MANSON'S AUSTRALASIAN ANTARCTIC EXPEDITION, 1911-1913
[SIR DOUGLAS MAWSON (1882-1958)].
Details
[SIR DOUGLAS MAWSON (1882-1958)].
Midwinter Dinner. Winter Quarters, Commonwealth Bay, Adelie Land: 21 June 1912. 8° (160 x 106mm). 2 leaves, each printed on one side only and glued together, stitched into printed wrappers with photographs of Winter Quarters and of a sea-elephant, the whole printed photographically using a gelatin silver process. Contemporary leather-backed wooden boards with vestiges of white fur, modern blue half morocco box. Provenance: [Sir Douglas Mawson], given by his widow, Lady Pacquita Mawson, to Vina Barnden.
MAWSON'S OWN COPY of a rare example of printing in the Antarctic, printed to celebrate the first Midwinter's Dinner at Main Base in 1912 by Mawson and the other members of his Australasian Antarctic Expedition. To keep up morale in such a desolate location, events such as birthdays and holidays were celebrated with great occasion. Midwinter's Day held particular significance for the expedition party as being the most extreme in an extreme environment. Special dishes were prepared, toast were drunk, speeches made, and menus commemorating the event were printed. Mawson himself described the party's first Midwinter's Dinner in The Home of the Blizzard (pp. 173-175, menu illustrated p.174): "Midwinter's Day! ... It was a jovial occasion, and we celebrated it with the uproarious delight of a community of eighteen young men unfettered by small conventions. ... Hannam and Bickerton shouldered the domestic responsibilities. Their menu du diner to us was a marvel of gorgeous delicacies. After the toasts and speeches came a musical and dramatic programme, punctuated by choice gramophone records and rowdy student choruses. ... Outside, the wind was not to be outdone; it surpassed itself with an unusual burst of ninety-five miles per hour." In his diary, Mawson recorded the dinner as "a great success" (Mawson's Antarctic Diaries, ed. F. and E. Jacka, 1988, p.54). Presumably each of the 18 expedition members present would have been given a copy of the Midwinter's Dinner menu, but the present copy is believed to be the only example ever to have come on the market.
Printing in Antarctica had already been practiced on Shackleton's expedition, in which Mawson had taken part, with the publication of the Aurea Borealis. Similarly, the Australasian Antarctic Expedition not only printed photographically such menus for celebratory dinners, but it also produced a monthly typewritten newsletter begun by McLean in April 1913, entitled the Adelie Blizzard. Hurley, the AAE official photographer, clearly had a hand in the printing process, since the menu is reproduced by the silver gelatin process on photographic paper. Hurley's photograph of collecting ice from the glacier in front of Main Base in a blizzard adorns the cover of the menu; it was later used to illustrate The Home of the Blizzard (opposite p.124). The menu is an elaborate production, even bound at Base using materials at hand, such as packing boards cut to size and sanded and a leather spine with remains of white fur, presumably seal or sea-elephant. The present copy was given by Mawson's widow, Lady Pacquita Mawon, to Vina Barnden, a concert pianist whom Lady Mawson patronised and who later became Lady Mawson's companion and housekeeper.
Having already achieved the ascent of the volcanic Mt. Erebus and the pioneering attainment of the south magnetic pole in 1908-09 on Shackleton's 1907 expedition to Antarctica, Mawson organised and led the Australasian Antarctic Expedition from December 1911 to February 1914. According to Mawson's own account, its object was "to investigate the Antarctic Continent to the southward of Australia", an area unexplored by other expeditions in their drive to reach the South Pole by the shortest route possible (Geographical Journal, 1914). Mawson and his team left Hobart on 2 December 1912 and landed at Adelie Land, Antarctica on 8 January 1912, where they established Main Base; several weeks later an 8-man team, led by F. Wild, established Western Base on the Shackleton Ice Shelf.
Midwinter Dinner. Winter Quarters, Commonwealth Bay, Adelie Land: 21 June 1912. 8° (160 x 106mm). 2 leaves, each printed on one side only and glued together, stitched into printed wrappers with photographs of Winter Quarters and of a sea-elephant, the whole printed photographically using a gelatin silver process. Contemporary leather-backed wooden boards with vestiges of white fur, modern blue half morocco box. Provenance: [Sir Douglas Mawson], given by his widow, Lady Pacquita Mawson, to Vina Barnden.
MAWSON'S OWN COPY of a rare example of printing in the Antarctic, printed to celebrate the first Midwinter's Dinner at Main Base in 1912 by Mawson and the other members of his Australasian Antarctic Expedition. To keep up morale in such a desolate location, events such as birthdays and holidays were celebrated with great occasion. Midwinter's Day held particular significance for the expedition party as being the most extreme in an extreme environment. Special dishes were prepared, toast were drunk, speeches made, and menus commemorating the event were printed. Mawson himself described the party's first Midwinter's Dinner in The Home of the Blizzard (pp. 173-175, menu illustrated p.174): "Midwinter's Day! ... It was a jovial occasion, and we celebrated it with the uproarious delight of a community of eighteen young men unfettered by small conventions. ... Hannam and Bickerton shouldered the domestic responsibilities. Their menu du diner to us was a marvel of gorgeous delicacies. After the toasts and speeches came a musical and dramatic programme, punctuated by choice gramophone records and rowdy student choruses. ... Outside, the wind was not to be outdone; it surpassed itself with an unusual burst of ninety-five miles per hour." In his diary, Mawson recorded the dinner as "a great success" (Mawson's Antarctic Diaries, ed. F. and E. Jacka, 1988, p.54). Presumably each of the 18 expedition members present would have been given a copy of the Midwinter's Dinner menu, but the present copy is believed to be the only example ever to have come on the market.
Printing in Antarctica had already been practiced on Shackleton's expedition, in which Mawson had taken part, with the publication of the Aurea Borealis. Similarly, the Australasian Antarctic Expedition not only printed photographically such menus for celebratory dinners, but it also produced a monthly typewritten newsletter begun by McLean in April 1913, entitled the Adelie Blizzard. Hurley, the AAE official photographer, clearly had a hand in the printing process, since the menu is reproduced by the silver gelatin process on photographic paper. Hurley's photograph of collecting ice from the glacier in front of Main Base in a blizzard adorns the cover of the menu; it was later used to illustrate The Home of the Blizzard (opposite p.124). The menu is an elaborate production, even bound at Base using materials at hand, such as packing boards cut to size and sanded and a leather spine with remains of white fur, presumably seal or sea-elephant. The present copy was given by Mawson's widow, Lady Pacquita Mawon, to Vina Barnden, a concert pianist whom Lady Mawson patronised and who later became Lady Mawson's companion and housekeeper.
Having already achieved the ascent of the volcanic Mt. Erebus and the pioneering attainment of the south magnetic pole in 1908-09 on Shackleton's 1907 expedition to Antarctica, Mawson organised and led the Australasian Antarctic Expedition from December 1911 to February 1914. According to Mawson's own account, its object was "to investigate the Antarctic Continent to the southward of Australia", an area unexplored by other expeditions in their drive to reach the South Pole by the shortest route possible (Geographical Journal, 1914). Mawson and his team left Hobart on 2 December 1912 and landed at Adelie Land, Antarctica on 8 January 1912, where they established Main Base; several weeks later an 8-man team, led by F. Wild, established Western Base on the Shackleton Ice Shelf.