The Antarctic Treaty went into effect on
June 23, 1961, demilitarizing the continent of Antarctica and preserving
it for scientific research. This stamp honors the treaty’s 30th
anniversary.
Wilkes Expedition Discovers Antarctica
On January 19, 1840, US Naval captain Charles Wilkes became the first American to explore the coast of Antarctica.
Born on April 3, 1798, in New York City,
New York, Charles Wilkes joined the US Navy in 1818. In the 1820s he
was part of the Columbian Institute for the Promotion of Arts and
Scientists. And in the 1830s, his survey of Narragansett Bay earned him
a promotion to head of the Navy’s Department of Charts and Instruments,
where he developed the Naval Observatory and Hydrographic Office.
As
early as 1828, President John Quincy Adams had wanted to send a naval
surveying expedition to the Antarctic Ocean. At the time, ships
traveling to the Antarctic in search of whales, seals, and fish were
wrecked because the area was uncharted. Despite these concerns, Congress
wouldn’t award the funding. It wasn’t until 1836, under President
Andrew Jackson, that funding was finally granted, though the project
would stall again until President Martin Van Buren pushed for it while
in office. Due to the long delay, the original commanding officer
resigned, and Wilkes was selected due to his experience with
hydrography, geodesy, and magnetism. Naturalists, botanists, a
mineralogist, taxidermists, artists, and a philologist joined Wilkes.
The
fleet of six ships departed Virginia on August 18, 1838. They traveled
down the coast of South America to the Pacific, through the Polynesian
islands and on to Australia. Heading south after leaving Sydney, Wilkes
saw a wall of ice and directed his ships toward it.
On
January 19, the expedition sighted land, which Wilkes called Cape
Hudson. Up until that time, there was little information about that
part of the world, and it was left blank on most maps. Though whalers
traveled the waters near Antarctica, no one had mapped out the
land. While explorers from other nations had spotted small areas of land
there before, none had explored it as widely as Wilkes would.
Once
he saw land, Wilkes followed along the shore as closely as possible,
being ever careful as the water was filled with icebergs. After sailing
for several more days and spotting land a few more times, Wilkes
concluded that what he was seeing was a continent (previous sightings
believed they simply saw a series of small islands) and named it the
Antarctic Continent. Wilkes continued to follow along the coast for
nearly a month. During that time, the cold and conditions were so bad
that his crew and doctors warned that they should turn back, but Wilkes
was adamant about completing his mission. Finally on February 21, after
a month of skirting the coast for over 1,500 miles, he believed he had
achieved his goal of exploring the Antarctic and agreed to head north.
The
expedition continued for another two years after that. By the time
they returned to America in June 1842, they had circumnavigated the
globe, traveling nearly 87,000 miles. Their journey included the
Madeira Islands, Rio de Janeiro, Tierra del Fuego, Chile, Peru, Samoa,
New South Wales, the Balleny Islands, Fiji, the Philippines, Singapore,
Polynesia, and many other areas. The expedition is credited with
playing a significant role in the development of 19th-century science,
and in particular the growth of America’s scientific establishment. The
crew collected thousands of plant and animal specimens that were later
made part of the Smithsonian Institution collection. Additionally,
Wilkes’ 19-volume report gave detailed information on the customs,
politics, and economies of the far-away places they had explored.