1975 British Mount Everest Southwest Face expedition

The 1975 British Mount Everest Southwest Face expedition was the first to successfully climb Mount Everest by ascending one of its faces. In the post-monsoon season Chris Bonington led the expedition which used rock climbing techniques to put fixed ropes up the face from the Western Cwm to just below the South Summit. A key aspect of the success of the climb was the scaling of the cliffs of the Rock Band at about 8,200 metres (27,000 ft) by Nick Estcourt and Tut Braithwaite. Two teams then climbed to the South Summit and followed the Southeast Ridge to the main summit – Dougal Haston with Doug Scott on 24 September 1975, who at the South Summit made the highest ever bivouac for that time, and Peter Boardman with Pertemba two days later. It is thought that Mick Burke fell to his death shortly after he had also reached the top. British climbers reached the summit of Everest for the first time in an event that has been described as "the apotheosis of the big, military-style expeditions".

After years of stagnation between the wars, British rock climbing underwent a renaissance, particularly with working-class climbing clubs starting up in the north of England and Scotland. The Rock and Ice Club in Manchester, the Creagh Dhu Mountaineering Club in Glasgow and several university climbing clubs were amongst those that engendered a highly competitive climbing environment. At Clogwyn Du'r Arddu in Wales numerous routes of a very high standard were achieved using strictly free climbing techniques. Hamish MacInnes and Dougal Haston, although not members, climbed with Creagh Dhu. MacInnes had mentored Bonington's youthful climbing as early as 1953. These associations led on to spectacular exploits such as the American-led direttissima route up the North Face of the Eiger in the winter of 1966 (including Haston) and the televised climbing of the Old Man of Hoy in Orkney in the following year (including Bonington and Haston). The public took notice and commercial sponsorship started to become a possibility for even more elaborate expeditions but with an ultimate aim of rock climbing. With all the 8000-metre peaks climbed by 1964, climbing in Himalaya using rock climbing routes became an aspiration.

...
Wikipedia