Antarctica History: Ernest Shackleton

To help our students and blog readers better appreciate our pen pal program with the US Antarctic Program, which has been going on now for two years, I am adding a few stories about the history of Antarctic exploration. The following story is about my favorite Antarctic explorer -- other than our present pen pals, of course-- whose name is Ernest Shackleton.

Shackleton was born in county Kildare, Ireland and became a sailor. He was a junior member of an early expedition by Robert Falcon Scott, but he longed to lead his own expedition to the South Pole. After the Norwegian Roald Amundsen and his crew became the first men to reach the Pole, followed by Scott and his crew who all later perished on the return trek, Shackleton knew he needed a different challenge. After giving many lecture tours about his earlier expedition to Antarctica, he decided to become the first to lead an expedition across the entire continent. This became the expic adventure of the ship Endurance.

The plan was to have half of his men come from one side of Antarctica on the Weddell Sea, and the other half from the other side on the Ross Sea. Then they would set supply depots as they moved and crossed Antarctica.

However, Shackleton's ship, the Endurance, became trapped in the ice in the Weddell Sea and was crushed. Shakleton had to lead his men and some sled dogs, and whatever salvaged supplies he had, to safety. Against incredible odds, in extreme cold, in the open Antarctic wilderness, and with very little food and supplies, Shackleton managed to save his crew. Part of his adventures included sailing in a lifeboat called the James Caird with part of his crew across frozen seas from Elephant Island to South Georgia Island, getting help, and then going back to save the rest of his crew who stayed behind. Shackleton did not lose a single man in his crew. His greatness was that even though his original goal -- to cross Antarctica -- was a total failure, he found a new and far more meaningful goal, that of saving the lives of his crew.

(Photos: The boat is the James Caird, a life boat from the Endurance which Shackleton used in his attempt to save his crew. The photo was taken by the ship's photographer, Frank Hurley. The poster is a copy of an advertisement for a lecture tour of Shackleton's before his Endurance Expedition. The map is of Antarctica from the US Government, CIA maps. All of the photos are in public domain from Wikimedia Commons. )

-- Adrian