Reaching the Summit of His Profession
When I got to the summit of Mt. Everest, the Sherpa guides put a Buddhist prayer ribbon around my neck. It brought tears to my eyes and the fatigue just disappeared.
Shoe stores must love H. Jay Sexton, CPA, because he hasn't met a hiking trail he didn't like. His treks have taken him from the Appalachian Trail to Mount Everest.
It was during a Navy stint that Sexton cast off on the way to becoming an accountant, "I was the financial disbursement clerk on the destroyer U.S.S. Rich," says Sexton. "I liked it and found I was good at it." His Mediterranean tour of duty took him to Italy, France, Spain, Greece and Lebanon — occasionally playing hide and seek with Soviet submarines.
After leaving active service in 1959, Sexton enrolled in Rider University's accounting program. After graduating from Rider, Jay worked briefly in industry, but the call of public accounting beckoned, and in 1974 Sexton started a firm that eventually merged into WithumSmith+Brown.
For enjoyment, Sexton and his family have been hiking the Appalachian Trail since the 1970s. In fact, they built a retirement home in Pennsylvania to be closer to the trail. "I have 1,250 miles under my belt and hope to complete the whole trail before I leave this planet," says Sexton.
But it was a different type of hiking challenge — much colder and more vertical — proposed by his brother-in-law that stopped Sexton in his tracks, so to speak. "He knew a cultural anthropologist from Holland with knowledge of Nepal who also led excursions up Mount Everest," remarks Sexton.
"I wanted to give this trip a purpose," notes Sexton. "There is a young man in my church named Myles who suffers from histiocytosis, a rare disease affecting the nervous system. I decided to use this trip to raise awareness and money for this disease: 'Miles for Myles.' We would up raising more than $17,000."
After a 36-hour flight from New York to Kathmandu, the group of eight, along with a pair of Sherpa guides, began the ascent from the little village of Phalplu. "Despite being a very poor nation, the country is beautiful and the people are friendly," says Sexton.
After a 12-day trek, the expedition reached the 19,000-foot summit of Kala Patar. At age 72, Sexton was the oldest on the team. "It was 10 degrees and crystal clear with an amazing view from the roof of the world," recounts Sexton.
"Prior to the trip, my wife made a felt heart and cut it half," notes Sexton. "She gave half to Myles and I brought the other half with me. When I got to the summit, I took it out and it brought tears to my eyes."