Yes, Edmund Hillary is a New Zealander and was one of two
people who were the first to reach the top of Mt Everest in 1953.
He belongs in the category 'famous people who used to keep
bees'.
 
His father Percy Hillary had a small holding south of Auckland
(New Zealand's largest city) and developed a commercial
beekeeping business.  He was also heavily involved in industry
organisations and promoting new marketing methods, and
founded and edited several beekeeping journals (he had been a
newspaper editor).
 
Ed Hillary recounts some of his beekeeping time in one of his
books (Nothing venture, nothing win): "Finally I dropped out from
university to work full time for my father, as my brother did too.  It
was a good life; a life of open air and sun and hard physical
work.  And in its way a life of uncertainty and adventure; a
constant fight against the vagaries of the weather.
 
"We had 1600 hives of bees spread around the pleasant
dairyland south of Auckland, occupying small corners on fifty
different farms... We neve knew what our crop would be until the
last pound of honey had been taken off the hives; it could range
from a massive sixty tons down to a miserable twenty or less.
But all through the exciting months of the honey flow the dream
of a bumper crop would drive us on through long hard hours of
labour; manhandling thousands of ninety pound boxes of honey
comb for extracting, and grimacing at our daily ration of a dozen,
or a hundred beestings.  We were incurable optimists."
 
His involvement in the family business diminished as he spent
more time climbing, exploring, and helping the Sherpa people.
 
In 1994 I had the opportunity to hear 'Sir Ed' address a dinner at
the annual conference of the National Beekeepers' Association,
and he drew on his time with beekeeping and the value of
honest, hard, outdoor work.  Sounds like it could have been
rather hokey, but it was the most refreshingly personal talk I've
ever heard at a beekeepers' meeting, or probably elsewhere for
that matter.
 
In the early 1990s when New Zealand issued new designs of
banknotes, notable New Zealanders were to be featured.  By
some process of public consultation (I'm not sure how this
happened, as I was out of the country) Ed Hillary was selected
as the only living New Zealander to end up on the banknotes.
(And he's the only (former) beekeeper, I suppose, at least on
New Zealand's currency!).
 
Andrew