/ Antarctica / 1911

The ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition of 1910–1913 was one of the last great episodes in the age of exploration, a British scientific journey to Antarctica led by Royal Navy captain and seasoned polar explorer Robert Falcon Scott. There was every expectation that Scott and his crew would achieve the pinnacle of Edwardian derring-do— conquering the South Pole—with photographer Herbert Ponting along to chronicle the heroics. More than a century later, Ponting’s haunting images (including this picture of the expedition ship

Terra Nova in McMurdo Sound) remain among the most enduring of the time, depicting yawning ice caves, frozen rigging, and frostbitten men eating baked beans from the can. The journey ended badly for Scott, who reached the Pole with four men on January 18, 1912, only to discover another nation’s flag already flying—Norway’s Roald Amundsen had beaten them by just over a month. Scott and his team perished on the march back to their base camp; the last words in his diary read, “The end cannot be far. It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more.” The remainder of the expedition, Ponting included, sailed home to inform the world of the tragedy, little imagining that one day, almost 40,000 tourists would visit the world’s least hospitable continent every year. —David Tse