The Explorers: A Century of Discovery Page #2

---

Abandoned by the Incas 450 years ago,

The first National Geographic

archeological grant

was made to help clear

and map the colossal ruins.

It took more than $20,000 and months

of labor to reveal them all.

In 1917 one of the first

National Geographic expeditions

to be documented in motion pictures

explored a rare freak of nature

the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes

in Alaska.

This bizarre landscape was

the aftermath

of a gigantic volcanic explosion

several years before.

In this nightmare world,

superheated steam hissed

from millions of vents

and often, it seemed,

the ground itself was alive

Scientists attempted to explore

the larger fissures,

but barely escaped being boiled alive.

More than half a million members

now shared in the exploration

of such natural wonders.

And the home of Alexander Graham Bell

had become the unofficial summer

headquarter of the National Geographic

On holidays the hard-pressed Grosvenor

set up his office in a tent

on the lawn of Beinn Bhreagh.

On these visits the

Grosvenor children enchanted

their legendary Grandfather Bell.

The great inventor was over 60,

but still a bold explorer.

He astonished and sometimes alarmed

his Nova Scotia neighbors

with his odd inventions.

Giant kites made up of tetrahedral

cells were Bell's obsession.

They taught him much about aeronautics

and some were large enough

to life a man.

Bell's avid interest in aviation

culminated in 1909

with the first flight in Canada

by a powered airplane.

One of Bell's last experiments was

a hydrofoil speedboat called the HD-4.

It worked perfectly.

It went 71 miles an hour for years

the fastest thing on water.

World War I was over.

And people who had fought to save the

world for democracy were more curious

about the world than ever.

Six-hundred-and-fifty-six thousand

of them had joined National Geographic

and received its Magazine,

the pride of 400 employees.

Society headquarters was Hubbard Hall,

named for Gardiner Greene Hubbard,

Bell's father-in-law and

the Society's first president.

Geographic's Magazine combined

education and adventure

in the form of first-person reports

from explorers in the field.

Some of the most colorful accounts

came from a botanist, Joseph Rock.

Daring, arrogant, and difficult,

Rock had a talent for getting into

trouble and living to tell the tale.

On his travels in China and Tibet.

He was often menaced by bandits

and warlords.

Roch always escaped them

and sometimes even got their pictures

for the Magazine.

One of Rock's classic articles told of

his visit to the tiny kingdom of Muli.

Deep in the mountains of Szechuan,

Muli was ruled by a king

who had the power of life

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes