Journey and Joy

Charles Wilkes (1798–1877) was an American naval officer and explorer. Wilkes was born in New York City on April 3, 1798. He entered the navy as a midshipman in 1818, did service during the next few years in Mediterranean and Pacific areas, and in 1832–1833 did survey work in Narragansett Bay, which led to his appointment in Washington, D.C., to head a depot of charts and instruments that eventually became the United States Naval Observatory. In 1838 Wilkes was put in command of an important expedition for scientific exploration that took him to several island groups of the South Pacific, Australia, the Antarctic coastal areas now known as Wilkes Land, the Hawaiian Islands, the northwest coast of the United States, and islands of Oceania, completing a voyage around the world before his return to New York in the summer of 1842. During the next 20 years his main occupation was the preparation of records of this expedition. He wrote a 5-volume Narrative of the United States Explori...

Hubert Wilkins (1888–1958) was an Australian polar explorer and aviator who made the first west-to-east Arctic aerial crossing. Born in Mount Bryan East, Australia, on Oct. 31, 1888, George Hubert Wilkins was educated in electrical engineering at the School of Mines and Industries in Adelaide, after which he took up photography and learned the fundamentals of flying. As a newsreel photographer, he covered (1912–1913) the Balkan War for British newspaper and motion-picture concerns. The American explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson selected Wilkins as official photographer for the Canadian Arctic Expedition (1913–1917), and his loyalty and devotion to the aims of the expedition resulted in his promotion to second in command. In September 1917, during World War I, Wilkins joined the Australian Flying Corps on the French front as a photographer. In 1919 he competed, unsuccessfully, for the London Daily Mail prize of $50,000 for a flight from England to Australia. Wilkins was second in co...