Antartica & the 1930s
This extract from more than an hour of film shot by Wilkins features preparations for the Ellsworth Antarctic expedition during which the millionaire Ellsworth hoped to become the first man to fly over the South Pole. Film courtesy of the Byrd Polar & Climate Research Center.
Following the return to dock of The Nautilus, Sir Hubert and Lady Suzanne Wilkins were broke and owing money. To their conditional rescue came one of those owed money, the wealthy Lincoln Ellsworth. In return for forgiving his debt, Wilkins was asked to travel with new expeditions to Antarctica, principally to give Ellsworth the chance to create history of his own flying to the South Pole.
Part of the Wilkins friendship extended to Ellsworth hosting Hubert and Suzanne for their honeymoon in 1931.
In this clip we see the happy couple and Ellsworth in what may seem sometimes like a scene out of The Sound of Music. This is courtesy of the Byrd Polar & Climate Research Center.
In the unique style of Movietone News newsreels, we see and hear from Sir Hubert with his wife, Suzanne, on their return to Sydney for a visit believed to be in 1938. In it, incredibly perhaps, Wilkins is gung-ho about another venture under the northern Polar ice. Film courtesy of the National Film and Sound Archives.
In time, Wilkins grew tired of these indulgences and extracted himself in the name of going on a search for a Russian aviator and his crew who had gone missing attempting to repeat Wilkins’ own flight over the Arctic. This endeavour, though a failure, not only earned him praise from Joe Stalin himself but helped to redeem his name in the eyes of many.
As war and age started to close him down, Wilkins struck up a relationship with US armed services but not before a trip back to Australia around 1938.
