Ciarán is a writer, historian, and graphic designer from Tennessee, USA. He is currently researching and writing about the Polaris Expedition and the death of Charles Francis Hall. He has also written on the historiography of Scott and Amundsen's race to the South Pole. When not obsessing over polar and maritime history or yelling at Adobe Illustrator, you can usually find him analyzing modernist poetry, drinking copious amounts of iced coffee, or drawing pictures of various Appalachian flora and fauna.

Fun Fact: Ciarán played quiz bowl in high school and college. He still volunteers at the occasional tournament!

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: Scott and Shackleton’s Antarctic expeditions, as well as Polaris, Karluk, Jeannette, and the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition.

Sledging Flag: Flag of Tennessee, slightly rounded tails, crest featuring a cicada and the motto One day I am going to grow wings.

Stewart is a university student currently studying for a Bachelor’s degree in dramatic arts, with a focus on production and design. When not hanging lights or moving set pieces, they can be found watching old movies, scrapbooking, or reading about doomed expeditions. They fell down the polar history rabbit hole after picking up a copy of Frozen in Time at a used bookstore and haven’t been the same since. 

Fun Fact: They’re only two degrees of separation away from David Cronenberg.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: The Australasian Antarctic Expedition and the Terra Nova Expedition.

Sledging Flag: Canadian flag, rounded tails, crest featuring three covered cups and the motto Meae voluntates bonae sunt.

Nina is a classics student in France. She spends her free time either reading about her favourite polar expeditions (and connecting the dots) or exploring obscure archives no one has heard of. Her current research investigates references to Greco-Roman literary works and myths in first-hand accounts of polar exploration. She was a speaker at Terror Camp 2024 and is a member of the French society Les Amis de Jean-Baptiste Charcot.

Fun Fact: She once drank official Shackleton whisky in a -30°C container.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: Discovery, Terra Nova, Charcot’s Antarctic expeditions. Favourite explorers? Edward Wilson and Jean-Baptiste Charcot.

Sledging Flag: Breton flag, pointed tails, crest featuring an emperor penguin and the motto Inveniam viam.

Kai is a student from Germany. They have a bachelor‘s degree in comparative literature and are currently obtaining their master‘s degree in international literature. They are interested in the connections of polar exploration and literature and they have written papers about Dan Simmons's The Terror, E. A. Poe’s Arthur Gordon Pym, and Frederick Cook’s Belgica diary. They are also a fiction writer, artist, and knitter. 

Fun Fact: They are writing their master‘s thesis on representations of queerness in polar fiction.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: Roald Amundsen, Frederick Cook, Belgrave Ninnis, Belgica, Australasian Antarctic Expedition.

Sledging flag: German flag, pointed tails, crest featuring sun dogs and the motto Quid faciat mihi homo?

Ceres is a freelance artist always on-the-go with a background in entertainment design and a sideline in polar and maritime history. She was an artist for Terror Camp 2024. When she’s not drawing or doing research into the “lower decks” of polar exploration and the Welsh-polar connection, she can be found with a sword in one hand and historical fencing manuals in the other - just don’t ask her about Royal Navy cutlass drills, though.

Fun Fact: She has a great deal many interests, at least one of which has spurred her on to go back into education for conservation studies specialising in books and papers.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: She has an extra soft spot for the Karluk, Bob Bartlett and Hugh “Clam” Williams, and especially Edgar “Taff” Evans and William Lashly of Terra Nova fame.

Sledging Flag: Hong Kong flag, pointed tails, crest featuring a barking dog and the motto Vetus vir.

Marv is an artist and writer whose former self has been swallowed up by polar madness. They collect porcelain clowns and horrible historical men, own an enormous fluffy cat, and prefer yogurt for breakfast. In another life, Marv earned a degree in both anthropology and film & media studies. Nowadays, he is typically found procrastinating a promised update to beyondthebelgica.com or otherwise loafing about on the pack.

Fun Fact: Marv has a tattoo of Dr. Frederick A. Cook as drawn by Emil Racovitza.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: The Belgica, especially Georges Lecointe, Emil Racovitza, & Émile Danco. Non-Belgica faves include Bob Bartlett, William Laird McKinlay, Thomas Griffith Taylor, & Edmund Hoar.

Sledging Flag: Flag of Maryland, rounded tails, crest featuring a lantern and the motto Veritatem dilexi.

Jo [/ jɔ /] is a young student from Poland. She plans to study history and French philology. She is working on a project to raise awareness of polar expeditions in her country. Jo is concerned with ecological issues and analyses the work of the Romantics to find solutions to current environmental problems. At the same time, she is trying to write, ride her beloved red mare, do research about 1830's France, buy another ticket for Les Misérables, plan a trip to Rome and look after her ivy.

Fun Fact: You can often meet her at the graves of Arctowski & Dobrowolski, where she lights candles and brings fresh flowers.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: Discovery, Terra Nova & Henry Robertson Bowers.

Sledging Flag: Polish flag, pointed tails, crest featuring a red mare prancing in a field of ivy with the motto Vita incipiet cum cras veniet.

Ben is a student who hopes to study something history related. When not dramatically reading Clements Markham's James Fitzjames fanfiction, they run an afterschool program teaching D&D to surprisingly bloodthirsty tweens.  They are also a historical costumer whose work focuses on 1840s menswear and 1890s-1910s womenswear. Their current project explores gender and its construction through reimagining Edward Wilson and Thomas Griffith Taylor's Jessamine depictions. 

Fun Fact: They narrowly escaped being stung by a wasp while visiting the Nathaniel Palmer house.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: Matthew Henson, Nathaniel Palmer, Henry Foster Collins, and the Terra Nova.

Sledging Flag: New York City flag, rounded tails, crest featuring a beaver with the motto Excelsior.

Allegra is the founder and director of Terror Camp and is excited to be acting in an advisory role for the New Polar Times. She has published polar journalism and research in The New York Times, Atlas Obscura, Conde Nast Traveller, National Geographic, and Polar Record, and presented at The Royal Geographical Society, the Explorer’s Club, and the Shackleton Autumn School. 

Fun Fact: She used to live across the street from Frederick Cook’s house in Bushwick!

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: The Terra Nova, especially the scientists trio of Silas, Deb, & Griff, and the dynamic duo of Pennell/Atkinson <3

Sledging Flag: Chicago flag, slightly rounded tails, crest featuring a Tree of Life. Motto (not pictured) is Ad erebum, delectatio.

Ash is a biological anthropology student who dabbles in polar expedition history as a hobby, with a particular interest in the medical aspects of Arctic and Antarctic living. She knows of more niche animals than what is advisable for any college student that ought to be focusing on his studies instead, and when she’s not scrolling through Wikipedia for fun, she likes to draw, journal, and go beachcombing & mudlarking!

Fun Fact: They dislike talking about themselves too much so this space will instead be used to advertise the experience of the southern greater glider, one of the most underrated animals to grace this planet.

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: Belgica, Terra Nova, Imperial Trans-Antarctic, and Franklin expeditions.

Sledging Flag: American and Chinese flags, crest featuring the Ursa Minor and Southern Cross constellations with the motto Lux sit.

Roman is a graduate student at the University of Alaska researching the comparative failures of North American expeditions to the Arctic during the Second Industrial Revolution. He also examines the historical perception of survival cannibalism through both Indigenous and Western perspectives. With a background in public history, he’s super interested in the court records of expedition inquiries after the survivors (if any) returned. When not crawling through archives like a Creature, he’s walking dogs, painting, or writing queer historical fiction. 

Fun Fact: He collects late nineteenth-century maps of the Arctic, several of which have sections labeled “Unexplored Regions.”

Favorite Explorers / Expeditions: USS Jeannette, Lady Franklin Bay, Andrée’s Swedish Balloon Expedition   

Sledging Flag: Flag of Alaska, rounded tails, crest featuring a polar bear and a sword with the motto Is this ambition?