Tony Freake wins 2008 Hillary Medal
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British national Mr. Anthony John Freake of Norfolk, England (UK), is the designated recipient of the 2008 Sir Edmund Hillary Mountain Legacy Medal for "remarkable service in conservation of culture and nature in remote mountainous regions." Tony Freake is the founder and director of the non-profit Phortse Community Project (PCP). The medal will be presented by Peter Hillary at a ceremony in Tengboche Monastery (Khumbu, Nepal) on May 29.
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Phortse is a community of about 400 Sherpas in the Khumbu District of Nepal, perched on an isolated terrace approximately 3800 meters above sea level and about 15 km southwest of Mt. Everest. Papa Tony, as Mr Freake is known locally, visited Phortse for the first time in 1989. In 1992, Mr Freake undertook to build a house for the schoolteachers at Phortse, and since then his PCP has undertaken numerous development projects including a health clinic, hydroelectric plant and electricity supply system, Tibetan Buddhist monastery, youth club, drinking water supply system, multipurpose community building and educational scholarships.
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In most of these projects, Eton College (Windsor, UK) has been a principal financial backer. In 1999 Mr Freake was able to mobilize not only a cohort of students from Eton College but also groups from Community Links (Canning Town, London) and Himalayan Hands (Derbyshire, UK), two non-profit organisations. Together they erected a new four-room schoolhouse that is a testament to the central importance of local education in preserving traditional communities. In great part, Mr Freake’s success has been due to his ability to inspire others with the urgency of the task at hand. As he says, without such facilities, Phortse’s children would have to leave home at an early age, contributing to the disruptive outmigration that threatens many remote communities.
According to Mr Freake, his projects in Phortse have been directly modeled on the philanthropic work of Sir Edmund Hillary. Sir Edmund’s personal efforts, and those of the foundations that he helped establish in New Zealand, Canada, the United States, Germany and the United Kingdom have resulted in the construction of some 30 schools, two airstrips, two hospitals and 11 village clinics. Hillary also assisted in the restoration of monasteries, instituted scholarship and teacher training programs and established reforestation projects in Khumbu (the Nepalese district encompassing Mt. Everest), Mustang and the Annapurna region. In every case, Sir Edmund undertook projects at the specific request of the local residents. The Hillary Medal was initiated in 2003 by the Nepalese NGO Mountain Legacy (www.mountainlegacy.org) both to honour Sir Edmund’s work and to encourage others to emulate his example.
The presentation of the Sir Edmund Hillary Medal will be a featured event at the 55th anniversary commemoration of the first ascent of Mt. Everest, by Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay; the celebration will take place at Tengboche Monastery (within sight of Phortse) on May 29, 2008. Peter Hillary, son of the world-famous explorer and an Everest summiter and explorer in his own right, will officiate the ceremony.
To find out about the Phortse Community Project, visit their Web site at http://www.phortsecommunityproject.org.uk. For further information, or to find out how you can collaborate, contact Tony Freake at info@phortsecommunityproject.org.uk.
The Sir Edmund Hillary Mountain Legacy Medal is a project of Mountain Legacy and is sponsored by the Environment and Planning Program, The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology University.
For information, contact Dr Beau B. Beza, Chair, Hillary Medal Selection Committee, School of Global Studies, Social Science and Planning, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) University, Melbourne, Australia (tel.: 61 3 9925 9822 or email: beza@hillarymedal.org).
World Expeditions is proud to be a major sponsor of the 2008 Sir Edmund Hillary Mountain Legacy Medal. World Expeditions applauds the good work this Medal represents in supporting and assisting the welfare of mountain people and continuing Sir Edmund Hillary's humanitarian projects.
