A dusty discovery may give shape to a legend

Clipping from The Adelaide Advertiser 17 January 2015

The Unseen ANZAC

How an Enigmatic Polar Explorer Created Australia’s World War I Photographs

Details: http://jeffmaynard.com.au/Jeff_Maynard/The_Unseen_Anzac.html

Jeff Maynard tells the story of a forgotten Australian explorer

Jeff Maynard

Historian, author and documentary maker Jeff Maynard has told the story of a man Australia has largely forgotten.

Read more and listen to this radio program at the ABC

The Last Explorer

by Simon Nasht

In the tradition of The Ice Master and Endurance, here is the incredible story of the first truly modern explorer, whose death-defying adventures and uncommon modesty make this book itself an extraordinary discovery. Hubert Wilkins was the most successful explorer in history—no one saw with his own eyes more undiscovered land and sea. Largely self-taught, Wilkins became a celebrated newsreel cameraman in the early 1900s, as well as a reporter, pilot, spy, war hero, scientist, and adventurer, capturing in his lens war and famine, cheating death repeatedly, meeting world leaders like Lenin and Stalin, and circling the globe on a zeppelin. Apprenticing with the greats of polar exploration, including Shackleton in the Antarctic, Wilkins recognized the importance of new technologies such as the airplane and submarine. He helped map the Canadian Arctic and plumbed the ocean depths from the icecap. A pioneer in the truest sense of the word, he became the first man to fly across the North Pole, which won him a knighthood; the first to fly to the Antarctic and discover land there by airplane; and the first to take a submarine under the Arctic ice. Grasping the link between the poles and changing global weather, Wilkins was a visionary in weather forecasting and the study of global warming. A true hero of the earth, he changed the way we look at our world.

Sir Hubert Wilkins His World of Adventure

Thomas, Lowell

New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961.

The Making of an Explorer

George Hubert Wilkins and the Canadian Arctic Expedition, 1913-1916

By Stuart E. Jenness

The Making of an Explorer reveals how George Hubert Wilkins' experiences with the Canadian Arctic Expedition of 1913-16 helped a little-known Australian photographer develop into the world-famous polar explorer Sir Hubert Wilkins. Making extensive use of Wilkins' Arctic diary and other sources, both archival and published, Stuart Jenness provides new information about Wilkins, explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson, the Canadian Arctic Expedition, and the early history of North America's Western Arctic.

Wilkins was originally seconded to Stefansson's Arctic Expedition for a year as its official photographer but circumstances forced him to stay in the Arctic for three years. He spent much of those extra two years in discussion with Stefansson, becoming his life-long friend. "The Making of an Explorer" describes Wilkins' successful expedition to Banks Island in 1914 in search of Stefansson and his subsequent relationship with Stefansson, his significant role and contribution as second-in-command of Stefansson's polar explorations over the next two years, his remarkable collection of films and photographs of the little-known Copper Eskimos in the Central Arctic, and his large but virtually unknown original collection of birds and mammals from Banks Island for the National Museum of Canada.

Details

Part of the McGill-Queen's Native and Northern Series (number 38 in series)
432 Pages, 6.25 x 9.25
65 black & white photographs
ISBN 9780773527980
November 2004
Formats: Cloth, eBook

Hubert Who?

by Malcom Andrews

How can a man who achieved so much be so little remembered? Explorer, pioneer aviator, war photographer, naturalist, meteorologist, author, student of the paranormal, and secret agent; loyal lieutenant to Shackleton, Bean and Hearst; the last man from the West to meet with Lenin ... Sir Hubert Wilkins lived many lives - all of them exciting and fantastic. He shot the world's first movie footage from an aircraft (while strapped to its fuselage); and was the first to fly over both polar ice caps. He was the only member of the media ever to win medals for gallantry (during World War I); the first man to attempt to take a submarine under the North Pole; a spy for the British in Soviet Russia and the Americans in the Far East; and an enlightened friend to Aboriginal people in outback Australia. Yet this South Australian farm boy is barely acknowledged here in his homeland. Author Malcolm Andrews has breathed life into the exploits of this remarkable yet humble adventurer, creating a gripping tale that resoundingly answers the question: 'Hubert who?' So set your compass north and it's chocks away - for the amazing true story of one of history's greatest unsung heroes...

Publisher page at Harper Collins

Product Details

• ISBN: 9780730497493
• ISBN 10: 0730497496
• Imprint: ABC Books
• On Sale: 01/09/2011
• Pages: 304
• List Price: 15.99 AUD
• BISAC1: BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / General
• BISAC2: Biography & True Stories / Biography: general