a group of college students from Evergreen State College across Mt. Rainier's often-dangerous Cadaver Gap. He was a founding member of the college.

In 1976, while attempting to climb Nanda Devi, India's highest peak, he watched the death of his daughter at high altitude, a gifted and talented climber in her own right who, ironically, Willi and Jolene had named after the mountain that took her life.

At last report, Jolene Unsoeld was a resident of Washington state, where she had been elected to Congress in the early 1980s.

Tom Hornbein served for many years as the chair of the anesthesiology department at the University of Washington's School of Medicine. Today, he is an emeritus professor with the school. On Feb. 13, 2003, Dr. Hornbein delivered the 2003 Willi Unsoeld Seminar Series lecture at the college, where he has been an ardent supporter of the series since its inception in 1986.

Lute Jerstand operated Lute Jerstad Adventures in Portland until his death by an apparent heart attack on Nov. 1, 1998, while trekking in the Everest region with his stepdaughter and grandson. According to news reports, he was cremated and his ashes spread over the Thyangboche Monastery on the route to the great mountain.

Barry Bishop lost his life in a one-car accident near Pocatello, Idaho, in 1994. He had only recently retired from National Geographic Magazine and had moved to Bozeman, Mont.

Unsoeld may have been the first from the Corvallis-area or OSU to conquer Everest, but there have been others.

On Sept. 29, 1988, another Oregon Stater, Stacy Allsion, became the first American woman to accomplish the amazing trip to the top. In addition to serving as a motivational speaker, the 1984 OSU graduate owns and operates Stacy Allison General Contracting, a residential building company. She lives in Portland with her husband, David, and their two sons.

In 1996, Corvallis High alumnus Jon Krakauer made it to the summit in a climb that ended with the tragic loss of eight members of the expedition.

George Edmonston Jr. is editor of the Oregon Stater and Eclips.