Douglas Mawson Popular Books

Douglas Mawson Biography & Facts

Sir Douglas Mawson (5 May 1882 – 14 October 1958) was a British-born Australian geologist, Antarctic explorer, and academic. Along with Roald Amundsen, Robert Falcon Scott, and Sir Ernest Shackleton, he was a key expedition leader during the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. Mawson was born in England and was brought to Australia as an infant. He completed degrees in mining engineering and geology at the University of Sydney. In 1905 he was made a lecturer in petrology and mineralogy at the University of Adelaide. Mawson's first experience in the Antarctic came as a member of Shackleton's Nimrod Expedition (1907–1909), alongside his mentor Edgeworth David. They were part of the expedition's northern party, which became the first to attain the South Magnetic Pole and to climb Mount Erebus. After his participation in Shackleton's expedition, Mawson became the principal instigator of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition (1911–1914). The expedition explored thousands of kilometres of previously unexplored regions, collected geological and botanical samples, and made important scientific observations. Mawson was the sole survivor of the three-man Far Eastern Party, which travelled across the Mertz and Ninnis Glaciers named after his two deceased companions. Their deaths forced him to travel alone for over a month to return to the expedition's main base. Mawson was knighted in 1914 and during World War I worked with the British and Russian militaries. He returned to the University of Adelaide in 1919 and became a full professor in 1921, contributing much to Australian geology. He returned to the Antarctic as the leader of the British Australian and New Zealand Antarctic Research Expedition (1929–1931), which led to a territorial claim in the form of the Australian Antarctic Territory. Mawson is commemorated by numerous landmarks and from 1984 to 1996 appeared on the Australian $100 note. Early life Mawson was born on 5 May 1882 to Robert Ellis Mawson and Margaret Ann Moore. He was born in Shipley, West Riding of Yorkshire, but was less than two years old when his family emigrated to Australia and settled at Rooty Hill, now in the western suburbs of Sydney. Later he and his family moved to the inner-Sydney suburb of Glebe in 1893. He attended Forest Lodge Public School, Fort Street Model School and the University of Sydney, where he graduated in 1902 with a Bachelor of Engineering degree. Early work He was appointed geologist to an expedition to the New Hebrides (now Vanuatu) in 1903; his report, The Geology of the New Hebrides, was one of the first major geological works of Melanesia. Also that year he published a geological paper on Mittagong, New South Wales. His major influences in his geological career were Professor Edgeworth David and Professor Archibald Liversidge. He then became a lecturer in petrology and mineralogy at the University of Adelaide in 1905. In 1906 He identified and first described the mineral davidite. Nimrod Expedition Mawson joined Ernest Shackleton's Nimrod Expedition (1907–1909) to the Antarctic, originally intending to stay for the duration of the ship's presence in the first summer. Instead both he and his mentor, Edgeworth David, stayed an extra year. In doing so they became, in the company of Alistair Mackay, the first to climb the summit of Mount Erebus and to trek to the South Magnetic Pole, which at that time was over land. During their stay, they also wrote, illustrated and printed the book Aurora Australis. Mawson contributed with the science fiction short-story Bathybia. Australasian Antarctic Expedition Mawson turned down an invitation to join Robert Falcon Scott's Terra Nova Expedition in 1910; Australian geologist Griffith Taylor went with Scott instead. Mawson chose to lead his own expedition, the Australasian Antarctic Expedition, to King George V Land and Adelie Land, the sector of the Antarctic continent immediately south of Australia, which at the time was almost entirely unexplored. The objectives were to carry out geographical exploration and scientific studies, including a visit to the South Magnetic Pole. Mawson raised the necessary funds in a year, from British and Australian governments, and from commercial backers interested in mining and whaling.The expedition, using the ship SY Aurora commanded by Captain John King Davis, departed from Hobart on 2 December 1911, landed at Cape Denison (named after Hugh Denison, a major backer of the expedition) on Commonwealth Bay on 8 January 1912, and established the Main Base. A second camp was located to the west on the ice shelf in Queen Mary Land. Cape Denison proved to be unrelentingly windy; the average wind speed for the entire year was about 50 mph (80 km/h), with some winds approaching 200 mph (320 km/h). They built a hut on the rocky cape and wintered through nearly constant blizzards. Mawson wanted to do aerial exploration and brought the first aeroplane to Antarctica. The aircraft, a Vickers R.E.P. Type Monoplane, was to be flown by Francis Howard Bickerton. When it was damaged in Australia shortly before the expedition departed, plans were changed so it was to be used only as a tractor on skis. However, the engine did not operate well in the cold, and it was removed and returned to Vickers in England. The aircraft fuselage itself was abandoned. On 1 January 2009, fragments of it were rediscovered by the Mawson's Huts Foundation, which is restoring the original huts.Mawson's exploration program was carried out by five parties from the Main Base and two from the Western Base. Mawson himself was part of a three-man sledging team, the Far Eastern Party, with Xavier Mertz and Lieutenant Belgrave Ninnis, who headed east on 10 November 1912, to survey King George V Land. After five weeks of excellent progress mapping the coastline and collecting geological samples, the party was crossing the Ninnis Glacier 480 km east of the main base. Mertz was skiing and Mawson was on his sled with his weight dispersed, but Ninnis was jogging beside the second sled. Ninnis fell through a crevasse, and his body weight is likely to have breached the snow bridge covering it. The six best dogs, most of the party's rations, their tent, and other essential supplies disappeared into the massive crevasse. Mertz and Mawson spotted one dead and one injured dog on a ledge 165 feet (50 m) below them, but Ninnis was never seen again.After a brief service, Mawson and Mertz turned back immediately. They had one week's provisions for two men and no dog food but plenty of fuel and a Primus stove. They sledged for 27 hours continuously to obtain a spare tent cover they had left behind, for which they improvised a frame from skis and a theodolite. Their lack of provisions forced them to use their remaining sled dogs to feed the other dogs and themselves: Their meat was tough, stringy and without a vestige of fat. For a change we sometimes chopped it up finely, mixed it with a little pemmican, and br.... Discover the Douglas Mawson popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Douglas Mawson books.

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  • Racing With Death synopsis, comments

    Racing With Death

    Beau Riffenburgh

    Scott, Shackleton and Mawson were the three great explorers of the Edwardian age. Now Beau Riffenburgh tells the forgotten story of Douglas Mawson and his deathdefying expedition o...

  • Meet... Douglas Mawson synopsis, comments

    Meet... Douglas Mawson

    Mike Dumbleton

    A picture book series about the extraordinary men and women who have shaped Australia's history, including the great Antarctic explorer, Sir Douglas Mawson.Douglas Mawson led the f...

  • In Bed with Douglas Mawson synopsis, comments

    In Bed with Douglas Mawson

    Craig Cormick

    Departing Hobart on a sevenweek voyage on board the RSV Aurora Australis, Craig Cormick is fulfilling a long time dream to visit the frozen continent of Antarctica an adventure to...

  • Flaws in the Ice synopsis, comments

    Flaws in the Ice

    David Day

    Douglas Mawson was determined to make his mark on Antarctica as no other explorer had done before him. What really happened on the ice has been buried for a century....