From Woody's Couch

This blog post is part of the Frozen Friday Series, an A-Z journey of the Polar Archives.  Each week, we will feature some aspect of the history of polar exploration with a blog post written by our student authors.

We would like to apologize for last week’s hiatus. We were in the process of producing a very special mini-series within this Frozen Friday blog series. I had the pleasure and honor to interview Dr. Lonnie Thompson, a leading glaciologist, an outspoken climate scientist, and one of the friendliest, most approachable men I have ever met.  The interview lasted for over one hour and was, in all honesty, one of the most interesting and fun experiences I have had while working with the Polar Archives. The reason we had decided to conduct an interview for this post is because Dr. Thompson is a living, breathing explorer. While we can guess at what drove Admiral Byrd or Dr. Cook to explore, we can easily ask Dr. Thompson why he does what he does. So, that is what I did. A full transcript of the interview can be found here.

Over the next four weeks, we will be publishing one of four blogs highlighting portions of the interview. Each post will focus on a theme from the interview and feature highlights of that particular section. This post will focus on introducing Dr. Thompson, in his own words, to those who might not already know of him. Next week will be about the difficulties he faced when beginning the Ice Core Paleoclimatology group here at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center.

How would you describe what you do and what you study to someone who wouldn’t know, just in your own words?

I’d say, first and foremost, we study glaciers… Glaciers are wonderful recorders in that every year, if you’re high enough, cold enough, or in high latitudes where it’s cold enough, you get an annual layer of snow deposited. You can measure that layer through measurements of isotopes of oxygen and hydrogen that tells us the temperature of the past so you can actually see the seasonal cycle in these areas…Every dry season, if you’re in the tropics, you get a layer of dust. You can measure the thickness of those dust layers through time and you can reconstruct precipitation… Literally anything in the atmosphere is recorded in the ice and that’s including the atmosphere itself. In the little bubbles (capsules) in the ice is capsules of the atmosphere of the past so we can extract the gasses from those bubbles so we can measure carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide; all the greenhouse gasses we’re concerned about today. We can look at how natural variation has changed through time. That record now goes back over eight hundred thousand years… But glaciers also respond to climate change. They’re indicators. If it gets warmer or drier, the glaciers will retreat. When it’s colder or wetter, they advance…They’re a visual recorder of how the system is changing… So they record so many variables and they’re the richest recorder that we have on the planet. Unfortunately in today’s world, those recorders are disappearing because the Earth is getting warmer.

I know you do a lot of travel and studying. I know the Byrd Center prides itself on having ice cores from various places. You said you’ve been to Greenland, where else have your studies taken you?

Well we have drilled the ice fields of Kilimanjaro in Africa, the highest tropical mountain in Africa. We’ve drilled the ice fields down in through the Andes of Peru, Bolivia, and Ecuador. The highest tropical mountain on Earth is Huascarán. It’s one of our drill sites in the Andes in Peru. We’ve drilled in places where people don’t even know there’s a glacier. For example, in Papua, Indonesia in what used to be called New Guinea, in the middle of a tropical rain forest, there’s a glacier, very difficult to get to and that glacier is disappearing very rapidly in today’s world but we were able to drill there in 2010. A lot of what we do is like a salvage mission to capture the history in the ice before it disappears. China, Tibet: we went into that part of the world right after relations were normalized between the U.S. and China. We’ve now been working there for thirty-three years and drilling in the Himalayas and across the Tibetan plateau. We just completed a project in 2015 in the far western Kunlun Mountains where we expect to have the oldest ice archive outside of the Polar Regions recovered on earth. We don’t know yet how old it is, but it might actually be the oldest ice on earth. That’s the beauty of what we do: we go to places where no one has gone before and in those areas you are almost guaranteed to find something new and exciting when you start reading that record.

Published by John Hooton

This blog post is part of the Frozen Friday Series, an A-Z journey of the Polar Archives.  Each week, we will feature some aspect of the history of polar exploration with a blog post written by our student authors

While doing research for another Frozen Fridays post (“‘O’ is for Outreach”), I came across a source written by a familiar name: Siple (as in Dr. Paul Siple). Puzzled by the familiarity, I summoned the “Googler” and sought to solve my self-created mystery. Upon skimming Paul Siple’s Wikipedia page, I arrived at my answer: Paul Siple, apart from his significant contribution to the development of what would commonly be known as the wind-chill factor, was also the famous Boy Scout that went with then Commander Richard E. Byrd on his first expedition to Antarctica (1928-30). With some excitement at this discovery, my curiosity succeeded in derailing me from my research and drove me to the Polar Archive’s website, seeking a short biography of the man. While Dr. Paul Siple did have a collection in the Polar Archives, to my disappointment, no such bio yet existed. With this week’s blog, I intend to rectify that by writing a bio pro tempore that will bring attention to one of the many interesting individuals within the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center Archival Program.

Paul Allman Siple, born on 18 December 1908 in Montpelier, Ohio, would be one of the few men to have the distinction of serving under Admiral Richard E. Byrd on all five of his Antarctic expeditions.[1] On the first of these expeditions, the young Paul Siple was a plucky nineteen year-old, fresh from his first year of college.[2]  In June 1928, Chief Scout Executive James E. West announced that Commander Richard Byrd was looking for a single Boy Scout to serve with him on his upcoming journey south.[3] Of the 826,000 scouts, eighty-eight were recommended to the National Office of the Boy Scouts, which in turn narrowed the selection pool to seventeen. A further committee narrowed the seventeen to six finalists.[4] The most basic considerations for any scout applying for this coveted position were rigorous: at least two years of First Class or Able Sea Scout rank in the Scout Movement, two recommendations from “qualified authorities” on his character and skill, and Merit Badges in various skills such as Aviation, Hiking, Machinery, and Taxidermy.[5] Obviously, the final six Scouts held all of those qualifications and more. The final selection memo sent to Chief Scout Executive James West detailed each of the six, listing the strengths and weaknesses of each boy.  Paul Siple received more than double the average number of strengths while fewer than the average number of weak points. Described in the memo as having “a good strong physique” and an “excellent character with the highest ideals,” Siple appeared to the selectors to be intelligent, sincere, respectful, and generally very well suited to the tasks of the expedition. Even his weak points were positive: “He is not a rapid thinker. He takes time, but is usually right. He is a little too serious…He accepts criticism appreciatively, however.”[6]  It appears that Paul Siple was the clear choice for the expedition.

Siple nearly missed the opportunity to winter on the continent. “‘Nobody knows who is going to stay on the ice,’” said Siple, quoting then Commander Byrd. “‘Everyone who does will have to have a reason. Besides, we do need crew members to bring the ships back for us at the end.’”[7] Luckily, Siple’s training as a Boy Scout came once again to his aid. Larry Gould, second in command of the expedition, “had promised the American Museum of Natural History that he would bring back a barrel each of seal and penguin skins,” an obligation that Gould no longer felt he could complete. Thus, when Gould sought someone to take on the messy task, Siple was first to volunteer. After pleading to the good Commander to allow the boy to winter on the ice, Siple joined the winter party as a “taxidermist, dog driver and naturalist.”[8] Siple would also become the driver of his own dog team when one the expedition’s dog handlers suffered “an unfortunate accident.”[9] Siple recounted his adventures as a Boy Scout with Byrd in his books,  A Boy Scout with Byrd and 90⁰ South. Perhaps the most amusing of these tales is the story of how he gained a “knighthood”. Siple was a founding member of the “Knights of the Grey Underwear” when, out of necessity the winter party engaged in a process known as “dry washing”. Siple explains: “In the cold of the winter the process we called ‘dry washing,’ or exchanging soiled clothes for almost equally soiled garments which had previously been set aside for laundering but which now looked somehow cleaner than those being worn, came into existence. And so the “Knights of the ‘Grey Underwear’ was born.”[10]

Upon returning to the United States, Mr. Siple would become Dr. Paul Siple after completing a doctorate in geography from Clark University. He would serve on all of Admiral Byrd’s expeditions to the Antarctic and devised, with Charles Passel, the wind-chill index that measures the effect of moving air on the human body.[11] Paul Siple lived an incredible live and had the privilege of serving with Admiral Byrd for nearly the entirety of his adult life. Paul Siple’s collections and the collections of other Polar Explorers, including the good Admiral, can be found at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center Archival Program.

Written by John Hooton.

[1] Jeff Rubin, “Siple, Paul,” Encyclopedia of the Antarctic (New York: Routledge 2007).

[2] Information taken from the Papers of Admiral Richard E. Byrd.

[3] Information taken from the Papers of Admiral Richard E. Byrd.

[4] James E. West,  “With Byrd to the Antarctic”, Boys Life, October 1928, 17.

[5] Information taken from the Papers of Admiral Richard E. Byrd.

[6] Information taken from the Papers of Admiral Richard E. Byrd.

[7] Paul Siple. 90⁰ South (New York: Putnam 1959), 40.

[8] Paul Siple. 90⁰ South, 41.

[9] Paul Siple. 90⁰ South, 42.

[10] Paul Siple. 90⁰ South, 43.

[11] Jeff Rubin, “Siple, Paul.”

This blog post is part of the Frozen Friday Series, an A-Z journey of the Polar Archives.  Each week, we will feature some aspect of the history of polar exploration with a blog post written by our student authors

A photograph can be a powerful thing, but it is a very simple concept to understand: a device takes in light and captures the light of a moment in a tangible form that can be printed and viewed over and over again. At their most meaningful, photographs can represent something deeply emotional. They can represent a moment in life and thus a nostalgic focal point. Imbued in the image are the sights, sounds, and feelings of a different time. Photographs can be a source of identity, representing something far more than just an image on a rectangular plane. They can bring a sense of reality to locations that would otherwise exist in the ethereal.

In this way, a photograph of Antarctica would represent something greater than just a new image of Antarctica. In a way, it would make Antarctica more real, like how a photograph of the Grand Canyon might make it seem more than just a place on a map. Yet it would be greater than that. Photographs of Antarctica from space are notoriously poor. Cloud cover always obscures Antarctica and, for about half the year, the darkness of the austral winter hides the continent.[1] Thus, photographing Antarctica in any fashion has proved a particular challenge for scientists. That is, until 1997, when the RADARSAT Antarctic Mapping Project provided the first high-resolution views of the entirety of Antarctica.[2]

Canadian RADARSAT-1 was the combined effort of the Canadian Space Program, which developed the satellite, and NASA, which launched the satellite from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Equipped with a C-band Synthetic Aperture Radar, which allows the satellite to take high-resolution images of the surface of the Earth regardless of the day/night cycle and any otherwise inclement weather.[3] Launched in 1995, RADARSAT-1 provided information and images of the Earth for many purposes, such as agriculture, cartography, and disaster management, until it ceased to be active.[4]

Scientists at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center (then just the Byrd Polar Research Center) saw the potential RADARSAT-1 had for a breakthrough in mapping Antarctica. The satellite could be ordered to maneuver in space from Earth in such a way that would allow for imaging of the elusive southern continent.[5] Dr. Kenneth Jezek led the team from the Ohio State University that led the overall project and provided scientific direction as well as producing the final products. The first Antarctic Imaging Campaign, as the initial stage of the RADARSAT Antarctic Mapping Project was known, utilized RADARSAT-1’s capabilities to maneuver and capture images despite conditions that would otherwise make image taking impossible. The campaign was completed nine days before it had originally been planned to end with minimal difficulties.[6]

The result was a rather large number of images representing many rectangular images if portions of Antarctica. The images were processed and combined by the Ohio State University team of scientists and resulted in a mosaic image of the frozen continent. In the words of Dr. Jezek, “the RAMP mosaic…is truly a new view of Antarctica.”[7] The mosaic allowed scientists to examine in great detail the geology and glaciology of the continent and provides a bench mark for scientists to judge future changes in the Antarctic ice sheet.[8]

The RADARTSAT-1 Antarctic Mapping Project (RAMP) resulted in a new picture of Antarctica. We can now see the continent through the clouds that kept it shrouded for so long. Scientists studying the Antarctic can use the images produced by RAMP to judge the state of the continent. For the rest of us, however, the image can make the continent more of a real place.

Dr. Jezek and many other polar scientists and explorers have collections at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center Archival Program, so come check us out!

Written by John Hooton.

[1] Kenneth C. Jezek, “RADSARSAT Antarctic Mapping Project,” Encyclopedia of the Antarctic (New York: Routledge 2007).

[2] Jezek, “RADSARSAT Antarctic Mapping Project.”

[3] Kenneth C. Jezek, “RADARSAT-1 Antarctic Mapping Project,” accessed March 15, 2017, http://research.bpcrc.osu.edu/rsl/radarsat/radarsat.html

[4] “RADARSAT-1”, Canadian Space Agency, last modified March 21, 2014, accessed March 15, 2017, http://www.asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/satellites/radarsat1/.

[5] Jezek, “RADARSAT-1 Antarctic Mapping Project.”

[6] Jezek, “RADARSAT-1 Antarctic Mapping Project.”

[7] Jezek, “RADARSAT-1 Antarctic Mapping Project.”

[8] Jezek, “RADSARSAT Antarctic Mapping Project.”