no day at the beach wrote:
On the 1924 Everest expedition, Edward Felix Norton reached a confirmed height of 28,126 ft (8572m) on the north face without supplementary oxygen.
It would be 54 years (1978) before anyone climbed higher without oxygen assistance.
Given the state of equipment and training in 1924 (and given the requirement to trek 400 miles from Darjeeling just to start the climb), I'd go with Norton over Meissner.
Norton and Somervell's accomplishment in 1924 was incredible, as was many of Messner's accomplishments. I'd add Odell as well with his futile search for the missing Mallory and Irvine on that same 1924 Everest expedition.
I recall reading a Reader's Digest story back in the 1980s. The details are hazy now, but it was about the lone survivor of the sinking of a (fishing?) boat. He swam some ridiculous distance in the open sea (in the North Atlantic if I recall correctly). He made it to shore, but had to avoid being cut to pieces on the rocks and then had to scale a near vertical cliff of good height. After walking for miles in the frigid cold (not sure if it was Iceland, Scandinavia, etc.), he found a trough for some farm animals with water in it...problem was it was frozen. Dying of thirst, he PUNCHED through the several inches of ice with his bare hands to get to the liquid water. After successfully doing that (with broken and bloodied hands), he had to walk several more miles before reaching help. I tried to find that story posted on the internet, but no luck so far - I thought it was titled something along the lines of "The Greatest Story Ever Told".
While searching for the above story, I stumbled upon the amazing story of Poon Lim during WWII.
Some other amazing open sea/castaway survival stories off the top of my head: Capt. Bligh and the others in the open launch after the mutiny, as well as the stories of the Karluk and the Essex (Moby Dick).
Finally, Joe Simpson's "Touching The Void" is an amazing mountaineering survival tale.