Photo provided Columbus resident Mark Yeaton is shown at the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro.
In the past decade alone, Mark Yeaton has cycled across the state to raise money for small business loans among the struggling in Ghana, pedaled 3,000 miles cross country to raise funds for clean water for the less fortunate in Kenya, and steered his handlebars up a total of 29,000 feet of Brown County hills to generate donations for United Way of Bartholomew County’s COVID-19 Relief Fund.
Interestingly, that last 20-hour climbing effort falls under an activity called Everesting.
Now, he has capped his fundraising feats by ditching the bike and summiting Tanzania’s Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak at 19,341 feet — all with an experienced crew from Indianapolis. Kilimanjaro, also scaled by Columbus resident Walter Glover, is known as one of the world’s Seven Summits.
Yeaton’s wife, Sherry, posted the news on Facebook about her husband who turns 60 on Feb. 18. Plus, leaders with the Christian-based Fellowship of Associates of Medical Evangelism announced that Yeaton has exceeded his climb’s goal of raising $20,000 to build the outreach’s Kisumu Kenya Clinic in the western segment of the country near Kilimanjaro across the Tanzania border. In fact the total raised stands at more than the goal, but organizers are now committed to spending up to $30,000 on the facility.
“I’ve never been so privileged to walk so slowly to such heights for the good of so many people,” Yeaton said after the climb through five climate zones.
Jeff Coon, FAME’s director of development, explained the clinic need in an online video clip at fameworld.org
“The lack of a well-equipped facility for medicine, combined with poor nutrition, accounts for many of the preventable and treatable illnesses the people there suffer from,” Coon said.
So Yeaton’s climb can bring healthful hope to as many as 10,000 Kenyans per year, according to FAME’s advance estimates. No wonder that a picture from Facebook shows him beaming at the summit — holding a FAME T-shirt. His brother, Pastor Steve Yeaton of First Christian Church, is impressed.
“I love how he pursues his passions with an eye to bless others along the way,” Steve Yeaton said.
The climber got the opportunity for the adventure out of the blue a few weeks ago from Columbus friend Dave Ketchum, who knew of a group going to climb Kilimanjaro.
And Yeaton loved the idea of reconnecting with Kisumu.
“Having been to Kisumu in 2014 following my cross country ride to raise funds for a well in that same region, I was excited and now had a purpose greater than just climbing one of the seven summits on Earth,” he said before the climb.
As a Southside Elementary School teacher, he had additional idea in mind with the effort.
“Another reason for climbing is to shoot some footage with my GoPro (video camera), especially on the receding snow/glaciers on Kilimanjaro,” he said. “According to some scientist/climatologist there may not be any snow on the roof of Africa after 2025 to 2040. As an educator, to be able to film and document for my students past, present and future, I believe is a valuable teaching tool with a Columbus connection.”
Those who figure Yeaton’s bucket list is now complete should think again.
“Also on the list is to rocket into space,” he said. “(But) I’ll call Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk later.”
After all, he’s now quite familiar with going sky high.
