Mr Fenn’s Bone At Home

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28823, 18 February 1959, Page 18

Mr Fenn’s Bone At Home

A “Life” photographer, Mr Albert Fenn, has finally got the whalebone he retrieved from, a river mouth near Cheviot two years ago. The bone now has place of honour in his home in Chicago as a memento of his stay in New Zealand with the United States Antarctic expedition. In November, 1956, Mr Fenn was staying with friends at Brookdale. At the mouth of a shallow river, skirted by a plateau, he found four large bones. With thoughts of giant .pre-historic monsters he photographed them, and .decided 'he must have the handsomest—and the largest. The bone, weighing a good 401 b, required some hard labour to drag it back to the plateau, where it was found to be part of a whale. It was then taken back

: to Christchurch for packing and , freighting back to the United ' States. 1 However, Mr Fenn lost sight > of his bone until he received a s clipping of its story in ‘‘The i Press,” of June 18 last year. With • the help of Admiral Dufek, it 1 was retrieved from the United States Navy’s headquarters in i Kilmore street, where it just - escaped the rubbish r Again Mr Fenn lost track of 3 his bone until he was told that i it was in. Donaldson Air Force - Base, South Carolina. This .time r, it was just saved from the dog- > pound. “It might have been more ro- ., mantic to have, retrieved it from 3 some desolate Antarctic shore," 3 he said. But at least he finally has s it—two years, two months and 15 c days since he first saw it