Junko Tabei

Junko Tabei (Japanese: 田部井 淳子, Hepburn: Tabei Junko; née Ishibashi; 22 September 1939 – 20 October 2016) was a Japanese mountaineer, author and teacher. She was the first woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest and ascend the Seven Summits, climbing the highest peak on every continent.

Tabei wrote seven books, organized environmental projects to clean up trash left behind by climbers on Everest, and led annual climbs up Mount Fuji for youth affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake.

An astronomer named asteroid 6897 Tabei after her and in 2019, a mountain range on Pluto was named Tabei Montes in her honor.

Early life

Junko Ishibashi was born on 22 September 1939 in Miharu, Fukushima. She was the fifth daughter in a family of seven children. Her father worked as a printer. Though she was considered a frail child, she began mountain climbing at the age of ten during a class trip to Mount Nasu. She loved the peaceful nature of climbing and the beautiful views from the mountain tops. However, her family did not have enough money for her to climb often during her high school years.

From 1958 to 1962, Ishibashi studied English and American literature at Showa Women's University. She planned to become a teacher. After finishing school, she returned to climbing and joined several men's climbing groups. Some men welcomed her, while others wondered why she wanted to climb, as it was mostly a men's activity at the time. She eventually climbed all the major mountains in Japan, including Mount Fuji.

When she was 27, Ishibashi married Masanobu Tabei, a fellow climber she met on Mount Tanigawa. They had two children, a daughter named Noriko and a son named Shinya.

Career

In 1969, Junko Tabei started the Joshi-Tohan Club, a group just for women who wanted to climb mountains. This was the first club like it in Japan. The women in the club faced some unfair treatment from male climbers, who sometimes refused to climb with them or made unfair assumptions about their goals. Despite these challenges, the club went on its first expedition in 1970 to climb Annapurna III in Nepal. They reached the top using a new path, becoming the first women and Japanese people to do so.

Tabei and her club later aimed to climb Mount Everest. After waiting four years, they finally got permission to try. They trained for a long time and faced many difficulties, including an avalanche that buried some of the climbers. Tabei was buried in the snow but was dug out safely. She continued with the climb and, on May 16, 1975, became the first woman to reach the top of Everest.

Tabei went on to climb the highest mountains on every continent, achieving a major goal known as the Seven Summits. She also worked to protect mountain environments from waste left by climbers. After a big earthquake in Japan in 2011, she led trips up Mount Fuji for children affected by the disaster. Tabei wrote seven books and continued to inspire many with her love for climbing and nature.

Death and legacy

Junko Tabei was diagnosed with a serious illness in 2012 but kept climbing mountains. In July 2016, she even led a group of young people up Mount Fuji. She passed away in a hospital in Kawagoe on 20 October 2016.

Before she passed away, an astronomer named an asteroid after her, called 6897 Tabei. Later, on the anniversary of her birth in 2019, Google honored her with a special picture on their homepage. In 2019, a mountain range on the distant planet Pluto was also named after her, called Tabei Montes, to remember her amazing climbs.

In popular culture

In 2025, a film called Climbing for Life directed by Junji Sakamoto and starring Sayuri Yoshinaga told the story of Junko Tabei’s first climb up Mount Everest in 1975. The movie showed her amazing achievement and the challenges she faced in her life, celebrating the 50th anniversary of her success. The film began showing at the 38th Tokyo International Film Festival on October 27, 2025.