Antarctic, Arctic, Polar

1910-1916 Antarctic Photographs of Herbert Ponting and Frank Hurley

A first edition of this smart book of Ponting and Hurley photographs.

Published by MacMillan, Melbourne in 1969. Landscape 119 pages. The first twenty-five pages with and forward by Sir Vivian Fuchs and an introduction by Jennie Boddington, the selector of the images and then Curator of Photography at the National Gallery, Victoria. Very good condition.

It is universally agreed that it is impossible, even with modern camera to surpass the quality and emotion of the Ponting and Hurley images. Not for nothing is it called the Heroic Era. The story of Hurley’s anguish in leaving behind so many images on the ill-fated Endurance Expedition only goes to enhance what we have.

Ponting and Hurley – No Introduction Required!

$85.00

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Force Nine and More – High Winds, Wild Seas – Stories of Australians Who Fought Them and Survived – Kenneth Slack and Others

First edition published by Murray, Sydney and Melbourne in 1969.

Large octavo, 168 pages, heavily illustrated with images from photographs, charts etc. Very good condition.

A compilation of 18 separate, often heroic voyages involving Australians often in Australian waters …. Bass Strait seeking harbour at Stanley; difficulties in the Pacific but making Norfolk Island; with Bill Tilman (Voyager Hero) and the cold dangerous waters around Heard Island; around the Horn, a Tasmanian Nightmare and the rest … impossible to put down.

Australians surviving the most difficult sailing challenges

$30.00

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Antarctic Manual – E. E. Hedblom

Prepared and published under the auspices of the U.S. Naval Medical School by Captain Hedblom of the Department of Cold Weather Medicine.

Published in June 1960, a second edition and a year before Hedblom’s expanded work “Polar Manual”

The author held a number of distinguished relevant positions including Staff Surgeon, Commander Naval Support Force Antarctica 1955-1959.

Quarto, 64 pages after preliminaries. Stapled in soft covers, very good condition. From the library of Antarctic Scientist P Arnaud, but without his mark … although there is there is an institutional stamp from which it may have been borrowed, or purchased.

Sound advice under the following general headings … Living Conditions (Geography, Shelter, Heating); Selection of Personnel; Hygiene; Clothing; Nutrition; Sanitation; Visual Disabilities; Cold Injuries; Carbon Monoxide Poisoning; First Aid; Survival; Polar Do’s and Don’ts; Antarctic Mortality; Basic Medical supplies and a relevant Bibliography.

Makes for interesting reading and not just for the medically inclined. We learned that for sure if lost one should stay in the same place and wait to be found … but keep moving … and aircraft accident are the biggest cause of death so stay out of the sky. Alcohol at this time still highly recommended but gin was the recommended tipple.

Get prepared for your next Antarctic trip ..

$65.00

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Australian Antarctic Bibliography – Knight 1987

A first edition of Russell Knight’s comprehensive catalogue of all publications Australian Antarctic. Issued by the Institute of Antarctic and Southern Ocean Studies, University of Tasmania.

We say comprehensive and that is understating the effort. Published in large landscape spiral bound form 463 pages after Preface and organisational descriptions. Very good condition.

Contains information relating to the Australian Antarctic Territory, the sub-Antarctic islands, Heard, Macquarie and McDonald and the waters in proximity.

The major criterion for inclusion is that parent material is relevant to thee areas about which Australia is especially concerned. Consequently, other nations efforts in the geographical region are included.

The organisation of information assists greatly … references are organised in two dimensions … first by subject matter … Atmospheric Physics; Bases and Logistics; Biological Sciences; Terrestrial sciences; Oceanology; Medical Sciences and Socio-Economic … and then by geography … the Territory, Heard Island etc.

We can find no update and the document appears very hard to get. This example came from the personal library of French Polar Scientist Patrick Arnaud although does not contain his mark.

Go to reference re Australian Antarctic Interest.

$120.00

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Mon Expedition au Sud Polaire – Sir Ernest Shackleton – Translated from “South”‘ by Landel – First French Edition 1920

The French edition of “South” … The story of Shackleton’s Expedition (The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition 1914 – 1917).

A very good copy of the first edition published by Alfred Mame et Fils, Tours, France.

Folio, 384 pages with folding map and 77 illustrations mainly from expedition photographs. Beautifully bound with vivid stamped front cover. All edges richly gilt. Corners bit bumped and hinge a little cracked, still a lovely example. A substantial book 1.6kgs.

Shackleton believed that after Amundsen’s conquest of the South Pole in 1911 the “one great main object of Antarctic journeyings” was to make the first land crossing of the Antarctic continent. He sent the Aurora to the Ross Sea under Mackintosh and took the Endurance to the Weddell Sea. Before they could reach Vahsel Bay they became entrapped in ice and drifted with it throughout the winter of 1915. Eventually the ship gave way and was crushed and sank, Mon Expedition au Sud Polaire contains photographs of its gradual demise. Stranded on the ice they took to the lifeboats and made inhospitable Elephant Island. Shackleton and five men then made a 1,287km journey in the James Caird to reach South Georgia eventually mounting a rescue mission for the men left behind. The Ross Sea party also had difficulties and three men lost their lives.

Special French Edition of Shackleton’s South … what way to improve your language skills!

$240.00

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The Seamans Secrets (1633) – John Davis – Fine Facsimile from John Carter Brown University – 1992

Published by Scholars’ Facsimiles & Reprints, New York 1992. Reproduced from a n original in The John Carter Brown Library at Brown University. Hard to come by.

Longer title … “The Seamans secrets. Divided into two parts, wherein is taught the three kindes of sayling, horizontall, paradoxall, and sayling upon a great circle. Also an horizontall tyde-table for the easie finding of the ebbing and flowing of the tydes, with a regiment newly calculated for the finding of the declination of the sunne, and many other most necessary rules and instruments, not heretofore set forth by any. Newly corrected and amended, and the fifth time imprinted.”

Octavo, very good condition with no jacket as published. Facsimile reprint with a very good historical introduction by A.N. Ryan. Illustrated, one folding at rear, and with tables and charts. Original unpaginated but runs to circa 110 pages … here after 26 page introduction and further reading list, references etc.

John Davis (1550? – 1605) published the first edition of this book in 1595. He made three voyages in search of the North West Passage. He was associated with Sir Humphrey and Adrian Gilbert promoters of English colonisation in North America. Through the Gilbert’s he knew Walter Raleigh and the famous mathematician and cosmographer Dr John Dee.

Nice reproduction of important early maritime navigation book.

$60.00

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1910-1916 Antarctic Photographs of Herbert Ponting and Frank Hurley

Force Nine and More – High Winds, Wild Seas – Stories of Australians Who Fought Them and Survived – Kenneth Slack and Others

Antarctic Manual – E. E. Hedblom

Australian Antarctic Bibliography – Knight 1987

Mon Expedition au Sud Polaire – Sir Ernest Shackleton – Translated from “South”‘ by Landel – First French Edition 1920

The Seamans Secrets (1633) – John Davis – Fine Facsimile from John Carter Brown University – 1992

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