You are bidding on a rare vintage hardcover book with original dustjacket titled Operation Deepfreeze. By Rear Admiral George J. Dufek, Commander U.S. Naval Support Force Antarctica. Published by Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1957. This is the scarce and highly collectible First Edition.
Book is signed by the author, George Dufek on the title page.
In the mid-1950s Admiral Dufek was appointed commander of Task Force 43 of the USN to carry out Antarctic scientific research and exploration as part of the International Geophysical Year. This account by the admiral covers Operation Deepfreeze I and II.
Condition: The book is bound in blue boards with black lettering on spine. Front cover has illustration of ships with ice flows near them. The covers are securely attached with no cracking or splitting of hinges. Top area of spine slightly sun-lightened. All pages are clean and tightly bound. Illustrated map endpages. No writing in book and no signs of previous ownership. The book remains in very good condition. The dustjacket shows wear and has a piece missing at top area of front cover. The dustjacket is in a mylar cover to protect it.
This is a very rare and desirable signed book by one of the last of the Great Polar Explorers!
Would make a nice addition to a collection.
Great gift idea!
About the author (from wikipedia):
George John Dufek (10 February 1903, Rockford, Illinois - 10 February 1977, Bethesda, Maryland[1]) was an American naval officer, naval aviator, and polar expert. He served in World War II and the Korean War and in the 1940s and 1950s spent much of his career in the Antarctic, first with Admiral Byrd and later as supervisor of U.S. programs in the South Polar regions. Rear Admiral Dufek was the director of the Mariners' Museum[2] in Newport News, Virginia after his retirement from the Navy in 1959.
Born in Rockford, Illinois, he joined the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) at his local high school and was appointed to the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland in 1921. Upon graduation in 1925 he received his ensign's commission and commenced his career aboard the battleship USS Maryland. In 1932 he entered flight training school at the Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida; after graduating as a naval aviator in 1933 he served as navigator and executive officer on three different ships.
During World War II Dufek commanded a flight training squadron, served as senior naval aviator in Algeria during the invasion of North Africa, assisted in the planning for the invasion of Sicily and Salerno and, after his promotion to captain and subsequent reassignment, the invasion of southern France. In September 1944 he assumed command of the escort carrier USS Bogue, which sank the final German submarine lost in World War II.
During the Korean War the Navy placed Dufek in command of the aircraft carrier USS Antietam, then on Kwajalein in the Pacific and finally at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island in Oak Harbor, Washington.
With Admiral Byrd
In the spring of 1939 Dufek, at this time a lieutenant, requested and received an assignment with Rear Admiral Richard E. Byrd's third expedition to Antarctica, where he served as navigator of the USS Bear, the flagship of the expedition. In recognition of his many hours of exploratory flying over the South Polar continent Dufek later received the Antarctic Expedition Medal.
Operation Highjump
After a brief post-war stint in Japan, Dufek was assigned as chief staff officer to a U.S. Navy-Coast Guard task force to establish weather bases in the polar regions. While there he participated in Operation Highjump, a Naval expedition to Antarctica under the command of Admiral Byrd, during which he made the first flight over the Thurston Peninsula and later rescued six survivors of another flight over the same area. He returned to Washington D.C. briefly, but by 1947 was back in the Antarctic, this time commanding a task force sent to supply existing weather stations and to establish new ones near the Pole.
Operation Deepfreeze
In 1954 Dufek joined a special Antarctic planning group preparing for the Navy's Operation Deep Freeze, a scientific polar research expedition. When planning was complete Dufek was given command of Task Force 43 which, with more than 80 officers and 1000 enlisted men, three ice-breakers, and three cargo ships, was charged with logistics and support for the expedition.
Among other accomplishments the task force established bases on Ross Island and in Little America, and on October 31, 1956,[3] Admiral Dufek and a crew of six[4] became the first Americans to set foot at the South Pole and to plant the American flag, and the first men to land on the pole from the air. On November 28, 1957, Dufek was present with a US congressional delegation during a change of command ceremony held at McMurdo Sound.[5] After Admiral Byrd's death, Dufek was appointed to succeed him as supervisor of U.S. programs in the South Polar Regions.
He died in 1977, on his 74th birthday.
(Inventory: S - 52)