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Obits in Brief: Edith 'Jackie' Ronne

Tuesday 30 June 2009 19:00 EDT
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Edith Ronne, who died on 14 June aged 89, became one of the first two American women to overwinter in Antarctica, in 1947 when she accompanied her husband, the explorer Finn Ronne.

Known as Jackie, Edith Ronne was born in Baltimore in 1919. She married Finn in 1945, and two years later went to Beaumont, Texas, to see him off on the trip. Her husband persuaded her to travel with his team, step by step, to Panama, then Chile, and eventually she agreed to go all the way as long as Jennie Darlington, the wife of the chief pilot, also went. Jackie served as the trip's historian.

The 15-month expedition was riven by conflict, but the two women are credited with helping smooth things over as the group proved conclusively that Antarctica is a single land mass.

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