Olav Bjaaland

The photo above, downloaded from Wikipedia is of Amundsen, Hanssen, Hassel, and Wisting at the South Pole at the end of 1911. There was a fifth member of the team, Olav Bjaaland, presumably the photographer. The bare heads for identification purposes is a nice touch.

These Wikipedia paragraphs about Bjaaland are cool:

At the turn of the century, Bjaaland, together with the Hemmestveit brothers were among the best skiers in Norway. In 1902, he won the nordic combined at the Holmenkollen Ski Festival, to this day the classic event in nordic skiing. In 1909 Bjaaland, together with five others were invited to France to compete with the best skiers of Europe.

On this trip, Bjaaland by chance met Roald Amundsen. The already successful explorer invited Bjaaland to join his forthcoming expedition to the North Pole. Bjaaland was thrilled, and still believing that they were heading to the North Pole. However, they left Oslo, Norway on 7 June 1910 heading south to race for the Antarctic pole against Robert Falcon Scott.

Scott’s team arrived at the pole a month after Amundsen’s and perished on their return. All four in the photo above would die before men would again set foot at the South Pole 47 years later in 1958. Hanssen died in 1956. However, Bjaaland was still alive in 1958 and would be until 1961.

It comes to mind today as an astronaut crew is orbiting as much as 40,000 miles above the Earth, able for the first time since 1972 to view an entire hemisphere at once. Five of the twenty-four who previously had such a view still live.