Meredith Hooper | |
---|---|
Born | Adelaide, Australia |
Occupation | Writer |
Language | English |
Alma mater | University of Adelaide, University of Oxford |
Genre | History, science writing, children's books |
Subject | Antarctica |
Spouse | Richard Hooper |
Children | Tom Hooper |
Meredith Hooper is an Australian historian and writer. [1]
She was born and raised in Adelaide, Australia. [2] Hooper graduated in history from the University of Adelaide, [3] then studied imperial history at Oxford. [2]
She is a member of Association of British Science Writers, Royal Institution and the British Society for the History of Science.[ citation needed ]
In 2000, the National Science Foundation and the Congress of the United States awarded Hooper the Antarctica Service Medal. [4] In 2014, Hooper was named the Australian of the Year in the UK. [4] [5]
She is the wife of British civil servant Richard Hooper [14] and mother of film director Tom Hooper. After seeing a 2007 reading of an unproduced play, she told her son she thought he should consider pursuing it for a film adaptation; the project became his Academy Award-winning film, The King's Speech . [15]
The history of Antarctica emerges from early Western theories of a vast continent, known as Terra Australis, believed to exist in the far south of the globe. The term Antarctic, referring to the opposite of the Arctic Circle, was coined by Marinus of Tyre in the 2nd century AD.
Major Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.
Sir Douglas Mawson OBE FRS FAA was an Australian geologist, Antarctic explorer, and academic. Along with Roald Amundsen, Robert Falcon Scott, and Sir Ernest Shackleton, he was a key expedition leader during the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.
The Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition (CTAE) of 1955–1958 was a Commonwealth-sponsored expedition that successfully completed the first overland crossing of Antarctica, via the South Pole. It was the first expedition to reach the South Pole overland for 46 years, preceded only by Amundsen's expedition and Scott's expedition in 1911 and 1912.
Thomas Crean was an Irish seaman and Antarctic explorer who was awarded the Albert Medal for Lifesaving (AM).
Tim Jarvis AM is a British-Australian environmental explorer, adventurer, climber, author and documentary filmmaker, with Masters qualifications in environmental science and environmental law. Due to his 2013 expedition recreating the voyage and mountain crossing of Sir Ernest Shackleton, Jarvis is considered an authority on Shackleton and the leadership style he espoused.
The Australasian Antarctic Expedition was a 1911–1914 expedition headed by Douglas Mawson that explored the largely uncharted Antarctic coast due south of Australia. Mawson had been inspired to lead his own venture by his experiences on Ernest Shackleton's Nimrod expedition in 1907–1909. During its time in Antarctica, the expedition's sledging parties covered around 4,180 kilometres (2,600 mi) of unexplored territory, while its ship, SY Aurora, navigated 2,900 kilometres (1,800 mi) of unmapped coastline. Scientific activities included meteorological measurements, magnetic observations, an expansive oceanographic program, and the collection of many biological and geological samples, including the discovery of the first meteorite found in Antarctica. The expedition was the first to establish and maintain wireless contact between Antarctica and Australia. Another planned innovation – the use of an aircraft – was thwarted by an accident before the expedition sailed. The plane's fuselage was adapted to form a motorised sledge or "air-tractor", but it proved to be of very limited usefulness.
Scott's Hut is a building located on the north shore of Cape Evans on Ross Island in Antarctica. It was erected in 1911 by the British Antarctic Expedition of 1910–1913 led by Robert Falcon Scott.
The DiscoveryExpedition of 1901–1904, known officially as the British National Antarctic Expedition, was the first official British exploration of the Antarctic regions since the voyage of James Clark Ross sixty years earlier (1839–1843). Organized on a large scale under a joint committee of the Royal Society and the Royal Geographical Society (RGS), the new expedition carried out scientific research and geographical exploration in what was then largely an untouched continent. It launched the Antarctic careers of many who would become leading figures in the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, including Robert Falcon Scott who led the expedition, Ernest Shackleton, Edward Wilson, Frank Wild, Tom Crean and William Lashly.
The NimrodExpedition of 1907–1909, otherwise known as the British Antarctic Expedition, was the first of three successful expeditions to the Antarctic led by Ernest Shackleton and his second expedition to the Antarctic. Its main target, among a range of geographical and scientific objectives, was to be first to the South Pole. This was not attained, but the expedition's southern march reached a Farthest South latitude of 88° 23' S, just 97.5 nautical miles from the pole. This was by far the longest southern polar journey to that date and a record convergence on either Pole. A separate group led by Welsh Australian geology professor Edgeworth David reached the estimated location of the South Magnetic Pole, and the expedition also achieved the first ascent of Mount Erebus, Antarctica's second highest volcano.
The Ross Sea party was a component of Sir Ernest Shackleton's 1914–1917 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. Its task was to lay a series of supply depots across the Great Ice Barrier from the Ross Sea to the Beardmore Glacier, along the polar route established by earlier Antarctic expeditions. The expedition's main party, under Shackleton, was to land near Vahsel Bay on the Weddell Sea on the opposite coast of Antarctica, and to march across the continent via the South Pole to the Ross Sea. As the main party would be unable to carry sufficient fuel and supplies for the whole distance, their survival depended on the Ross Sea party setting up supply depots, which would cover the final quarter of their journey.
Victor Lindsey Arbuthnot Campbell was an English Royal Navy officer and Antarctic explorer.
The Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration was an era in the exploration of the continent of Antarctica which began at the end of the 19th century, and ended after the First World War; the Shackleton–Rowett Expedition of 1921–1922 is often cited by historians as the dividing line between the "Heroic" and "Mechanical" ages.
Sir Raymond Edward Priestley was an English geologist and early Antarctic explorer. He was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Birmingham, where he helped found The Raymond Priestley Centre on the shores of Coniston Water in the Lake District National Park.
Commander Joseph Russell Stenhouse, DSO, OBE, DSC, RD, RNR (1887–1941) was a Scottish-born seaman, Royal Navy Officer and Antarctic navigator, who commanded the expedition vessel SY Aurora during her 283-day drift in the ice while on service with the Ross Sea Party component of Sir Ernest Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1914–17. After Aurora's escape from the ice he brought her safely to New Zealand, but was thereafter replaced as the vessel's commander. He later served with distinction in the Royal Navy during both World Wars.
The South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole, Terrestrial South Pole or 90th Parallel South, is the southernmost point on Earth and lies antipodally on the opposite side of Earth from the North Pole, at a distance of 12,430 miles in all directions. It is one of the two points where Earth's axis of rotation intersects its surface.
This article is a list of English-language nonfiction books which have been described by reliable sources as in some way directly relating to the subject of Antarctica, its history, geography, people, etc.
Shackleton: Antarctic Odyssey is a graphic novel published in 2014 by First Second. Written and illustrated by Nick Bertozzi, the graphic novel focuses on Ernest Shackleton and his crew during the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914. The book was published during the 100th anniversary of the expedition
George Percy Abbott was a Royal Navy petty officer, Royal Naval Air Service pilot officer, and Antarctic explorer.