Re: [Paddlewise] Shackleton & Scott

As one of English extraction on my father's side, I was regaled literally on my grandmother's knee with stories of Scott's "heroic" failure, and of Oates supposedly leaving the tent at the last camp with the self-sacrificing announcement "I am just going out and may be sometime" (Versions I've read in later life suggest Oates may in fact have been doped to the gills with opium by his companions and more or less pushed out the door!) For granny these things had not been history, but current events of her youth. But really, getting on skis for the first time in your life just a couple of weeks before setting off for the South Pole? Compared to Shackleton's or Amundsen's careful preperations? 
I'm of Norwegian heritage on my mother's side, and I visited the ski museum in Olso several years ago, where they have an exhibit comparing Amundsen's and Scott's equipment. They are extremely tactful in the posted signs, noting only that Amundsen had the advantage of growing up in a country where skiing and polar travel is routine.   



>From: Dan Hagen <dan_at_hagen.net>
>To: a.ferguson_at_chem.canterbury.ac.nz
>CC: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net
>Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Shackleton exhibit - books
>Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 15:46:08 -0700
>
>Don't forget the classic of the genre, Alfred Lansing's "Endurance:
>Shackleton's Incredible Voyage".  You might also want to read Roland
>Huntford's "Shackelton".  Huntford was the author of "Amundsen and
>Scott", which thoroughly discredited Scott (while elevating Amundsen).
>I am puzzled by the view--held by many Brits--that Shackelton was not
>the equal of Scott.  It seems to me that Shackelton was in a completely
>different league.
>
>Dan Hagen
>
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