Magazine Article – George Lowe

GEORGE LOWE, AGED 28

Teacher in a rural primary school  in Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand. He  had extensive climbing experience in the New Zealand Alps and  was a master of climbing on ice. He was on the 1951 New Zealand expedition to the Garhwal Himalaya and took part in the 1952 Cho Oyu expedition. George Lowe’s work  breaking a path on the difficult Lhotse Face was a turning point in the expedition. John Hunt described Lowe’s performance as ‘an epic achievement of tenacity and skill’. Lowe did most of the high-altitude filming for Stobart. He climbed with Gregory, Ang Nyima, Hillary and Tenzing to establish Camp IX and, like George Band, he kept the expedition laughing. George Lowe photographed and filmed the 1957-58 Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition, and continued to climb in many parts of the world.

Photo: Alfred Gregory

Right: Tenzing Norgay and George Lowe at Camp VIII on the South Col

Alfred Gregory

[Sir Edmund Hillary, George Lowe and unknown woman]