Herbert Hollick-Kenyon - The Ellsworth Expedition

The Ellsworth Expedition

Hollick-Kenyon is most widely known as a pilot in the trans-Antarctic flight of Lincoln Ellsworth in 1935.

Ellsworth had made a prior attempt to fly across the south pole in 1934 with a different pilot, Bernt Balchen. Poor weather and a dispute over the number of crew members in the expedition (Ellsworth wanted 2, Balchen wanted 3) ended the trip.

Hollick-Kenyon (serving as a replacement for Balchen) and Ellsworth left on November 23, 1935 from Dundee Island bound for Richard E. Byrd's base camp at Little America. They flew 3500 km across the breadth of Antarctica, claiming 350,000 square miles (910,000 km2) of land for the United States of America.

They were forced to land 25 miles (40 km) short of their goal due to the lack of fuel. They began walking, but due to the loss of their radio at the outset of the trip, had been assumed lost by the United States. They arrived at the Little America camp, where they remained for nearly two months. They were eventually spotted by the British research ship Discovery which took them aboard and returned them safely home.

Hollick-Kenyon flew a Northrop Gamma (serial number 2B), a single-engine, low-winged airplane called the Polar Star. Hollick-Kenyon later recovered the aircraft and it was donated to the Smithsonian Institution in 1936 by Ellsworth.