Carl Anton Larsen

Carl Anton Larsen (7 August 1860 – 8 December 1924) was a Norwegian-born whaler and Antarctic explorer who made important contributions to the exploration of Antarctica, the most significant being the first discovery of fossils for which he received the Back Grant from the Royal Geographical Society. In December 1893 he became the first person to ski in Antarctica on the Larsen Ice Shelf which was subsequently named after him. In 1904, Larsen re-founded a whaling settlement at Grytviken on the island of South Georgia. In 1910, after some years' residence on South Georgia, he renounced his Norwegian citizenship and took British citizenship. The Norwegian whale factory ship was named after him.

Early life

Carl Anton Larsen was born in Østre Halsen, Tjolling, the son of Norwegian sea captain Ole Christian Larsen and his wife Ellen Andrea Larsen (née Thorsen). His family subsequently relocated to nearby Sandefjord, the home of the Norwegian whaling industry, where at the young age of 9 he went to sea in a small barque with his father chasing seals and trading across the North Atlantic with Britain, returning to go to school during the fall and winter. He continued this for a number of years, until his curiosity for the sea was so strong he enrolled himself in navigation school where he passed the exam for foreign-going mate at the age of 18.

Expeditions to Antarctica Norwegian expedition 1892–1894 Between 1892 and 1894 Larsen led a Norwegian whaling reconnaissance expedition to Antarctica, in command of the Jason. The Jason was a ship Larsen was familiar with as he had been aboard it during the voyage that carried Fridtjof Nansen to Greenland during his east–west crossing in 1888. They spent the 1892–93 summer exploring the waters and shores of Graham Land, returning the following summer to investigate the Weddell and Bellingshausen Seas. The sea ice was particularly light in 1893, allowing the Jason to sail to 68° 10' south, further south than had previously been achieved, and indeed no other traveller would penetrate so far south along the Larsen ice shelf for nearly a century.

Larsen added significantly to understanding of the geography of the area, discovering the Larsen Ice Shelf and the Jason Peninsula, two of 12 features named in Larsen's honour, as well as the Foyn Coast in Graham Land, King Oscar Land, and Robertson Island. He also identified two active volcanoes and many groups of islands, and was first to record a colony of emperor penguins although, as the species was unknown to him, he mis-identified them as king penguins. The colony was not rediscovered until 2014. His expedition also discovered fossilised plant remains on Seymour Island, The sea ice was heavier than in 1893, and – although the ship passed through the iceberg-infested Antarctic Sound now named after it – the expedition was unable to get further south than Snow Hill Island. on penguins and seals they captured.

Larsen had chosen the whaling station's site during his 1902 visit while in command of the Antarctic. Larsen organized the construction of Grytviken―a remarkable undertaking accomplished by a team of 60 Norwegians. As with other buildings, a church was pre-built in Norway and erected in Grytviken. This typical Norwegian-style church was consecrated as a Church of Norway church, on Christmas Day, 1913. In 1922, the funeral service for Sir Ernest Shackleton was conducted in the church before his burial in the church cemetery. Larsen established a meteorological observatory at Grytviken, which from 1905 was maintained in cooperation with the Argentine Meteorological Office under the British lease requirements of the whaling station until these changed in 1949. Larsen was also instrumental, with his brother, in introducing Reindeer to South Georgia in 1911, as a resource for recreational hunting for the people involved in the whaling industry.

Larsen, like other managers and senior officers of the South Georgia whaling stations, lived in Grytviken together with his family including his wife, three daughters and two sons. In 1910, they obtained British citizenship, following an application filed with the British Magistrate of South Georgia in which Larsen declared: "I have given up my Norwegian citizens rights and have resided here since I started whaling in this colony on 16 November 1904 and have no reason to be of any other citizenship than British, as I have had and intend to have my residence here still for a long time."

Larsen died in December 1925 while attempting to run a full-scale whale factory ship down towards the Ross Sea.