Paul Siple was an American Antarctic Explorer and Geographer from Erie who took part in six Antarctic expeditions, including the two Byrd expeditions of 1928-1930 and 1933-1935, representing the Boy Scouts of America as an Eagle Scout. Paul was also a Sea Scout. His first and third books covered these adventures. With Charles F. Passel he developed the wind chill factor, Paul Siple coined the term.
Born Paul Allman Siple on December 18, 1908, in Montpelier, Ohio, his father, Clyde L. Siple, and mother, Fannie Hope (Allman) Siple, moved the family to Erie, when Paul was about ten years of age, where two years later he joined the Boy Scouts of America. Merit badge work held the greatest interest for him and by the time he was eighteen, sixty of these badges had been earned. He applied himself to the study of insects, radio, woodwork, art, athletics, first aid, bee-keeping, and many other areas of science as well as pragmatic subjects. It was during this period of time that Paul discovered Captain Robert F. Scott's ill-fated journey during a Sea Scout session aboard the retired Brig Niagara when his Sea Scout leader read the story to his troop. The story cultivated his lifelong interest and desire to visit distant, frozen lands.
Upon graduation from from Central High School in 1926, he took a job working as an assistant draftsman for a year so that he could save money for entering college. The following year, in 1927, he entered Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania, and through the encouragement of Dr. Chester A. Darling, the head of the Biology Department, and a local Scoutmaster, Paul chose biology as his major in college. Having finished Spring Examinations, he spent the summer working in the Boy Scout’s camp as a nature instructor with the intentions of returning to school for his sophomore year in September.
However, when class opened in the fall of 1928, and after an extensive nationwide search in 1928, when he was elected to be the first Eagle Scout to be selected for an Antarctic Expedition, Paul Siple was serving on board Commander Richard E. Byrd's Antarctic Expedition flagship City of New York as the official representative of the Boy Scouts of America. Paul spent the next eighteen months either at sea or on the Antarctic continent living in close quarters with 41 other men. While there he taught himself to train and drive a dog team and learned the basic essentials of polar travel and camping, the mysteries of sorting out stores and provisions and all the innumerable chores of a large polar base.
When the explorers returned to the United States in the spring of 1930, Paul began a series of extraordinary accomplishments. Returning to Allegheny College, he became a brother of the Alpha Chi Rho fraternity while completing three years of study in two, thereby receiving his Bachelor of Science degree in biology in 1932. Dr. Darling, his mentor, was instrumental in this rapid movement and Paul forever afterwards acknowledged his regard for and gratitude to his dear friend. Paul participated in a lecture tour during the years 1930 and 1931, most often speaking to Boy Scout councils. On several of these occasions, he and Admiral Byrd lectured together. His association and friendship with Richard E. Byrd was tightly interlocked until the Admiral's death on March 11, 1957.
While continuing his education, Paul Siple married Ruth Ida Johannesmeyer on December 19, 1936, while attending Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, from which he received a Ph.D. in 1939. His dissertation was on Adaptations of the Explorer to the Climate of Antarctic. He worked in the Army Scientific Office for most of his career.
Paul was involved with the United States Antarctic Service Expedition of 1939-1941, which would have been the third Byrd expedition. It was this planned expedition when Admiral Byrd's Antarctic Snow Cruiser made it trip from Chicago to Boston, passing through Erie County in November of 1939, en-route to Boston harbor to be loaded aboard ship bound for the Antarctic.
He also served during Operation High Jump, (also known as the United States Navy Antarctic Developments Program 1946-1947), developed cold weather gear for the Korean War, and Operation Deep Freeze I in 1955-1956. He was the inaugural scientific leader at the U.S. Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station 1956-1957, during the International Geophysical Year. This activity is covered in his fourth book.
Paul Siple became a leading authority on the principles governing the adaptation of man to life in cold regions and on polar logistics. On December 31, 1956, he appeared on the cover of Time Magazine as the Scientific Leader of Admundsen-Scott South Pole Station. Among many other awards, he received the Patron's Medal of the [British Royal Geographic] Society in 1958, after receiving the Silver Buffalo Award from the BSA in 1947. In 1958, he received the Order of the Arrow National Distinguished Service Award, and the Hubbard Medal from the National Geographic Society. From 1963-1966 he served as the first U.S. science attaché to Australia and New Zealand where he had a stroke in 1966 and returned to the United States. He died on November 25, 1968, at the Army Research Center in Arlington, Virginia.
The Antarctic features many geographical points and a station named after Paul: Siple Coast, Siple Island, Mount Siple, Siple Ridge, and Siple Station were named in his honor.
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| Paul Siple. |
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| Eagle Scout Paul Siple with his troop. |
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| Paul Siple with his lifelong friend Admiral Byrd. |
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| On December 31, 1956, Paul Siple appeared on the cover of Time Magazine as the Scientific Leader of Admundsen-Scott South Pole Station. |
