Hellbent for the Pole

By: Geoffrey Lee Martin
Softcover; 160 pages

In the week before Christmas, 1957, most of the world’s media seemed totally fascinated with what they gleefully dubbed ‘the race to the South Pole’ between the leaders of the two field parties making up the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition: the United Kingdom’s Dr. Vivian Fuchs (later knighted, after the successful completion of the expedition) and New Zealand’s Sir Edmund Hillary, who had recently conquered Mount Everest.

Hillary was, in his own words, ‘Hellbent for the Pole’, although it had been planned for Fuchs to reach there first. With four companions aboard three quite basic but reliable Ferguson farm tractors, Hillary had completed his allotted task — laying fuel and food depots toward the Pole to re-supply Fuchs’s party, which was making the crossing of the continent — but had resolved to press forward.

Hellbent  is a behind-the-scenes, insider's account of the expedition by the journalist  who covered for the New Zealand Press Association. The book is illustrated by dramatic color photos and comes with an enclosed note signed by the author.