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A fundraiser to expand the Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre based at Aoraki/Mt Cook will take place this month.
An irreplaceable historical collection linked to New Zealand’s most celebrated explorer Sir Edmund Hillary is getting a new storage room to protect the more than 400 artefacts after a water leak had earlier threatened it.
Fundraising to fit out the new storage for the Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre at The Hermitage at Aoraki/Mt Cook will be spearheaded by two evening events in August.
Aoraki/Mt Cook Museum Trust chairperson, Ross Ivey, said a water pipe had burst above the museum’s storage room which had left them with no option but to rehouse the irreplaceable collection which includes items such as a sled used during Sir Edmund’s Trans-Antarctic expedition in the late 1950s.
“The Hermitage owner Sir John Davies made available a space that has good temperature control and, most importantly, no water pipes above it,” Ivey said.
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“They have stripped the room out, painted and carpeted it.
“Now the trust is fundraising to complete the fit out of the room, and provide a space that both researchers and our archivist can use to access and study the items.”
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The 1908 Darracq, one of the artefacts at the Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre, was one of the first tour cars that brought tourists to Aoraki/Mt Cook from Timaru.
Sir Edmund, who with Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay, became the first climbers to climb Mt Everest in 1953, spent many years climbing in the Aoraki/Mt Cook National Park, climbing in the mountain 1948 and also using the region as part of his training for the Trans-Antarctic expedition.
A statue of Sir Edmund gazing towards Aoraki/Mount Cook stands outside The Hermitage.
Pip Kay/Stuff
Sir Edmund Hillary stands alongside his statue at its unveiling at Aoraki/Mt Cook in 2003.
The fundraising evenings at The Hermitage, will feature screenings of the Ocean to Sky documentary about Sir Edmund’s 1977 Indian jet boat expedition, made by Australian filmmaker Michael Dillon in 2019.
“This is a great opportunity to get a group of friends together and come up to the park and celebrate Sir Edmund Hillary’s amazing journey through India,” Ivey said.
“Hamilton jet boats were invented and trialled in the Mackenzie Basin, so this seemed a fitting movie to show as a fundraiser.”
One of the 400 plus artefacts is this Oliver tractor that was mainly used to take ski gear and luggage up to Ball Hut in the Aoraki/Mt Cook National Park.
Ivey said the trust was excited to bring back a fundraiser, after a two-year, Covid-19 induced hiatus of events.
“The trust has not held any events over the past two years due to the pandemic but is now back fundraising to raise funds for further additions to the collection, more archiving, and to complete a fit out of a new storage room for the collection.”
Due to past fundraisers, the trust was able to purchase “specialist hardware” to display the collection online to keen historian’s wanting to see the items from afar.
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A replica of the original Ferguson tractor that Sir Edmund Hillary used on the 1958 Trans-Antarctic Expedition.
Funds from the two events in August would also funnel into the trust’s archivist efforts, which have been ongoing for the past three years according to trustee Simon Cameron.
The trust also has aspirations to update their displays in The Hermitage Hotel and add more items to the collection.
Tickets to the fundraiser evenings on August 20, and August 26, are $55 each, starting at 6pm and seating limited to 120 each night. All proceeds go to the trust.
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