Longland was the eldest son of the Rev E. H. Longland (successively curate of Hagley, vicar of St Paul's, Warwick (1908–16) rector of St Nicholas's
Droitwich (1916–27), and vicar of
Cropthorne (1927)) and his wife, Emily, elder daughter of Sir James Crockett. Longland was educated at
the King's School, Worcester, and
Jesus College, Cambridge, where he was
Rustat Exhibitioner and scholar, won a Blue for pole-vaulting, and gained a first in Part I of the Historical Tripos in 1926, and first class honours with distinction in the English Tripos in 1927. He finished second behind
Howard Ford in the pole jump event at the
1929 AAA Championships. After graduating, Longland was elected Charles Kingsley bye-fellow of
Magdalene College for two years, and then spent a year in Germany as Austausch-student at Königsberg University, where he witnessed the early rise of
Adolf Hitler. While still in his twenties Longland established a reputation as a mountaineer. He liked to say that he started out "with a clothes line and a pair of old army boots", but in the words of an obituarist, "as a rock-climber he was brilliant. He will always be remembered for 'Longland's Climb', on
Clogwyn Du'r Arddu, in Snowdonia, the first route right up that formidable crag. It gave him enormous pleasure to climb that route again with his son over 40 years later." He was a member of two major British expeditions – in
1933 to Everest and in 1935 to East Greenland. There were two sons and two daughters of the marriage. During his time at Durham, Longland became increasingly concerned at the social problems caused by the
Great Depression and unemployment in the Durham coalfields, and became an active member of the
Labour Party. In addition to his public service work, Longland was a frequent and popular broadcaster on
BBC Radio. He was described in
The Times as "the perfect chairman, courteous, receptive, self-effacing and clearly well liked by the team". In 1990 Longland gave an address at a gathering to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the birth of
Sir George Everest, the
Surveyor General of India, after whom the mountain was named. The
Royal Geographical Society hosted a gathering of climbers who had made or attempted the ascent of Everest. Among them were
Lord Hunt, leader of the first successful British expedition in 1953, and
Sir Edmund Hillary, who first climbed the mountain with
Tenzing Norgay.
Chris Bonington,
Doug Scott,
Stephen Venables and
Harry Taylor talked of the post-war achievements, and Longland spoke about the early attempts on the mountain. Longland was knighted on his retirement in 1970 and was elected as President of the
Alpine Club (UK) (1974-1976). In his last years he was distressed, in the words of
The Times, "to sit by and watch his educational work being undone by successively tougher Conservative secretaries of state." He died at the age of 88. His wife and one of his sons predeceased him. ==Notes and references==