Junko Tabei, a Japanese Climber who became the first woman to scale Mount Everest and to conquer the "Seven Summits" — the tallest peak on each continent, died on Oct. 20 in a hospital near Tokyo. She was 77.
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She made the 29,029-foot ascent of Everest, the world’s tallest mountain, in May 1975 as a 35-year-old co-leader of a 15-woman expedition guided by six Sherpas.
Tabei "was diagnosed with cancer 4 years ago but continued her mountaineering activities while undergoing treatment," Japanese broadcaster NHK reports, adding that she died Thursday in a hospital in Kawagoe City.
Her philosophy was to live life to the fullest. "I want to climb even more mountains," she said in a 1991 interview with The Associated Press, 16 years after conquering Everest. "To think, 'It was great,' and then die."
The feat was hailed not only as a triumph of physical fortitude but also as a milestone for women — both in a field dominated by men and in a society in which, Tabei said, “even women who had jobs, they were asked just to serve tea.”She founded the Ladies Climbing Club in 1969 with the slogan "Let's go on an overseas expedition by ourselves."
In 1992, Tabei became the first woman to mount the Seven Summits. After Everest, she climbed Kilimanjaro in Tanzania in 1980, Aconcagua in Argentina in 1987, McKinley (now known as Denali) in Alaska in 1988, Elbrus in Russia in 1989, Vinson Massif in Antarctica in 1991 and Carstensz Pyramid (also known as Puncak Jaya) in Indonesia in 1992.
She was born in 1939 in Miharu, a hilly farming town in Fukushima prefecture about 230 kilometres north of Tokyo. After graduating with a degree in English literature from Showa Women’s University in Tokyo, she abandoned her plans to teach, worked at several jobs to support her climbing and then devoted herself full time to mountaineering.. Her first summit was nearby Mount Nasu with her teacher in the fourth grade.
