My mother was a schoolteacher and very keen that I go to a city school, so although it was fairly impoverished times, I traveled every day to the Auckland Grammar School.
Edmund HillaryWhen you go to the mountains, you see them and you admire them. In a sense, they give you a challenge, and you try to express that challenge by climbing them.
Edmund HillaryI get older I get more cantankerous, but June [Hillary] gets a bit more cantankerous, too.
Edmund HillaryI think I mainly climb mountains because I get a great deal of enjoyment out of it. I never attempt to analyze these things too thoroughly, but I think that all mountaineers do get a great deal of satisfaction out of overcoming some challenge which they think is very difficult for them, or which perhaps may be a little dangerous.
Edmund HillaryIn those days we were punished very frequently and I felt that it was often unjust, and so I would resist the desire to agree with many, many things. So I used to get beaten quite frequently and I more or less accepted it as part of life.
Edmund HillaryGeorge Lowe was the one who opened the mail, and George started laughing uproariously and I looked up at him in astonishment and said, "What's so funny?" And he said, "You've been given a title", and I said, "Ha, ha, big joke." I didn't believe him but, sure enough, in this letter it indicated that the Queen had given me a title.
Edmund Hillary