Tuesday, May 12, 1998

The Complete History Of Rolex Conquering Mount Everest [Part 5 of 8]


The Complete History
Rolex Conquers Mount Everest
[Part 5 0f 8]


Worldwide Celebration!!!

There was a parade through Nepal that welcomed the expedition team that conquered Mount Everest.


There were many well wishers who were excited to celebrate the expedition teams outstanding achievement. In the photo below the parade passes Dubar Square in downtown Katmandu, Nepal.


After the parade through Nepal, the climbing party got on an airplane and headed for India.


The photo below is of the reception that was held in the honor of the Mount Everest expedition team and that is Jawaharlal Nehru standing on the podium with his hands behind his back.


The photo below is of Nehru awarding Edmund Hillary with a medal of honor.


In the photo below, Jawaharlal Nehru is talking with Sir Edmund Hillary after his successful conquering of Mount Everest, with other members of the expedition team looking on.


Jawaharlal Nehru was crazy about Tenzing Norgay and pronounced that Tenzing was of Indian descent. Tenzing is pictured below being awarded by Nehru.


Tenzing is pictured below with Nehru in a reception after the award ceremony.


While in India a huge controversy broke out. According to Edmund Hillary, Tenzing signed a document saying he made it to the summit first, ahead of Hillary. It was then learned that Tenzing did not understand what he signed and Tenzing and Hillary signed a statement saying they both made it to the summit next to each other.

Years later, in his his book, View From The Summit, first published in 1999, many years after Tenzing died, Hillary broke his silence and said that he made it to the top first, not Tenzing.

Sir Edmund Hillary

Edmund Hillary and John Hunt traveled to England where they were knighted by young Queen Elizabeth II.


Retirement

After climbing Mount Everest, Sir Edmund Hillary was considered to be one of the top explorer's on earth. in 1954, Hillary was on another Himalayan expedition, high on a peak neighboring Everest where he broke three of his ribs while rescuing one of his fellow climbers. He then caught pneumonia, and had to be removed from the mountain on a stretcher as seen below.


Ironically, this is the only photo taken during Hillary's climbing career where I believe I can positively identify a climber wearing a Rolex. In the photo above of Hillary being put on a stretcher, the climber taking off Hillary's goggles appears to be wearing a stainless steel Rolex Explorer. A few years later, Hillary suffered three high altitude strokes which would forever preclude him from high altitude climbing.


Tragedy Strikes

Four months after conquering Mount Everest, Edmund Hillary got married to Louise Mary Rose, who was a daughter of a mountain climber. Louise was 11 years younger than Edmund. They had three children together, a daughter and two sons. One of their sons, Peter would follow in his father's footstep by reaching the summit of Everest many years later.

Louise and Edmund are seen in the picture below. In 1975, tragedy struck Edmund Hillary when his wife Louise and daughter Belinda died in an airplane accident over the Himalayas while they were coming to visit him.

Edmund suffered for years over the tragedy, and blamed it on himself, because his wife never felt comfortable traveling aboard small airplanes all over the world to visit him and he realized he had pushed her against her will to do so. He was so upset that he contemplated suicide, but over the years he was able to move on.

Edmund Hillary was a man who experienced the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.


Sir Edmund Hillary is considered to be one of the most beloved and trusted New Zealanders. His portrait is commemorated on the New Zealand Five Dollar bill as seen below.



The Tiger of the Snow

After their successful climb, Tezing Norgay became an internationally famous figure. As with most fame, it was a blessing and a curse. Tenzing wrote an autobiography named The Tiger of the Snows which was a big hit.


Tenzing Norgay appeared on the Cover of the April 25, 1955 Sports Illustrated. Sports Illustrated was so enamored with Tezing's success that it ran a four installment article covering his book, The Tiger of the Snows. In the photo below Tenzing's shoulders are covered with vermilion powder that was sprinkled on him as a sign of adulation by Nepalese villagers.


Tenzing is pictured below in a photo that appeared in Sports Illustrated in 1955. In 1955 Tenzing must have felt like he was still on top of the world.


In the photo below, Tenzing had a rare family reunion in Darjeeling with three generations of his family. Pictured from left to right on the top row: first wife, Ang Lahinu, daughter Nima, aged 16, Tenzing's mother, Tenzing. Bottom Row, Older daughter Pem-Pem (18) is sitting with her Tibetian lap-dog. Others in photo are Tenzing's cousins.



Posted by Jake Ehrlich at 2:40 PM

Sunday, April 12, 1998

The Complete History Of Rolex Conquering Mount Everest [Part 4 of 8]


The Complete History
Rolex Conquers Mount Everest
[Part 4 0f 8]


Man Versus Mountain

In 1952 while Tenzing had been climbing Everest with the Swiss Expedition, Edmund Hillary had been surveying Everest for the upcoming British expedition. In the photo below, we see Edmund Hillary standing at the base of Mount Everest staring at the monster he would soon try to conquer.


The First Meeting

When Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary first met, as seen in the series of three photos below, they had no idea their lives would be inextricably linked forever. From all accounts, they were both very humble, unassuming, unpretentious men; both with a quiet, but burning desire to reach the top of the world.

Tenzing and Hillary were an odd couple. They came from completely different cultures and did not speak the same language. Hillary was 6 foot 3 inches tall and Tenzing was 5 foot 6 inches tall.



Tenzing Norgay was 39 years old and Edmund Hillary was 34 years old when they both finally climbed to the top of the world on May 29, 1953.


 Tensing Norgay was part of three official British attempts to climb Everest from the Tibetian side from the north in the 1930s. In 1947 Tensing also took part in another unsuccessful attempt to climb Mount Everest that failed because the weather pounded them. In 1952, Tensing took part in two Swiss expeditions led by Raymond Lambert which were the first serious attempts to climb Mount Everest from the southern (Nepalese) side.

In the photo below you notice Tenzing is wearing an oxygen tank like a scuba diver. This is because the higher you get on Everest the thinner the air gets. At the top of Mount Everest you enter a section aptly named "The Death Zone" because there is less than 1/3 of the amount of oxygen a human needs to live.

The further the climbers get to the top the slower they move due to the lack of oxygen. A very fit 30 year old man is suddenly rendered into an 90 year old man with the lack of oxygen.


After the Chinese government took over Tibet in 1950 they closed off any routes to Everest and Nepal only allowed one expedition per year.

Edmund Hillary was a member of a 1951 British reconnaissance expedition to Mount Everest. Again in 1952, Hillary with George Lowe were part of another British attempt led by Eric Shipton which failed due to a lack of a route from the Nepal side.

Eric Shipton was named as the leader for the 1953 British expedition, but was replaced by British Brigadier, Sir John Hunt. The Hunt expedition was a giant team effort that consisted of over 400 people of which there were 362 porters and 20 Sherpa guides along with 10,000 pounds of baggage.




British Expedition leader, Hunt appointed two climbing teams for the attempted conquest of Mount Everest. The first team consisted of Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, and the other team consisted of Charles Evans and Tom Bourdillon. In the photo above you see Tenzing below with Hillary leading the way above.

Ironically, on May 26, 1953 the team of Tom Bourdillon and Chalres Evans attempted to climb the last stretch of Everest but had to turn back when Charles Evans' oxygen system experienced a failure. The Evans and Bourdillon team came within 300 vertical feet (91 meters) of the summit.

Hunt then directed Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay to ascend to the summit.







 The Ultimate Wisdom

The famous mountaineer and writer, James Ullman who was the ghost writer for Tenzing Norgay's autobiography, Man of Everest (originally published as Tiger of the Snows), once wrote: "It is the ultimate wisdom of the mountains that a man is never more of a man than when he is striving for that which is beyond his grasp" and that was clearly the case with Tenzing and Hillary as they strove toward the top of Everest.

As a matter of fact, Sir Edmund Hillary said "we didn't know if it was humanly possible to reach the top of Mount Everest" but that clearly did not stop them from trying.

At 11:30 a.m. on May, 29, 1953 Hillary and Tenzing reached Mount Everest's Summit at 29,028 feet (8,848 Meters) which is the highest point on earth. When they reached the top they spent 15 minutes looking for evidence of the 1924 Mallory expedition but came up empty handed. When they returned down the mountain the first team member they ran into was Hillary's lifelong pal, George Lowe to which Hillary famously said "Well, George, we knocked the bastard off."

I always thought the photo above was of Hillary and Tenzing on top of the summit but apparently it is not. The only photo of either one of them on the summit is of Tenzing (pictured below) and it was taken by Hillary. Tenzing did not take a photo of Hillary because he did not know how to use a camera.



Posted by Jake Ehrlich at 2:43 PM

Thursday, March 12, 1998

Jacques-Yves Cousteau The Greatest Explorer [Part 3 of 5]


Jacques-Yves Cousteau
The Greatest Explorer
[Part 3 of 5]


The Right Stuff & Jacques Cousteau
The Two First Rolex SEA-DWELLERS

At the exact same time, in 1965, as Conshelf III was underway 328 feet below the sea, on the opposite side of the planet, in San Diego, California in the U.S.A., the United States Navy's SEA-LAB 2 project was underway, deep under the sea–with Scott Carpenter leading his team of U.S. Navy Aquanauts.

Scott Carpenter, aboard SEA-LAB 2, located in the Pacific Ocean had a telephone conversation with Jacques Cousteau's younger son, Philippe Cousteau who was aboard Conshelf III, located in the Mediterranean Ocean. Since they were both breathing a mixture of helium and oxygen, the both spoke like Donald-Duck.

The U.S. Navy decided to finally pursue Dr. Bond's ideas because they believed aquanauts living underwater in a zero-gravity-like-environment were very closely simulating the same conditions the NASA astronauts would soon be experiencing in space on their long journey to the moon, and who better to lead the team, than an experienced NASA astronaut and U.S. Navy test pilot, Scott Carpenter.

This is where the nexus I spoke about earlier in the story comes into play regarding the development of the Rolex SEA-DWELLER.

In order to best understand the metamorphosis of the Rolex Submariner into the Rolex SEA-DWELLER we have to examine the career of U.S. Navy test pilot, NASA Astronaut & SEA-LAB Aquanaut, Scott Carpenter.


Scott Carpenter was a U.S. Navy test pilot and was chosen as one of the Original 7 Mercury astronauts back in the late 1950s. Scott Carpenter is pictured below with his fellow Mercury astronauts and Scott is on the far left.


The photo below is the official group portrait of the Original 7 Mercury astronauts and Scott Carpenter is pictured in the bottom right-hand corner.


After Scott Capenter successfully flew his Mecury Mission aboard his Aurora 7 spacecraft, he became obsessed with Jacques Cousteau's amazing career achievements. Scott Carpenter mentioned to me, in a telephone conversation that he was completely blown away with Jacques Cousteau's work and asked NASA for special permission to go and work with Jacques Cousteau if Cousteau would permit him to do so.

Jacques Cousteau with U.S. Navy SEA-LAB Aquanaut Scott Carpenter

NASA approved loaning Scott to Jacques and Scott contacted Jacques and asked him what he thought. Jacques Cousteau said he would love to work with Scott but since Scott did not speak fluent French there would be somewhat of a language barrier.

Then Jacques asked Scott, why he didn't go to work for the U.S. Navy SEA-LAB project which was working on a very similar project? Scott was not aware of the U.S. Navy SEA-LAB project at the time, but took Jacques advice and became a member of the SEA-LAB Aquanaut team.


SEA-LAB was responsible for developing a great deal of new diving technology including modern diving tables. The U.S. Navy SEA-LAB habitat is pictured above in dry-dock.


Scott Carpenter is pictured above as he returns from a dive in California near La Jolla Canyon during the SEA-LAB 2 program in 1965. In the photo below we see Scott Carpenter aboard SEA-LAB 2 and he is wearing his Rolex Submariner, and the other round disc-like device on his watchband is a water temperature gauge which Scott told me was standard issue at the time.

Scott broke the record aboard SEA-LAB 2 for the longest SEA-DWELLER duration. Every day during his month on SEA-LAB 2, Scott would leave the habitat and work underwater. SEA-LAB 2 was positioned in the La Jolla Canyon off the California cost at a depth of 62m or 203 Feet, and the dive began on August 28, 1965.


Unlike SEA-LAB 1 which was located off the coast of Bermuda in 1964, SEA-LAB 2 had hot showers and refrigeration aboard. In the photo below we see Tuffy the dolphin from the U.S. Navy Marine Mammal Program, who delivered supplies to the team aboard SEA-LAB 2 from the surface.


[You can learn more about Scott Carpenter's involvement with the development of the Rolex SEA-DWELLER with SEA-LAB and listen to my podcast interview with Scott by clicking here.]

On Jake's Rolex Watch Blog we learned from the T. Walker Lloyd podcast interview that Rolex had been developing the helium-release valve on the Rolex SEA-DWELLER watch with SEA-LAB, because their divers were experiencing the crystals on their Rolex Submariner's shooting off their watches when they came up for decompression, and thus the helium-gas-release valve was born.

Prior to going to work for Rolex in a 25 year career as a Rolex executive, T. Walker Lloyd was a famous deep-sea diver and Rolex produced this magazine advertisement featuring T. Walker along with a Double-Red SEA-DWELLER.


The COMEX Link
to the Rolex Submariner, SEA-DWELLER & Jacques Cousteau

Until I discovered the link between SEA-LAB and the development of the helium release valve for the Rolex SEA-DWELLER it was believed that SEA-DWELLER owned its genesis to the French Diving Company, COMEX. Here is a COMEX ad for a double-red Rolex SEA-DWELLER.


Henry Germain Delauze
Founder of COMEX

Henry Germain Delauze was born in France in 1929 and went on to found COMEX in 1961. COMEX is the acronym for Compagnie Maritime d’Expertise in Marseille.

Prior to founding COMEX, Henry was a diver for Jacques Cousteau's Calypso team from 1952 to 1955. The photo below of Henry Germain Delauze was taken in 1950.


This next photo of Henry Delauze, founder of COMEX was taken two years after he founded COMEX, in 1963. Jacques Cousteau with the Conshelf Project and Scott Carpenter with SEA-LAB may have pioneered living and working under the sea, but COMEX continued to live, work and dwell in the sea to this day. In many ways, COMEX was the primary beneficiary of the Conshelf and SEA-LAB projects.


I don't know exactly what COMEX's role was in the development of the Rolex Submariner and SEA-DWELLER? T. Walker Lloyd said he believed they originally came to Rolex and said they needed a Rolex Submariner that could go deeper but this still remains a big question mark in my mind.

Rolex produced special COMEX Submariner and SEA-DWELLER watch models that had the COMEX designation on the dial which are highly valued by the Rolex collectible community today because the COMEX models were never available to the public for purchase–and thus they are very rare.

The Rolex Submariner [Reference 5513/5514] pictured below was recently sold by the Antiquorum auction house in Switzerland for $75,000 in U.S. Dollars. This watch is a rarity because it is a Submariner with a helium release valve. This watch was made by Rolex for Comex in 1977.

According to the Antiquorum, Rolex siad the following about Comex models:

"Submariner and Sea-Dweller References used by Comex: 1970-1972/3 Submariner Reference 5513 with HEV (Helium Escape Valve).
• 1972-1978 Submariners Reference 5514 with HEV made for COMEX only.
• 1978-1979 Submariner Reference 1680 without HEV.
• 1977-1980 Sea-Dweller Reference 1665 with HEV.
• 1980-1984 Sea-Dweller sapphire Reference 16660 with HEV.
• 1982-1986 Submariner sapphire Reference 168000 without HEV.
• 1988-1989 Submariner Reference 168000 without HEV.
• 1986-1997 Submariner Reference 16610 without HEV.
• 1992-1997 Sea-Dweller Reference 16600 with HEV and sapphire crystal.

COMEX (COmpaignie Maritime d'EXpertixe)
A French company, specialized in deep sea exploration that made great advances in saturation diving in the 1960's and 1970's. At the time COMEX divers wore Rolex Submariners, reference 5513. There were rated to 200 meters, sufficient for most dives. However, during the 10-day decompression period following saturation dives, the watch crystals would explode due to pressure from helium that had built up in the watch. To rectify the problem, Rolex invented the gas escape valve (Swiss Patent 492246). This simple spring-loaded one-way valve was first fitted to the standard Submariner 5513, which was then given the Reference 5514. Further research led to the first "Sea-Dweller, Submariner 2000", Reference 1665, in 1971."


There is an apparently gaping hole (pun not intended) in Antiquorum's analysis because they don't discuss the Single Red, SEA-LAB SEA-DWELLER [Reference 1665] that was made by Rolex in 1967 (pictured below). According to vintage Rolex dealer, Erik Ku and confirmed by John Goldberger, there are only 5 known examples of the Single Red SEA-LAB SEA-DWELLER.

Notice that the Single Red SEA-LAB SEA-DWELLER has a number of unusual designations on the dial including obviously the red SEA-DWELLER designation, but also it says "Submariner 500M –1650 FT." All other SEA-DWELLERS have the 2000FT designation rating. Also notice on the dial the second text line under "ROLEX" has the word "DATE" larger than "Oyster Perpetual."

Assuming the data table from Antiquorum is correct then the Single Red SEA-LAB SEA-DWELLER predates any COMEX Submariner or SEA-DWELLER. In a conversation I had with leading Rolex expert, James Dowling he confirmed this notion by saying he believed the SEA-DWELLER owed its genesis more to SEA-LAB than COMEX.




Posted by Jake Ehrlich at 8:02 PM

The Complete History Of Rolex Conquering Mount Everest [Part 3 of 8]


The Complete History
Rolex Conquers Mount Everest
[Part 3 0f 8]

Onward & Upward

Throughout history mankind has had a preoccupation with trying to conquer the unexplored. In 1924, George Mallory, an Englishman from Cheshire tried to climb Everest with his climbing partner, Andrew Irvine. Both Mallory and Irvine are pictured below.


The climbers were last seen just a few hundred meters from the summit and then they disappeared. Nobody knows if they made it to the top. The photo below is the last time Mallory or Irvine were ever seen. If you look closely, you can see them about one third of the way over from the left edge of the photo. In 1999 Mallory's body was discovered.

When somebody asked Mallory why he wanted to climb Mount Everest, he famously replied, "because it is there!"


Many other men attempted to climb Everest in 1924 including the group below who posed for the portrait.


Many men have lost their lives attempting to conquer Mount Everest. In the early expeditions, the gentlemen climbers were ill equipped with their tweed suits that did not do a very good job of protecting them from the elements.

The Beekeeper & The Yak Herder

Sir Edmund Hillary was born in Auckland, New Zealand on July 21, 1919. During World War II, Hillary served in the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF) as seen in the photo below. As a teen, Edmund Hillary developed a passion for mountain climbing. He took a job as a beekeeper so that in the winter he could climb.


Tenzing Norgay

Tenzing Norgay's early life has conflicting accounts. In his first autobiography he said he was born and brought up in Khumbu, Nepal, but recent research claims he was born in Tibet in Khara Valley. Apparently his family became destitute when their yaks died from disease, and he was sold as a slave to a Sherpa family in Thamey, Nepal.

Tenzing Norgay wrote about the significance of Yak's where he grew up near Everest. Tenzing wrote:

"The land there is harsh and stony; the weather is bitter; but still we have both agriculture and pasturage. But most important are the yaks. From them we get wool for clothing, leather for shoes, dung for fuel, milk, butter and cheese for food. For the Sherpa, as for all high Himalayan people, the yak is the great staple of life. From it a man can get almost everything he needs to nourish him and keep him warm."

I included this photo of a Tibetian Yak for frame of reference. I think Tenzing forgot to mention that Yak's are also used for transportation, for plowing land and perhaps their skin would be used for making bags and gloves.


In this next photo taken with Mount Everest in the background you see a local farmer plowing land with Yaks.


This next photo is of Tenzing as a young man.


This next photo of Tenzing was taken with his first of three wives and two of his daughters.


Tezning tried to climb Mount Everest 7 times before finally making it. In 1952, Tenzing joined two different Swiss Expedition's and in the second expedition, he climbed to within 800 feet of the summit with Swiss climber Raymond Lambert. Lambert and Tenzing made it up to 28,215 feet (8,599 Meters) and had to turn back.


The reason they had to turn back was because when the got very close to the top, they had a tent, but no sleeping bags, so they almost froze to death at night. This was a powerful lesson learned so in the next attempt, Tenzing and Hillary brought sleeping bags.


Posted by Jake Ehrlich at 2:51 PM
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