Papanin, Ivan (1894-1986)

Life on an Ice Floe : Diary of Ivan Papanin [Soviet Polar Exploration]

New York: J. Messner, Inc., 1939. First Edition, First Printing. Hardcover with Dust Jacket.

Blue cloth with silver gilt spine titles; 8.75 inches tall; 300 pages, illustrated with b/w photographs and a frontispiece map. The bindings are tight and square. Text is clean, light even age-toning. Moderate shelf handling wear with some color loss on the bottom of the spine. The illustrated dust jacket has the price intact and slight corner wear with a slight mark horizontally on the spine.

Ivan Dmitriyevich Papanin was a legendary Soviet polar explorer, scientist, and Counter Admiral who earned the prestigious title of Hero of the Soviet Union twice, along with nine Orders of Lenin. A true pioneer of his time, Papanin led the groundbreaking North Pole-1 expedition in 1937, an adventure that made history.

With three fellow researchers, Papanin landed on drifting ice floes aboard a plane, beginning a daring 234-day mission in the harsh near-polar region. Their task? To carry out crucial scientific observations while surviving the brutal elements. As the ice floes drifted, they gathered vital data until the two mighty icebreakers, Murman and Taimyr, arrived to bring them safely back.

This was the first expedition of its kind anywhere in the world, and its success earned every team member the rare title of Hero of the Soviet Union—an honor scarcely awarded before World War II. They were also granted the coveted title of Doctor of Geographic Sciences without the need for a dissertation and welcomed into the Geographical Society of the USSR. Papanin later shared the gripping story of this extraordinary experience in his book Life on an Ice Floe: Diary of Ivan Papanin, forever cementing his legacy in the annals of exploration. [Adapted from wiki and online resources]

Item #19449

Price: $75.00