The Antarctic Snow Cruiser:
" Early one October morning in 1939, an improbable vehicle lumbered out of Chicago on the first leg of a long and eventful trip to Boston. It looked like something from the mind of H. G. Wells, with its high, slanted turret and red and silver paint. It was so huge that the roads it traveled had to be closed to other traffic.
The Antarctic Snow Cruiser was the inspiration of Thomas C. Poulter, a physicist and explorer who had experienced the difficulties of polar travel firsthand during the second Byrd expedition in 1934. As second-in-command, Poulter had used snow tractors in his heroic rescue of Rear Adm. Richard E. Byrd from the advance base hut where he lay ill with carbon monoxide poisoning.
After covering hundreds of miles in the tractors under emergency conditions, Poulter knew how cramped and impractical they were for long hauls.
After that expedition Poulter joined the Research Foundation of Armour Institute of Technology, in Chicago. He convinced his new colleagues that what the country needed was the ultimate polar exploration vehicle, something to solve the problem of moving outposts in the interior of Antarctica. Other countries were claiming territory there; the United States needed to use its superior technology to seize the advantage. Who knew what mineral wealth might lie beneath the ice?
When the United States announced plans for a third Antarctic expedition in 1939, Poulter rushed to Washington and sold officials on the idea of the cruiser, which would be built at private expense and lent to the government. At that point Poulter had less than six months to complete a gigantic machine loaded with novel design features that would have to function in the harshest environment on earth."
" Early one October morning in 1939, an improbable vehicle lumbered out of Chicago on the first leg of a long and eventful trip to Boston. It looked like something from the mind of H. G. Wells, with its high, slanted turret and red and silver paint. It was so huge that the roads it traveled had to be closed to other traffic.
The Antarctic Snow Cruiser was the inspiration of Thomas C. Poulter, a physicist and explorer who had experienced the difficulties of polar travel firsthand during the second Byrd expedition in 1934. As second-in-command, Poulter had used snow tractors in his heroic rescue of Rear Adm. Richard E. Byrd from the advance base hut where he lay ill with carbon monoxide poisoning.
After covering hundreds of miles in the tractors under emergency conditions, Poulter knew how cramped and impractical they were for long hauls.
After that expedition Poulter joined the Research Foundation of Armour Institute of Technology, in Chicago. He convinced his new colleagues that what the country needed was the ultimate polar exploration vehicle, something to solve the problem of moving outposts in the interior of Antarctica. Other countries were claiming territory there; the United States needed to use its superior technology to seize the advantage. Who knew what mineral wealth might lie beneath the ice?
When the United States announced plans for a third Antarctic expedition in 1939, Poulter rushed to Washington and sold officials on the idea of the cruiser, which would be built at private expense and lent to the government. At that point Poulter had less than six months to complete a gigantic machine loaded with novel design features that would have to function in the harshest environment on earth."
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