Pre-Antarctic Mawson in South Australia and western New South Wales

ABSTRACT

Douglas Mawson took up his position at the University of Adelaide as Lecturer in Mineralogy and Petrology on 1 March 1905 at the age of 22. He had already been the joint author of a substantial paper on the geology of the Mittagong area as well as of a paper on the occurrence of radioactivity and radium in Australia. In 1903, he had undertaken an almost 6-month long expedition to study the geology of the New Hebrides. Mawson joined the Royal Society of South Australia soon after arriving in Adelaide and was an active participant in its activities in the following years. Mawson was an enthusiastic field geologist who visited the Adelaide Hills, Kangaroo Island, the Flinders Ranges, southern Yorke and Eyre Peninsulas and the Olary-Broken Hill area within 2 years of arriving in South Australia. This work resulted in several publications and reports. However, some of these were not fully thought out and by the end of 1906, Mawson had managed to upset the longstanding Government Geologist, H.Y.L. Brown, to such an extent that his free rail pass for geological investigations was withdrawn, although it was later restored. It was while working in Broken Hill in late September 1907 that Mawson learnt of the British Antarctic Expedition, led by Ernest Shackleton. Soon after, Mawson was appointed physicist on the BAE which left Lyttelton, the port of Christchurch, on 1 January 1908.

KEYWORDS:

• Douglas Mawson
• early career
• Olary
• Broken Hill
• Flinders Ranges
• Kangaroo Island
• radioactivity
• glacial sediments

Acknowledgements

This paper is dedicated to the late Clive Wilson-Roberts who made a substantial contribution as a volunteer at the Australian Polar Collection of the South Australian Museum. Tim Tolley, Alun Thomas and Clive Wilson-Roberts are thanked for transcribing Mawson’s field notes, some of which are quite difficult to read. Cheryl Hoskins and staff of the Rare Book Collection at the Barr-Smith Library, University of Adelaide, are thanked for allowing access to the Mawson Papers held in the Barr-Smith Library. Alun Thomas is thanked for drafting the two maps. Barry Cooper is thanked for valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper. Two anonymous reviewers are thanked for constructive comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.