While some explorers were just back with tales of their summer adventuring, others last week were planning or embarking on new expeditions. Some tales and plans: Antarctic Cruise. Five months ago, owners of the Stella Polaris, a sturdy 6,000-ton steamer, announced in London that Lieut.-Commander J. R. Stenhouse would take a group of tourists to Antarctica. Last fortnight, a pleasant-faced woman engaged passage for the cruise. She was Emily Dorman Lady Shackleton, the lady whom the late gallant Sir Ernest Shackleton left behind him for the third and last time, when he embarked on the Antarctic trip that killed him nine years ago. She wanted to see the white frozen country where his body lies. But the Stella Polaris will not put in at South Georgia where he is buried beneath a cairn of cold stones.
Twenty-six years ago, Ernest Shackleton, 30 and Irish, was married in London to Miss Emily Mary Dorman. They had been engaged for five years. Ernest, who had always loved sea ways, and had come to know them through years in the mercantile marine service, had just returned from Antarctica with Scott Antarctic Expedition of 1901. The couple went to live in Edinburgh, Scotland, where Mrs. Shackleton knew many important people. Among her friends was the Earl of Rosebery, Queen Victoria's famed Prime Minister (1894-95). Four years after the marriage, Explorer Shackleton turned again toward the South Pole. This time he was commanding officer. When he returned the next year after having been within 97 miles of the pole, England made a knight of him. Five years later, he set out again. Terrific ice packs wrecked his ship. He and his men camped on an ice floe for six months, were finally rescued by a Chilean trawler. In 1921, English bells were rung as Sir Ernest sailed away on another white voyage, his last. The following year on Jan. 5, he died of a, heart attack off South Georgia Island, 2,800 mi. northeast of Explorer Byrd's later Little America. When Lady Shackleton heard of his death, she insisted that his body be buried in the country he loved to explore.
New Islands. Soviet professors aboard the icebreaker Sedov discovered two new Arctic islands near the Taimyr Peninsula, Siberia. They named them Wise and Kameniev Islands after two expedition members. They suspected their finds were part of a large archipelago. Some of the party went ashore on Fridtjof Nansen Land for a cold year's stay to operate the world's most northerly radio station.