This note considers the recent developments in Anglo–Argentine relations vis-à-vis the overseas territories of the Falkland Islands and South Georgia. The construction of the research station in South Georgia is considered significant because it signals the ending of the 19-year British military presence on the island. The Falkland Islands elections of November 2001 have shown that public opinion is still divided over the provisions of the Anglo- Argentine Joint Statement of 14 July 1999, which inter alia removed restrictions on Argentine passport holders entering the Falklands. Finally, the prospects for further rapprochement between Britain and Argentina are considered, and it is noted that these outstanding territorial disputes will continue to demand careful management notwithstanding the presence of the ‘sovereignty umbrella’ in the case of the Falklands.

The object of trying to ascertain how environmental concerns are being faced in the Soviet northlands is twofold. On the one hand, it may be interesting to compare the Soviet experience with that of other countries having the same environment; on the other, these areas are very seldom visited, in particular by foreigners, so they are in no sense a shop window and may therefore be a good guide to the real situation in the country.

The wheel was constructed as shown in the accompanying sketch. It was made from a bicycle wheel and a thin sheet of iron 4 in. wide. The bolts fixing this tread on to the rim projected so as to grip the ice. An ordinary cyclometer was attached to the axle so as to “tick over” by contact with a projection on the spoke.

A British Polar Exhibition, under the auspices of the Royal Geographical Society, was held at the Central Hall, Westminster, from July 2 to July 19.

The full extent of the height and scale of the Sentinel Range, Antarctica, was not known until reconnaissance flights and scientific traverses in the International Geophysical Year (IGY), 1957–1958. These explorations revealed the range to be twenty miles in length, with a large number of high peaks culminating in Mt. Vinson, the highest on the Antarctic continent at nearly 4900 meters. The discoveries captured the interest of the U.S. and world mountaineering communities setting off a competition to achieve the first climb of Vinson. The challenge was tempered only by the range's remoteness from the coast of Antarctica and the formidable logistics of mounting a mountaineering expedition. The US which had the most advanced ski-equipped cargo aircraft, had an established post-IGY policy that prohibited adventure expeditions that could divert logistic resources from the scientific programme. This paper discusses Mt. Vinson competition within the US and international climbing communities, mounting national pressures to achieve the first climb, and a reversal in policy by the US Antarctic Policy Group that resulted in the 1966–1967 American Antarctic Mountaineering Expedition's first ascents of Vinson and five other high peaks. Today, between 100 and 200 persons climb Mt. Vinson each austral summer.

Sir John Franklin's widow, Jane Franklin, planned a biography of her husband in the years following the disappearance of his expedition. In this project she was directly assisted by her niece and amanuensis Sophia Cracroft. This biography never came to fruition, but it did result in an unpublished manuscript history of the Franklin family, dated 1853, which Cracroft shared with Franklin's early biographers. The manuscript provides an interesting account of the Franklin family, including the detailed circumstances of the failure of the Boston and Spilsby Bank in 1804, which caused great financial and emotional stress. The final section of the manuscript provides an account of John Franklin's early naval career and Arctic expeditions.

Sir Ernest Shackleton bought the Norwegian sealer Foca 7 in 1921 for his third Antarctic expedition and renamed it Quest. He died aboard the ship in South Georgia in January 1922, but Frank Wild took over the leadership and completed the expedition after the delayed start. The vessel returned to Norwegian ownership in 1923 but kept the name Quest. In the 1920s and 1930s, in-between sealing voyages, she was chartered out for various scientific or hunting expeditions, mostly to S valbard or the east coast of Greenland, during which many well-known explorers trod her decks, including Gunnar Isachsen, Gino Watkins, Augustine Courtauld, John Rymill, Count Eigil Knuth, Lawrence Wager, H.W. Ahlmann, Gaston Micard, Paul-Emile Victor, and John Giaever. Vital assistance was given in rescuing the survivors of the Italian airship Italia in 1928, of the Danish ship Teddy in 1924, and of several sealers at different times. Many sailors owed their lives to this little ship, which was owned by the Schjelderup family and for most years captained by Ludolf Schjelderup, who gained international fame as an expert ice pilot. On one occasion, 1936–37, the vessel overwintered at Loch Fyne in northeast Greenland. In April 1940, when the Germans invaded Norway, Quest was sealing off Newfoundland. Allied naval forces took possession of her and she was used in various capacities in Canada, Bermuda, and UK coastal waters for the rest of the war. After the war, she once again returned to the sealing business under Norwegian ownership until finally coming to grief in the ice just north of Newfoundland and sinking on 5 May 1962.