Little America

by Richard Evelyn Byrd Jr.

1 The reason for the allowance o f greater speed in the return journey was the expectancy they should be able to travel much faster with lighter loads.

  2 10 days were allowed here for the side-trip to Amundsen’s reported high land.

  CHAPTER XII

  THE START OF THE SOUTHERN PARTIES

  ALL during August, save when the sky was overcast, a steadily enlarging shimmer of gold and red burned and waned on the northern horizon. The hours of darkness grew shorter. Spring was in the air—but not the kind of spring of which poets sing in more temperate climes. From the 16th to the 18th raged a severe blizzard, turning the outside world into chaos. When it ceased, the temperature began to fall steadily. On the 19th the Antarctic equivalent of the robin—or shall we say the ground-hog?—a timorous Weddell seal—poked a brown head out of the thin ice over a blow hole, took one breath of the frigid air, and hastily drew it in again. He drew back none too soon, for a man hungry for the taste of fresh meat pounced at him with a pole.

  On the 20th the radiance in the north grew and splashed the Barrier with a gold and yellow effulgence. The return of the sun was nigh. A few of us stole a march on it by climbing the radio towers, thus gaining a pre-view of its long-anticipated return. It was cold up there, and Rucker and Van der Veer suffered tortures to carry their heavy camera to the top for the sake of a novel “shot.” The sun was a gorgeous sight from this precarious perch, half a hemisphere of warm splendor suspended beneath a strand of coral clouds. In the south a moon that was green cheese was set, wan, pale and ethereal, in a vaporous purple firmament.

  That day Braathen and Bursey killed a seal on the bay ice, so we had fresh steak for supper. Balchen and Strom put on their skis and journeyed to Framheim, to report on the condition of the crevasses through which the Southern parties must defile. They returned over the bay ice, and saw that many changes had taken place. New upheavals had lifted new pressure ridges, deep crevasses had been formed and were partly drifted over and the surface was badly torn and broken. Winter had torn the place to pieces as if it was so much scrap paper.

  We began to dig out now, with a vengeance.

  Thursday, August 22d, the sun returned officially. A yellow immensity, distorted by refraction, it peeped over the horizon, past a gossamer veil of clouds, awakened the slumbering colors in the Barrier cliffs, rolled along the horizon a while and then, its job done, sank in a marvellous sunset. There was the same rush for grandstand seats on the radio towers, but not even the most devoted admirer of Apollo cared to remain long in his perch. The temperature was 40° below. Dean Smith dropped a glove, in his hurry to ascend, and though he came down like a circus acrobat he was not fast enough to escape a nasty frost bite. His hand was burned and seared when he grasped the iron.

  The sun’s return was celebrated appropriately.

  The American flag was raised, to signal its return, and was left flying until the base was abandoned. Then Ronne, representing the Norwegians, and Davies, the British, raised the flags of their countries, in a ceremony which had for its purpose the honoring of the achievements of the British and Norwegians in the Antarctic.

  A Victrola played the bugle call to arms, and all uncovered. The wind was blowing and it was chilly.

  That night we celebrated joyfully. As the sun’s return coincided with Dr. Gould’s birthday, the two celebrations were merged. The best and worst features of each were preserved. Although I dare say it would be interesting, a description of the affair has no place in this volume: I can only submit the report which the meteorological department included in its monthly paper: “A mild tornado struck the mess hall on the night of August 22nd-23rd and left a trail of wreckage in its wake.”

  The sun rose a little higher every day, remained up a little longer, and slowly advanced his rise to the east. Spring was in its flowering, but it was a chilly spring. Snow covered the camp, and only the chimney pipes and the radio towers stood above the surface. In fact the weight of the snow on the houses was so great that the roofs of two of them were sagging. We began to dig out, timidly, lest a walloping snow storm nullify the work of the shovel squad.

  August went out with a temperature reading 66° below zero and September came in with the same impressive low. September was the second coldest month of all. It was the one month during our sojourn in the Antarctic during which the temperature did not once rise above zero. The highest reading was 2° below on the 18th, the next highest was 11° below, on the 17th; for the most part, it fluctuated between 30° and below. The mean temperature for the month was 44° below. September ended on the frosty low of 63° below, and we bade it farewell with shivering gladness.

  Some of the men now began to suffer. Owing to extravagant use, the supply of cigarettes was nearly exhausted. The cry of pain that went up when Supply Officer Black announced the crisis must have been heard by the tobacco workers in Virginia. There was no recourse save to roll our own, with poor paper and pipe tobacco, which we did painfully and badly. Cigars were already more precious than—as a matter of fact, the cigar, at that period of Antarctic civilization, allowed of no comparison; it stood for absolute luxury and opulence. The man who owned a few was spoken to with deference by the rest, and the aroma that escaped from him was a tantalizing rebuke to the others who had not been so frugal. Our Times correspondent, with a self-denial which no one suspected in him, had carefully budgeted his supply and so had enough to eke out the winter. There were several others, too, who had put aside a few boxes of cigarettes and cigars against absolute need; and it was astonishing how they were brought forth on special occasions. “Have a smoke,” some one would say, and lo! he would offer a real cigarette. Henry Harrison told me that the most precious gift he ever received was when good old Ronne gave him a box of cigarettes.

  The month raced past, for all the cold, on the wings of expectancy. We were eager, all of us, to be off on our various missions: the Supporting Party to its depots, the Geological Party to the Mountains, the Polar Flight Group to the Pole.

  Monday

  September

  Shovels to the fore again.

  Today the Aviation Unit began to dig out the Fairchild. Just a mass of snow marks its hangar. Haines tells me that 93.8 inches of snow have fallen since the first of the year, according to his calculations. Of course much of this has been lost through ablation. The surface about the mounds, however, seems to have been built up at least five feet higher than before. There is a most marvellous streamlining of snow about every raised place.

  Wednesday

  September II

  The houses are as busy as factories. The southern parties are making final preparations for the trail. Every one is at work at something—sewing parkas and socks, repairing harness, testing tents, relashing sledges.

  The quietest place in camp is Braathen’s House, and Owen, seeking quiet for his literary productions, has fled there for sanctuary.

  More seals have been seen in the bay, big, fat fellows.

  Temperature today 68° below. Can spring be far behind?

  Tuesday

  September 17

  The shovellers have burrowed into the Fairchild hangar. The plane has come through the winter better than I had dared hope. No snow was found in the cabin—just a trace of ice crystals. The mechanics are getting ready to take down the engine. If the weather is good, we ought to have both planes in the air early in November.

  After a week of dazzlingly clear atmosphere, the sky clouded and remains generally overcast. Today, there is a ten-knot wind, and with the temperature down to 43° below it has an edge like a razor blade. There were a number of frost bites today, none serious.

  Friday

  Sept. 20th

  We have had a wild time with the dogs. They are so overjoyed to be above ground once more that they have forgotten all manners and training, and run about the camp like lunatics.

  It is simply impossible to get them into harness. After a patient hour’s work to get his team in line, Crockett finally gave up an unruly pair
and started off with six dogs. Instantly they dashed around in a mad circle, slamming the sledge around as if it weighed nothing at all, while Freddy yelled and cursed and tried to hold on to the careening sledge. In the midst of these revolutions, the dogs suddenly sighted the entrance to their tunnel, and with impish perversity raced right down, carrying sledge, Crockett and all. It was a frightful tangle.

  Bursey and Vaughan had no better luck. Vaughan’s big black leader, Dinty, from whom we had been led to expect things, was as wild as a stallion, and sooner than it takes to tell it his sledge was upside down in the snow and everything a noisy confusion. Braathen’s team made a racing swing about the camp, but came to grief when the dogs ran head-on into one of the guy wires supporting the radio towers. The impact cut the harnesses, and poor Braathen had to chase two of the dogs down into the Ver-sur-Mer. It is a wonder they did not break their necks.

  I wish we had more dogs. The dogs that Taylor has at Mt. Cook would certainly come in handy now. Beyond a doubt we shall have to train some of the wild pups that have been running about the camp. It will be hard enough to catch them, let alone train them. They are wilder and fleeter than March hares. Their size and strength speak well for their future usefulness. Actually, they appear to be in better condition than the dogs that were pampered throughout the winter.

  Wednesday

  September 25

  We put the new airplane sledge that Balchen and Strom made on the scales this morning and found it weighed only 200 pounds. It is a beauty. This is to be our transport in case of a forced landing on the polar flight. I have decided to take it on my daily walks to practice man-hauling.

  The chimney in the administration building, which lasted through all the worst storms of the winter, collapsed in a 15-knot wind, and fell through its hole, choking the place with soot. We had a devil of a job getting it back—the temperature was 50° below, and many hands were nipped before it was done. Our quarters are filled with greasy soot. It will be days before we can scrape things clean.

  Thursday

  Sept. 26th

  Still driving ahead on preparations for the southern journeys.

  Thorne put on skis today and made a trip to the old Barrier cache. In spite of the heavy fall of snow, the trail still visible, although only a furrow in the surface, and most of the flags were still up.

  Siple and Bursey have just returned from a trip to East Cape by dog team.

  Saturday

  September 28

  Temp. 60° below at its lowest today.

  Our dog power is dwindling much too fast. Spee, one of the best dogs in Goodale’s team, was killed in a fight last night. The team was staked outside, and apparently he broke loose from the gang line. A few days ago one of Bursey’s dogs was so badly chewed up in a scuffle that he cannot be used on the southern trip.

  The dog men must take greater precautions. It is a deucedly hard thing to chain the dogs down, but it can and must be done. We shall be hard-pressed for dogs if any rescue efforts are necessary. Gould has already proposed to borrow the two pups, Sky and Ski, which Parker and McKinley have adopted. If he values his life, he had better bring them back. McKinley and Parker will put up a real protest when this plan is suggested.

  I have decided to radio Taylor to board one of the whalers with his dogs. The Kosmos is leaving New Zealand early, and it is possible that they can relay him and the dogs to the base on a chaser. We shall need dogs badly very soon.

  Monday

  September 30

  After four days of clear, bristling cold weather, another blizzard is on us. The temperature was 63° below this morning, but is rising steadily. It is now 17° below.

  Although they cannot possibly reach here before the end of December, we are looking forward to a return of the ships. The men are betting on the day of their arrival; and the largest prizes that are being offered in the camp are the privileges of eating, if the victor, the biggest dinner that the Grand Hotel at Dunedin offers.

  We are praying that the ice in the Bay will go out farther than it did last year. Conditions are certainly more promising. Although the edge of the new ice is now between 15 and 20 miles north of us and stretches solidly across north of West Cape, it is badly torn and rafted by pressure, and should go out faster.

  The Ross Sea is apparently open far to the north. During the clear spells we constantly saw a dark water sky.

  We had another fog today—a light, impalpable mist which greatly reduced visibility.

  Tuesday

  Oct. I

  Working days are here again.

  Breakfast has been advanced to 7:30, and all hands begin work at 8:15 o’clock, “ob” at noon, and supper at 5 o’clock. This gives us a long working day.

  We have weighed all the various types of sledges, with the following results:

  Black has been busy weighing the final list of material that will be carried on the base-laying and polar flights. The sum total of listed material is about 15,000 pounds, including gasoline and the weight of the plane. We have reduced emergency equipment, which includes sledge, food and clothing, to approximately 1,400 lbs. I think that we can still further reduce these weights.

  Friday

  October 4th

  Siple and Bursey have made another long trip by dog team on the bay ice to the north, rounding West Cape and proceeding some distance in the direction of Discovery Bay. The Bay of Whales is frozen much more extensively than we had believed. They did not encounter open water until 20 miles out. The sea smoke was then so dense they could not see any great distance. They sledged over new green ice which had been blown free of drift and was smooth enough, according to Siple, for skating. They also sighted a number of small whales, the first seen this spring.

  Saturday

  October 5th

  More signs of spring.

  Strom saw a baby seal, a scrawny, gray-brown Weddell seal, on the ice, and the traces about it and the mother indicated the pup was born yesterday.

  Also a flight of Antarctic petrels was seen, flying high.

  The wild pups, which, by the way, are nearly as big as their parents, have been down to the Bay, looking over the seals. They were overwhelmed by curiosity, but the boldest of them dared not approach within 20 yards. They will learn rashness soon enough.

  Sunday

  October 6th

  Blackburn, Bursey and Siple have been given the job of rounding up all stray pups and breaking them to harness. They will have their hands full.

  The Aviation Unit has been hard at work with snow shovels about the Fairchild, and should have it on the surface within a couple of days. The mechanics have been wonderful. Day after day, they have worked in temperatures that rarely got higher than 20° above zero.

  Overcast and cold, 42° below.

  The Supporting Party will be ready to start in eight days.

  Monday, March 7th, the Fairchild, its motor oiled, greased and checked, came out of its snow hangar and resumed its old place on the surface. Its folded wings were swung into position, and the plane was secured firmly by ice anchors. Instruments, engine and structure had come through the winter without harm. We then turned our energies toward liberating the Ford, a back-rending effort. On the same day, McKinley took over the responsibility of the administration of the camp, in order that Dr. Gould might be able to devote his whole time to the trail parties, which were nearly ready for the start.

  From the 7th of October to the 9th, we had a spell of fairly warm weather, the thermometer registering as high as 3° below; but even had the teams been ready, I was reluctant to start them early, as it was suggested, for fear they would encounter low enough temperatures on the Barrier to turn them back.

  Dogs quickly lose their vitality in excessive cold, and the friction of the sand-like snow adds greatly to the weight of the load. As it was, the wind veered from the east to the south on the 9th, and the thermometer tumbled to 47° below zero on the 10th.

  After days of a diffused, gray nothing which passe
d as daylight, in which the world about us took on an unreal and ghostly aspect, oddly lacking in shadows, the sun put on a gorgeous show. The meteorologists, in their terse way, said: “a brilliant, complex halo phenomena occurred on the 9th and the 18th,” and let it go at that. When the wind shifted to the south, the canopy of clouds overhead was rent into feathery fragments and sent scudding more or less to the west. The air suddenly became charged with ice crystals, which fell like rain. The sun broke through the shattered cloud fabric which turned yellow and opalescent in its growing power, then an arch more beautiful than any rainbow I have ever seen swept upward, curved, and in a moment the sun was crossed by two great shafts of brilliant light, in the center of which it burned with leaping tongues of flame. On either side could be seen the trembling halos of the mock suns, each impaled on its shaft of prismatic light. Directly opposite the sun was the anthelion, the reflection of the outstretched reach of the cross, a luminous gray pillar rising from the snows of the Barrier.

  For nearly an hour we watched this gorgeous display, while the ice crystals that caused it fell in sparkling showers. But as the temperature slid down, and the moisture in the air condensed more rapidly, the fall of crystals became thicker and slowly hid the sun. The gray impalpability again took possession of the scene. And as Owen wrote that night: “we went indoors deeply affected by the beauty and grandeur of this great vision.”

  On the 9th we also inaugurated Daylight Saving Time (we began to operate on 180th Meridian Time which is about an hour earlier than our time. At this meridian we could use today’s date or tomorrow’s as we wished). A group of men filled the hole from which the Fairchild emerged so as to eliminate the danger of the planes falling through while taxiing about the camp. Considerable progress was meanwhile made in digging out the Ford. While this work went on, Balchen, Bubier, June, Demas and Roth worked in the chamber in which the nose lay, checking the motors and examing the center section. The first investigation showed that it, too, had come through the winter unscathed; its duralumin structure had endured the low temperatures without so much as a crack. Our hangar was an exceptionally good one. Niches had been cut in the walls of snow and it was possible to work directly on the engines and center sections. Handling metal parts at 25° below, with bare hands, was like handling a red hot stove lid.