Early Life
Rutkiewicz was born in Plungė, Lithuania. After World War II, her family chose to leave for Poland, settling in Wrocław in southwestern Poland's Recovered Territories, where she graduated from Wroclaw University of Technology as an electrical engineer.
Began climbing in the rocks near the Janowice Wielkie (Mount Falcon (Polish: Góry Sokole))
On 16 October 1978, she became the third woman, the first Pole and the first European woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest. In 1986 she became the first woman to successfully climb and descend K2, which she did without supplemental oxygen, as part of a small expedition led by Lilliane and Maurice Barrard. Her triumph was marred when both the Barrards died on the descent, becoming two of thirteen climbers to die on K2 that summer.
Read more about this topic: Wanda Rutkiewicz
Famous quotes containing the words early life, early and/or life:
“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“Probably more than youngsters at any age, early adolescents expect the adults they care about to demonstrate the virtues they want demonstrated. They also tend to expect adults they admire to be absolutely perfect. When adults disappoint them, they can be critical and intolerant.”
—The Lions Clubs International and the Quest Nation. The Surprising Years, I, ch.4 (1985)
“I think it beats the heck out of life after death, that’s for sure.”
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