Albert Paddock Crary (July 25, 1911 – October 29, 1987), was an American pioneer polar geophysicist and glaciologist.[1] He was the first person to have set foot on both the North and South Poles, having made it to the North Pole on May 3, 1952 (with Joseph O. Fletcher and William P. Benedict) and then to the South Pole on February 12, 1961, as the leader of a team of eight.[2] The South Pole expedition set out from McMurdo Station on December 10, 1960, using three Snowcats with trailers. Crary was the seventh expedition leader to arrive at the South Pole by surface transportation (the six others before him were—in sequence—Amundsen, Scott, Hillary, Fuchs, a Russian expedition in 1959–60 from Vostok base, and Antero Havola).[3] He was widely admired for his intellect, wit, skills and as a great administrator for polar research expeditions.[4]
Biography
Crary was born in 1911 into a farming family in northern New York State. He was the second oldest in a family of 7 children. He was a physics major and geology student at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York. He graduated in 1931 Phi Beta Kappa from St. Lawrence University and then enrolled at Lehigh University to obtain a master's degree in physics. After spending years completing and facilitating research at both poles, Crary eventually settled in Bethesda, Maryland, with his wife and son.[1]
Deputy Leader of United States science during the International Geophysical Year, 1957
Leader of the U.S. seismic traverse of Ross Ice Shelf, 1957–1958
Leader, geophysical traverse W from Little America V, up Skelton Glacier to the Victoria Land plateau and W along the 78 parallel to c. 13130E, 1958–1959
Leader, geophysical traverse from McMurdo Station via Skelton Glacier to the South Pole, 1960–1961
Chief Scientist, United States Antarctic Research Program, 1960–1968
Deputy then Director, Division of Environmental Sciences, National Science Foundation, 1969–1978
Member of ACAN, 1961–76 (Chairman, 1974–1976)
He worked with many notable scientists and famous institutions:
Assisted Dr. James Peoples at MOGUL (Project Mogul) as the Field Operations Director using meteorological balloons to experiment with different types of equipment to collect and transmit sound waves in the upper atmosphere (Roswell incident- see Project Mogul)
↑Brown, Michelle (28 November 2011). "Welcome to Crary". PolarTREC Journal. Archived from the original on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 15 August 2015.
↑Staff (January 1989). "Albert Paddock Crary"(PDF). Arctic Institute of North America – University of Calgary. Archived from the original(PDF) on 2016-03-05. Retrieved 2015-08-15.
