Final Report U.S. Naval Construction Battalion Unit Two Hundred One. Deep Freeze 68 [cover title]

[Antarctica, 1968. Very good.. [65]pp. report typed on rectos only, plus [28] leaves, illustrated with eighty-six black-and-white mounted photographs, each approximately 5 x 7 inches, most accompanied by typed paper caption strips, plus three loose photographs. Quarto. Original pressboard wrappers with metal spine fastener, with printed title leaf pasted to front board. Minor wear to binding, photos in generally nice condition. A typed report accompanied by detailed photographs documenting the 1967-1968 projects carried out by U.S. Naval Construction Battalion Unit 201 in Antarctica dubbed "Deep Freeze '68." The projects involved the upgrading and expansion of facilities at McMurdo Station and Palmer Station including water, sewer, and energy infrastructure improvements and laboratory and living-quarters construction. The original photographs here provide more than eighty-five detailed and well-captioned views of Antarctic construction, architecture, and engineering involved in the execution of “Deep Freeze ‘68,” with sixty-five pages of typed reports providing a dense written summary in support of the project.

Battalion Unit 201 had been newly established in 1967 as a Seabee unit specializing solely in Antarctic construction to continue supporting the series of "Operation Deep Freeze" missions first headed by Admiral Richard E. Byrd in the 1950s to establish a permanent research infrastructure on the then-largely unexplored Antarctic continent. Plagued by material shortages and the savage regional climate, Unit 201 was disbanded at the end of “Deep Freeze ‘71” as the brief building season made the continuation of a dedicated Antarctic construction unit unfeasible.