Burton Island (AGB 1) - Naval Cruise Book

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MAIL DROP The sight of the mail plane overhead was always welcome. The planes came from the Kodiak Navy Air Station and usually performed an ice reconnaisance while in the area. While the ship was setting up the EPI station on Banks Island, the mail cans were parachuted near the shore party. During the Spring Cruise the cans were dropped on the ice. Occasionally the cans, which were supposedly watertight, would be dropped in the water, invariably one or two of the cans would leak. Despite all efforts to dry the mail in the boiler room immediately, a few letters written in ink were all but illegible. Of course, the mail from home was the most welcomed and important part of the delivery, but the official mail sometimes brought good news. The official letter everyone wanted most to arrive was the confirmation that the overhaul originally scheduled for San Francisco had been changed to Long Beach. - Although the BURTON ISLAND carried gear for a mail pick-up, it was never used. The pick-up gear was set up once in the ice as an experiment. f a.,,4 4 , X

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W. f r. PM x ,. x - . A ph Q wg K! Q , 3 V. I , H , , ' W.. I ,, W t -, V- 4.-.sw m sawa mf, I. X f , r r f -K 'em , s .f ' ,sw ,r if f JK, Q y H ar ' W 4 K r -SW - i Wi I 4 ' A mi f ., ., ' ,f ..-, HISTORY OF THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE The search for the Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific spans a period of over 450 years since the pioneering voyages of explorer John Cabot in 14-96-97. A Southern route was finally negotiated in 1903-06 by Roald Amundsen fNor- wayj, but this 'route that avoided the hazardous Melville Sound is not suitable for deep-draft vessels. Long before- even this partial success, it had been concluded that the Northwest Passage had no commercial value, but the search continued. Existence of a deep water route was iirst indicated by Parry's first expedition of 1819-1820, when he sailed with HMS HECLA and HMS GRIPER through Lancaster Sound, Barrow Strait, and Northern Viscount Melville Sound as far west as longitude 113O46' West. His expedition thereby won a prize of five thousand pounds which had been offered to the first ship to cross the 1100 W. meridian in the Northern hemisphere. On his second trip Parry, searching for yet another lroute, concluded that the Fury and Hecla Strait could be traversed, though he was unable to do so. It was not until 194-8, however, that this route was proven practi- cal when the USS EDISTO and the USCGC EASTWIND finally navigated the strait. With this accomplishment, all possible routes across the top of the continent had been udiscoveredn, though not all had been conquered. A