Background
Richard E. Byrd was born in Winchester, Virginia, United States on October 25, 1888, into a distinguished Tidewater family.
(By Richard Evelyn Byrd - Little America: Aerial Explorati...)
By Richard Evelyn Byrd - Little America: Aerial Exploration in the Antarctic, The Flight t (1930-09-16) Hardcover
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( From the moment Admiral Richard E. Byrd, Jr. first left...)
From the moment Admiral Richard E. Byrd, Jr. first left Anarctica, he knew he would return. Both the scope of the strange land and the uncharted scientific promise it held were too much to leave behind forever. Launched during the Great Depression amid great public skepticism, and with funding at its toughest to secure, this second Antarctic journey proved as daring, eventful, and inspiring as any Byrd ever embarked upon. Reissued for todays readers, Admiral Byrds classic explorations by land, air, and sea transport us to the farthest reaches of the globe. As companions on Byrds journeys, modern audiences experience the polar landscape through Byrds own struggles, doubts, revelations, and triumphs and share the excitement of these timeless adventures.
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( When Admiral Richard E. Byrd set out on his second Anta...)
When Admiral Richard E. Byrd set out on his second Antarctic expedition in 1934, he was already an international hero for having piloted the first flights over the North and South Poles. His plan for this latest adventure was to spend six months alone near the bottom of the world, gathering weather data and indulging his desire to taste peace and quiet long enough to know how good they really are. But early on things went terribly wrong. Isolated in the pervasive polar night with no hope of release until spring, Byrd began suffering inexplicable symptoms of mental and physical illness. By the time he discovered that carbon monoxide from a defective stovepipe was poisoning him, Byrd was already engaged in a monumental struggle to save his life and preserve his sanity. When Alone was first published in 1938, it became an enormous bestseller. This edition keeps alive Byrds unforgettable narrative for new generations of readers.
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Richard E. Byrd was born in Winchester, Virginia, United States on October 25, 1888, into a distinguished Tidewater family.
His early education included study at the Shenandoah Valley Military Academy and a trip around the world alone at the age of 13. He attended Virginia Military Institute, the University of Virginia, and the U. S. Naval Academy, graduating in 1912. At the academy Byrd established himself as a class leader and athlete, although leg injuries suffered in football threatened his military career.
After briefly retiring from active duty, Byrd returned to the service when the United States entered World War I. He requested assignment to the Navy's aviation division. In 1918 Byrd developed a plan to fly the Navy's trimotored NC-1 flying boat across the Atlantic. His wartime assignment, however, was as commander of U. S. Navy aviation forces in Canada, where a submarine patrol was maintained. Byrd worked on improving aerial navigation when neither land nor horizon was visible, and developed a "bubble" sextant and a drift indicator. After the war he took charge of the navigational preparations for a one-stop transatlantic flight of three Navy planes but was not himself permitted to make the May 1919 flight.
Eight years later Byrd would make one of the early nonstop transatlantic flights; in the meantime he influenced flight development in other important ways. He successfully lobbied for legislation to establish a Bureau of Aeronautics in the Navy; and he commanded the Navy flying unit that accompanied Donald MacMillan's Arctic expedition of 1925, during which over 30, 000 square miles of northern Greenland and Ellesmere Island were explored.
Convinced of the practicability of the airplane for polar exploration, in 1926 Byrd undertook a privately sponsored expedition to the North Pole. Flying from Kings Bay, Spitsbergen, Byrd and his copilot circled the North Pole on May 9, 1926. Byrd returned to the United States to a tumultuous reception and promotion to the rank of commander.
Byrd's new goal was to demonstrate the scientific and commercial value of multiengine planes on sustained flight over long distances. He entered the "transatlantic derby" of 1927, but the crash of his new plane during tests delayed his departure until after Charles Lindbergh's flight. His aviation experiences are detailed in his first book, Skyward (1928).
Byrd's subsequent career centered on his Antarctic adventures. Buoyed by scientific and technological developments, he planned a large-scale exploration of Antarctica. Reaching the Bay of Whales in December 1928, Byrd established his camp, Little America, on the Ross Ice Shelf. In constant radio communication with the outside world, he and his companions carried out their scientific studies and aerial surveys. On November 28-29, 1929, Byrd and three companions successfully completed a hazardous flight to the South Pole and back, a distance of 1, 560 miles, discovering several new mountain ranges and obtaining valuable geological, meteorological, and radiowave propagation data. When Byrd came home in 1930, he was showered with additional honors and awards, including promotion to the rank of rear admiral. His Little America (1930) is a full account of the expedition.
Byrd returned to Antarctica in 1933-1935. He spent 5 months in solitude at Advance Base, making careful meteorological and auroral observations. This expedition nearly cost him his life when he was stricken by carbon monoxide fumes. Rescued in August 1934, Byrd could not return to Little America II until 2 months later. He wrote about this expedition in Discovery (1935) and later in Alone (1938).
In 1939 the United States government sponsored its first Antarctic expedition in a century, with Adm. Byrd in charge. He made several flights over the continent, delineated hundreds of additional miles of coastline, and mapped mineral deposits. Further work in the Antarctic awaited the cessation of World War II, a conflict in which Byrd served with distinction.
In 1946-1947 Byrd led his fourth expedition to the Antarctic as part of the Navy's Operation High Jump. Thirteen ships and 4, 000 men participated, photographing and mapping vast areas of the ice continent. Byrd again flew over the South Pole, dropping a packet containing flags of all the members of the United Nations. Byrd's final labors in Antarctica were made in Operation Deep Freeze (1955 - 1956) and in planning the United States Antarctic Program for the International Geophysical Year (1957 - 1958).
(By Richard Evelyn Byrd - Little America: Aerial Explorati...)
( From the moment Admiral Richard E. Byrd, Jr. first left...)
( When Admiral Richard E. Byrd set out on his second Anta...)
Century Club, Explorers Club, The Country Club in Brookline, Massachusetts, Lions Clubs in Washington D. C.
On January 20, 1915, Richard married Marie Donaldson Ames (d. 1974).
Rear Admiral