Packed programme for Shackleton Autumn School
It begins on Friday 25 October at the event base, Athy Museum, with an 11am sculpture class by Mark Richards who created Athy’s acclaimed Shackleton statue. The workshop will be with Leaving Certificate Art students from Athy Community College and Ardscoil Na Trionóide.
The launch of Andy Dickinson's latest publication Shackleton and His Stowaway will take place at 8pm on that evening, a fictional account of the fate of an 18 year-old stowaway who sneaks aboard Shackleton's ship Endurance.
A daily exhibition in the Museum over the weekend will be 'Quest – Shackleton's Last Expedition', focusing on the explorer's final expedition to the Antarctic.
Lectures through the Saturday programme include 'Bransfield and the Discovery of Antarctica' by Jim Wilson, 'Tales from the Polar Book Room' by Paul Davies, 'Apollo 11 – The Inside Story' by David Whitehouse, and 'Silent Witness - the Arctic and Climate Change' by Dirk Notz.
In a section on The Endurance Diary Inquiry leading experts will attempt to fill in the backstory of an Endurance crew-member’s diary which surfaced on BBC’s ‘Antiques Roadshow’ over 100 years after it was written.
Dinner on the Saturday night will be in The Green Barn at Burtown House.
The Sunday programme includes lectures 'A Matter of Time – How Greenwich Meantime came to rule the World' by Juliana Adelman, 'The Rescue from Elephant Island – The Full Story' by Bob Burton, 'The Arctic Fox – Admiral Sir Leopold McClintock' by David Murphy, and 'Antarctic Imprints: The Climate of Polar Printing' by Hester Blum.
A cultural evening in the Athy Arts Centre will feature 'Shackleton and his Stowaway', a play which follows the misfortunes of an 18 year-old stowaway who sneaks aboard Endurance. This is a production of the Stolen Elephant Theatre Company.
The field trip will be on Monday 28 October, including a visit to Ballitore and the home of Mary Leadbeater, writer and ancestor of Ernest Shackleton, and the Quaker Meeting House.
Full information and booking available here.
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