The bulletin appeared while Commander Richard E. Byrd and his crew were undertaking their first Antarctic expedition. Byrd had already become famous for his 1926 flight toward the North Pole, and public interest now followed him south. His expedition faced bitter cold, isolation, exhaustion, and all the hazards of attempting to explore one of the least hospitable places on Earth.
Among the supplies expected to sustain the men was tea.
The Tea Association was quick to connect Byrd with earlier polar explorers, including Robert Peary and Roald Amundsen.
According to its account, both men relied upon hot tea while struggling over the polar ice. The bulletin even contrasted tea with rum, arguing that explorers in need of clear minds, courage, and the last reserves of human energy turned to the teapot rather than the bottle.
Goodness of Tea Imparts Health and Vigor to Exploration Heroes
In the drama of polar exploration and adventure, tea has played an important part.
Commander Richard E. Byrd, the first to pilot an airplane over the North Pole, and the second to attain the top of the world, will rely largely on the refreshing qualities of tea to warm him and the members of his crew on their perilous journey into the South Polar regions.
Recognition given not only by Byrd, but by Peary, Amundsen, and other explorers, to tea as a sustaining beverage, a bulletin from the Tea Association of America points out, only goes to justify its use by pioneers and trail blazers the world over.
“Tommy Atkins, the Canadian lumberjack, the Australian bushwhacker, all have been great tea drinkers,” the bulletin declares. “Peary on his dash to the Pole over ice hummocks and in the teeth of blizzards, found in a cup of hot tea the ‘punch’ needed to forge another few miles onward. With the mercury registering 50 or 60 below zero, the heroic Amundsen relied on tea to carry him forward on his conquest of the South Pole.
“It is significant that these explorers have depended on tea, rather than rum, in the attainment of their objective, for if the last ounce of human energy and courage is ever required, it is on a dash over the polar ice wastes.
“Similarly, the American business man and the American worker, when they find themselves losing heart and facing the zero hour, are coming to rely more and more on tea when the call comes to go over the top.”
Source: Richmond Planet. Richmond, Va. February 9, 1929.
