biography
| name: |
Byrd, Richard (Evelyn)
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1888–1957)
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| biography:
| Aviator and explorer, born in Winchester, Virginia, USA. The brother of Harry Flood Byrd and son of the lawyer who founded the Byrd political dynasty in Virginia, he joined the navy's aviation service in 1917, five years after graduating from Annapolis. On 9 May 1926, he and his co-pilot Floyd Bennett made the first flight over the North Pole, flying the round trip from Spitsbergen I. Both men received the Congressional Medal of Honor for the feat. During the Antarctic expedition of 1928–30 he established the Little America base, and with Bernt Balchen made the first flight over the South Pole (28–9 Nov 1929). He made four more expeditions to Antarctica for exploration and mapping (1933–5, 1939–41, 1946–7, 1955–6). Director of the US Antarctic programme for the International Geophysical Year (1957–8), he was planning future explorations of Antarctica at his death. He published several accounts of his experiences, including Little America (1930) and Alone (1938). |
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