Sacrifices in the Name of Science

In the corridors of McMurdo’s Crary Lab building (a research facility for the advancement of Antarctic science) there is a permanent exhibit showcasing titbits of McMurdoan scientific history. It is a voyage that retraces the footsteps of men who came here with a strong sense of adventure. Many of the remarkable stories of Antarctica recount the sacrifices the first explorers, particularly Robert F. Scott and Douglas Mawson, made in the name of science.

The Worst Journey in the World, by A. Cherry-Garrard (a member of Scott’s second expedition), gives an example of the extremes these men went through to gather data. Edward Wilson, the biologist of the expedition, was convinced the embryos of emperor penguins would provide answers as to the evolution of ancient to modern birds. Due to the emperors’ reproductive calendar, the eggs had to be collected in the dead of winter at a nesting ground at Cape Crozier, some 60 miles South of Hut Point. To survive the cold the explorers spent the long winter in an ice-cave, with not much else to eat than raw seal meat. Even if relatively short, the voyage on foot and the terrible hardships endured by the team of intrepid Brits surpasses, in my opinion, many modern-day expeditions with more ambitious goals.

During their ill-fated trip to the South Pole, Scott and his 4 men collected 35 pounds of fossils.

“The three emperor penguin eggs collected by Wilson [the expeditions biologist and head of science] and his colleagues on 20 Jully 1911 are sill in the collections of the Natural History Museum in London. They were presented to the Museum in 1913 by Cherry-Garrard.”*

“The ‘Winter Journey’ emperor penguin embryos were cut into about 800 thin slices, stained, and put onto glass slides for microscope study. Their official scientific report did not appear until 1934, by which time ideas about bird evolution had changed.”*

“Ponting [the expedition photographer] took many intimate portraits of the men, here highlighting Cherry-Garrard’s youthful innocence. Cherry-Garrard lived to know that, sadly, his ‘Worst Journey’ for penguin eggs produced no major scientific advance. Even as the eggs were gathered, the penguin theory of bird evolution was gradually being discounted.”*

“Wilson, Bowers and Cherry-Garrard tuck into a well-earned meal back at Cape Evans, having endured some of the worst conditions on Earth in the name of science”*

Despite losing two of their companions and starving from cold and hunger, Scott and his party continued to man-haul the load of rocks (contrast this with Amundsen, who had no scientific agenda and dashed to the pole on ultra light sledges, pulled to and from the Pole by his team of dogs). Scott’s "rock solid data" was to be recovered along with their frozen bodies nearly a year after they perrished. One of these fossils was of Glossopteris indica, a Permian era (approximately 250 to 300 million year-old) beech-like tree. Glossopteris fossils had been found previously in India and Africa, so Scott’s discovery was a key piece of evidence supporting the existence of Gondwana and proved that Antarctica was once covered in temperate forests.

“… (from left, standing) Oates, Scott and Evans, with (sitting) Bowers and Wilson, display the British flag [at the South Pole, a little over a month after Amundsen and his three companions had claimed it for Norway]. The film was found at the Last Camp and developed later.”*

“Both Scott and Amundsen had similar overall routes to the South Pole, although the Norwegians’ Framheim base at the Bay of Whales was just over 100 kilometres closer [to the Pole] than Cape Evans.”*

“This rock contains a fossil of Glossopteris, a type of extinct tree-fern. The rocks that Scott and his Polar Party hauled back included fossils of Glossopteris.”*

On the walls of the McMurdo Station cafeteria there are posters of Yellowstone National Park. It is not hard to transpose these landscapes of tall, forested mountains and fast flowing streams to ancient Antarctica, in the days of Glossopteris.

Ironically, it was the opportunistically collected fossil not the penguin embryos that proved to be the major discovery, but Scott and his men didn't live to realize the significance of their find. 

–Geoff

*All images and captions were taken from the book Scott’s Last Expedition, by Steve Parker, published in 2012 by the Natural History Museum, London for the Canterbury Museum.