SHMIDT, O. IU. [and others; editors]. Kak my spasali Cheliuskintsev. Moscow, "Pravda", 1934.
8vo. Original grey cloth, lettered and illustrated in red, white, silver and blue, illustrated endpapers; pp. [viii], 406, [2], with mounted frontispiece and nine plates (one in colour), many (several full-page) illustrations in the text, one large colour-printed folding map, 12 leaves printed in red with laudatory text bound in; extremities a little rubbed, internally only light marginal browning.
First edition of this celebration of the successful aerial relief mission to save the crew of the icebreaker Cheliuskin, which had been crushed by icepacks near Kolyuchin Island in the Chukchi Sea in February, 1934. The crew escaped and built a makeshift airstrip (which they had to rebuild 13 times) in the hope of a search aircraft spotting them. The pilots involved in the relief mission, which succeded in April, became fêted Soviet heroes, and Marina Tsvetayeva wrote a poem honouring the rescue team.
#2081094