By Alysha Bohanon
The obituary for Lincoln Hall in the New York Times used a number of sources. The first was the Australian Himalayan Foundation, which Hall had helped found. The Times attributed Hall's death announcement to this foundation's web site. Another source was the leader of the climbing group Hall participated in when he was left for dead on Mount Everest, Daniel Mazur, who had been quoted in the Associated Press. Finally, the Sydney Morning Herald was attributed to information about Hall's early life.
The story followed a standard obituary lead, giving the deceased's name, claim to fame, date location of death, and age. This was an effective lead, because Hall has an interesting claim to fame but the typical reader would not recognize him by his name alone. Later paragraphs give additional details about his death, but his cause of death is not addressed in the lead.
This obituary differs from a resume because it doesn't extensively discuss his employment or educational history. Instead, it focuses on his main accomplishments, in this case the Mount Everest climb he survived even after being left for dead, and only briefly touches on his chronological history and employment.
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