Norman Vaughan is 99 years old and when I interviewed him it was like talking to someone half his age. The sole survivor of Admiral Byrd’s 1925 Antarctica expedition, Norman and his crew of supporters are preparing to climb the Mountain which Admiral Byrd named in his honor (Mount Vaughan) for a 100th birthday party unlike any other I have ever heard about.
To begin with, Mount Vaughan, is no ordinary mountain&emdash;10,302 feet high, it is located 450 miles inland (in Antarctica, of course) where it towers above the Polar Plateau alongside the huge Ross Ice Shelf. Just getting there is an adventure, never mind the long glaciers on both sides of the mountain or the 30 and 50 degree slopes. To climb it, you need to “rope up” in case you slip into one of the many crevasses and disappear forever.
