FLEW OVER THE POLE

New Zealand Times, Volume LIV, Issue 12659, 20 January 1927, Page 4

FLEW OVER THE POLE

STEWARD RECOUNTS EXPERIENCE “THE TOP OF THE WORLD.” Air T. A. Hewson, chief steward of tlie Roosevelt Line steamer Cokesit, which has been visiting Sydney, was a member of Commander Byrd’s expedition which flew over the North Pole, and was in charge of the icommissariat. He said in tlie course of an interview that to travel to “the top of the world” was the most wonderful experience of his life. It was impossible to visualise the wonders of the Arctic. A photograph he possesses, taken exactly oyer the North Pole, shows a huge crevice. Throughout his life Mr Hewson has been a missionary carrying Christianity into ail corners of the earth, and he is known as “The Steward Missionary.” He had his first experience of an Arctio snow storm, when the flakes were the size of a saucer and as thin as a wafer. In a few minutes the whole ship was covered. The flakes immediately became ioe, and had the storm continued for two days the ship would have been crushed and sunk hy its weight. Tho expedition sailed from Brooklyn in April of last year in a steamer owned by Mr Henry Ford. The actual flight over the Pole was made by Commander Byrd and Pilot Bennett.