We are enormously proud to be custodians of the papers of Phillip Law, the scientist who is most responsible for establishment of the Australian Antarctic Territory through his work on the Australian National Antarctic Research Expedition (ANARE).  

During his time as ANARE director from 1949 to 1966, Law mapped over 5000km of coastline and directed expeditions which charted over one million square kilometres of territory.  

From the photographs that Phillip Law took during the early days of Mawson Station to the diaries, field notes and correspondence from his many trips to Antarctica, these papers tell the story of a towering figure in Australian science and exploration.  

With your support, we can share his story with the world through Trove. 

Phillip Law brought an unexpected visitor with him on his 1961 expedition to Antarctica. Discovered only when the ship was about to set sail from Perth, Phillip Law’s wife Nel Law had stowed away on the vessel.  

Nel Law made the journey to Mawson Station and became the first Australian woman to set foot on the Antarctic continent in 1961.  

Nel was a talented artist, and her courage and curiosity to see Antarctica yielded beautiful oil paintings and sketches of the continent’s landscapes and fauna.  

The National Library holds the diaries of Nel Law’s journey to Antarctica, many of the works that she produced there, and her extensive correspondence with Phillip.  

With your assistance, the world will be able to glimpse the stark beauty of Antarctica through Nel’s eyes, as we share her papers on Trove.  

Among the untold stories held in the National Library’s Antarctica collections are the journeys of two scientists whose careers were made in and around the southernmost continent.

Thomas Griffith Taylor was still a student at Cambridge when he joined the British explorer Robert Scott's expedition to Antarctica in 1910. Scott’s Terra Nova expedition (1910-13) included a legendary effort to reach the South Pole that ended fatally for Scott and his four companions.

The expedition’s scientific efforts were enduring: over two years, Taylor charted the coastlines and glaciers of Antarctica with the western geological party.  The National Library holds Taylor’s photographs, diaries, and the flag from his sledge.

Isobell Bennett was one of the first women to visit sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island in 1959 with the Australian Antarctic Research Expedition (ANARE). Her research on the Island's coastal ecosystems advanced understanding of inter-tidal species in cold temperate climates. The National Library preserves her extensive diaries, photographic slides, and other materials from her ANARE expedition.

With your support, we can share Taylor and Bennett’s experiences in Antarctica with the world, through Trove, for the very first time.