Recently, when traveling just north of Burra at the very small township of Hallet in South Australia, I came upon a sign showing the way to the birthplace of this little known explorer. Twenty kilometres of dirt road and many kangaroos later, I arrived at the hut where Wilkins was born in 1888 and spent the early years of his life as the youngest of 13 children of Louisa and Harry Wilkins.The homestead has now been restored and stands north of the Goyder Line isolated and looking across marginal pastoral land.
After leaving Hallet he went on to have an astonishing life as a war correspondent, polar explorer, naturalist, geographer, climatologist, aviator, author, balloonist, war hero, reporter, secret agent, submariner and navigator. This was an extraordinary man and so few South Australians have heard of him or his amazing achievements. After leaving the farm in 1905 to move to Adelaide with his parents, he travelled to Sydney first and then Britain, Europe, Antarctica, North Pole and America.
While he lived and worked in America until his death in 1958, he retained his Australian citizenship. His ashes are scattered at the North Pole.
If you would like to read more, try these websites:
Or the book “The Last Explorer” by Simon Nasht
If you’d like to see video footage, the first one is a talk show in America filmed just a few months before Wilkins died. The second is an interview he did in 1931 before attempting to take a submarine to the North Pole.
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