you may already know this romanian scientist as the subject of this popular and famous photo, the first-ever photograph taken underwater, with an exposure time of 30 minutes:
it was taken in 1899 at the oceanographic laboratory in banyuls-sur-mer, france, where racovitza was working at the time in his capacity as a pioneering marine biologist.
however, a mere year prior, racovitza had been suffering through a harsh antarctic winter as a member of the scientific staff on board the belgica, the ice-locked ship of the belgian antarctic expedition.
(for more on this expedition i am beseeching you to read MADHOUSE AT THE END OF THE EARTH which you can find at your library probably or on various illicit webbed sites as well as bookstores!!!)
but the basic summary is, raco (as he was known) was one of the first men hired onto the expedition by leader adrien de gerlache, who was essentially a trust fund kid with a lifelong obsession with ships, sailing, and exploration. which was kind of unfortunate for someone from belgium, a country with little coastline to speak of and a navy that was mainly for show. this was the late 19th century and most belgians were hella amped re doing atrocities in the congo but no, not good old adrien. instead his heart was fixed on making belgium a name to be reckoned with in the world of polar exploration. cue laugh track
anyway raco came along for the ride, he was also from a rich family so it helped that he offered to serve without pay. also look at him. you would want him on your ship. you would want him, like, in general. i certainly do. he's like if the man on the pringles can exuded unbearable erotic energy.
raco's official duties on the expedition included collecting and analyzing zoological and botanic samples from the sea, ice, and land; conducting meteorological readings; documenting the wildlife and landscape; and all sorts of other vital scientific tasks. and being cute.
however his most important job on the expedition by far was probably that of resident cartoonist:
Another beloved monotony-breaking ritual was the presentation of Racovitza’s daily cartoon. In addition to his skill at anatomical drawing, the zoologist was a scathing caricaturist with an eastern European fondness for the absurd and a scatological streak. Though bawdy and puerile, Racovitza’s pencil sketches were an unfiltered take on life aboard the Belgica, a chronicle of the men’s frustrations and inside jokes.
listen. when julian said these cartoons were bawdy i was like yeah sure okay. but my god, the man did not hold back. he was KINKY. he was obsessed with butts in particular, drawing the ass of his scientific colleague henryk arctowski over and over, including comparisons to the flat backside of lieutenant danco:
there were also cartoons dealing with shitting blood, watching women piss, and naked boxing. you can literally look at them all yourself although i will say they're about 1000x funnier if you know the people involved so it's a nice treat after you finish reading madhouse. but here's another favorite demonstrating the harsh realities of an icebound ship ("promenade in the caca avenue"):
anyway while the life-threatening chaos of this frathouse-esque expedition was going on around him, and cook and amundsen were off somewhere staring into each other's eyes like in the "is this allowed!?!" vine, raco continued doing important scientific work, pranking the hell out of his shipmates, and also being adorable.
eventually the expedition freed themselves from the ice and returned home. raco resumed his research career, working with the other members of the expedition to compile and publish the results of their findings, and eventually rising in the ranks of the scientific establishment of europe.
basically what i love about raco and what brings me joy every day to contemplate is that he was clearly an enormous goof with a wide variety of deranged fetishes, but also a brilliant and hard-working scientist who founded an entirely new scientific field (biospeleogy, the study of cave organisms) and grew up to be a hot dad, the most badass looking grandpa, and ended his life as one of the most respected and renowned scientists in all of romanian history. he's on stamps!!!!!!!!!!!! sometimes i reflect on how he seems to be a man before his time, but also i guess i am grateful he was born in the 1800s and not the 80s because i think if he had access to the internet he definitely would've been a chronic shitposter and not got nearly as much important science done.
How do I keep my 18th century man from trying to explore the high arctic? I've tried to distract him but it hasn't worked :( I feel worried about the risks
I assume this is a typo and you meant to say 19th century man? I still know a thing or two about late 18th century Georgians and early 20th century Edwardians because long nineteenth century and all that, but 19th century men are my main hobbyist interest.
That said, Lord Nelson fighting a polar bear (which allegedly took place in 1773 when he was a midshipman) in this 1806 painting by Richard Westall has caused so many problems!
You would think an early 19th century man would be unaffected by the siren song of the Discovery Service with the Napoleonic Wars still raging, but no! They really had Captain Philip Broke of HMS Shannon—yes, that Captain Broke—up in the arctic in 1807 chasing French warships that were harrassing British whalers, and also making new charts of the area with inadequate surveying equipment. (It’s true, read “In Arctic Waters” by Michael Barritt in Broke of the Shannon and the War of 1812 ed. Tim Voelcker.)
Not even literature is safe—there are all those dramatic passages about the arctic in Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, and before you know it your 19th century man thinks the polar wilderness is the embodiment of the sublime!
If he’s a mid 19th century man, there’s the added pressure of seeking employment in a bleak economic climate, and he might see an arctic voyage as a sure path to career advancement no matter how many times you tell him John Ross was lucky to be rescued and no his officers were probably not wearing elegant coats and black stocks like that; sometimes explorer narratives embellish the truth.
Some diversions to take his mind off the high arctic include:
Take a course at the Royal Naval College! He’s probably some kind of math nerd if your man thinks he’s cut out for the Discovery Service.
A tour to improve his draughtsmanship—get him into nature with the excuse that he’s developing his artistic skills to draw flora and fauna on an expedition.
A good old-fashioned vacation. He could just need a break from constantly being assigned to a ship and/or processing his experiences from one or more foreign wars.
Sometimes you can successfully redirect his polar passion into something like hydrographic surveying and cartography. Reassure him that it’s just as imperialist, but with less scurvy and cannibalism. Any voyage, even if it’s not very long, is going to give him the homosocial bonding he probably craves.
Vol.1 of my graphic adaptation of The Worst Journey In The World is coming out 24 Nov.! Visit indienovella.co.uk to preorder worldwide – other international options coming soon.
#OTD in 1958, USS Skate managed to circumnavigate the globe in 50 minutes. To accomplish this remarkable feat, the sub took a shortcut by sailing on a circular course within two miles of the North Pole. The Skate only needed to travel 12 miles to pass through all time zones.
Frederic Edwin Church - A mixed bag of oil paintings and preliminary studies of icebergs. Better have a good look, they may be the last you ever get so see…
highly skilled ocean voyagers living close to antarctica who have oral history of heading south and discovering a land full of ice sheets and mountains of ice and snow were first to discover antarctica, not news to said group of people
polar exploration nerds 🤝 cryptography nerds 🤝 people who got their entire shit fucked up by The Terror (2018): COOL SHIT ALERT
a bunch of gibberish classified ads from the early 1850s were finally decrypted using an old maritime signal code, and were confirmed to be updates to & from the would-be rescuers of the Franklin Expedition, placed in The Times presumably on the assumption that the crew would be able to find a copy no matter where in the world the ships ended up
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tomhartnell
tealin
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shinelikethunder
