The summer of 1911-1912 was certainly the most dramatic and perhaps the most tragic of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, due to the race between Amundsen and Scott, concluded in favor of the Norwegian, who reached the South Pole on 14 December 1911. The British reached also to the pole, but after more than a month, on 17 January 1912, and he died on the way back. During the same period were conducted another two expeditions to the continent, Second German Antarctic Expedition, led by Wilhelm Filchner, and Australasian Antarctic Expedition (AAE), led by Douglas Mawson.
The only one of them with a substantial scientific program was that of Mawson, even if neither he wasn't lacked of national pride, as he will recognize in The Home of the Blizzard, book published in 1915: "For many reasons, besides the fact that it was the country of my home and Alma Mater, I was desirous that the Expedition should be maintained by Australia. It seemed to me that here was an opportunity to prove that the young men of a young country could rise to those traditions which have made the history of British Polar exploration one of triumphant endeavour as well as of tragic sacrifice. And so I was privileged to rally the sons of the younger son."
