Casey A. Jones

Casey A. Jones, the Holmes & Narver Inc. cook assigned to Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, died 9 January 1980 when he was caught under a collapsing column of snow. Mr. Jones was removing snow that had plugged a vertical intake shaft when the column gave way.

This was Mr. Jones's second tour in Antarctica. He wintered at Palmer in 1979 [sic, he wintered in 1978].

At the request of his family, Mr. Jones's body was cremated in New Zealand. His ashes were committed to the Antarctic from an LC-130 airplane in flight over the Beardmore Glacier on 25 January.

Flags of the United States, the U.S. Antarctic Research Program, and Holmes & Narver were presented to Mr. Jones's family along with a posthumous Antarctic Service Medal.

Holmes & Narver employees in Antarctica prepared a memorial plaque that was mounted at South Pole Station in honor of Casey Jones's service to the U.S. Antarctic Research Program.

--from the Antarctic Journal, March, 1980

Interestingly, both the Antarctic Journal article and Robert Spotz's plaque (which quotes the article) refer to a memorial plaque prepared by fellow H&N employees and on display at Pole. When I arrived at Pole in December 1986 (my first visit since my 1977 winter) and again in 2005 when I documented all of the photos and memorabilia in the dome pool room and library, there was no such plaque on display. But...in one of a number of videos created by the 1983 winterovers (which I was sent by John MacMillan and converted to digital/DVD format) the plaque was prominently displayed on the north wall of the pool room. Below, two screen grabs of the plaque...I was unable to obtain legible grabs from the original VHS tape, the DVD, or the mp4 file, although after many viewings I was able to discern the text.