The Crane Pacific Expedition
A Journey Aboard Cornelius Crane's Illyria
The following is a summary of the Illyria trip that I wrote back in 2020. It contains many quotes from Jungle Islands by Sidney Shurcliff.
In 1928, Cornelius V. Crane took some friends and some scientists aboard the Illyria to follow in the footsteps of Darwin and Wallace. The book that was published following the expedition was written by Sidney Shurcliff, but copyright by Cornelius Crane in 1930. The book was dedicated "To R. T. Crane, Jr. without whose assistance the expedition would never have taken place".
The Illyria itself was constructed in Lussinpiccolo, Italy and was constructed as a gift to Cornelius from his father. "The Illyria's length overall was to be 147' 6"; her height of foremast 116', mainmast 128'; her gross tonnage 356. She would carry 10,000 square feet of sail and auxiliary power would be supplied by a 300 H. P. Diesel engine." There was ample space aboard to turn what would have been a pleasure yacht into a scientific vessel, and so she was.
In addition to Sidney and Cornelius, and friends Murry N. Fairbank and Charles R. Peavy, a scientific crew was aboard: "Karl P. Schmidt, herpetologist and director of scientific work, Walter A. Weber, artist and ornithologist, Frank C. Wonder, taxidermist, all of Field Museum; Dr. William L. Moss, of the Harvard Medical School, physician and anthropologist; Dr. Albert W. Herre, of Stanford University, ichthyologist." Add to all of that Captain S. B. Boutilier to captain the ship, and you have a full compliment.
"We had boasted that ours was to be the most completely equipped scientific expedition ever to sail the Pacific," Sidney writes. "We had laid our plans to bring an aeroplane with folding wings, two motorcycles and a side car, twelve trunks of medicines, several cases of dynamite, three motion picture cameras, 50,000 feet of motion picture film, two diving outfits, a moving picture projector, 25 rifles and shotguns with ammunition, complete apparatus for the capture, preservation and mounting of specimens -- and a dog mascot."
By November 16th, 1928, the Illyria was underway (after a near "calamity", as Sidney calls it, in Boston Harbor). They left Boston Harbor without Cornelius as Cornelius was not feeling well, but five days later on November 21st, the crew reconvened with Cornelius in Hamilton, Bermuda. Before they left Boston, they had been told they could not take the aeroplane or the dog. Now they were in Bermuda it was now time for the motorcycles to go. Cornelius told Murray Fairbank and Sidney that if they could find a place for them in their stateroom, they could keep just one of the motorcycles. "... the next day Murray and I put our heads together and took the motorcycle apart. We put the frame and wheels under his bunk and the motor into our trunk. Then ushering in Cornelius, we asked him if the room was in good enough order to suit him." It was. The motorcycles were appropriately taken care of, and at the same time, the large order of potatoes that needed storage we stowed where the motorcycles had once been.
The expedition went on until late September of 1929. "Our travels and adventures during the remainder of the trip are no part of this story, for after we left New Guinea our scientific work was practically over. At Borneo, the next stopping point, all the scientists except Dr. Moss went home to America by steamer." When they reached Java, Sidney and Cornelius, along with Charles R. Peavy, Murry N. Fairbank, and William L. Moss, all decided to go on as regular tourists, visiting "Java, Bali, British Malaya, Siam, French Indo-China, China, and Japan. Then [they] took a steamer home and reached the United States in late September, having been away nearly eleven months".
Shurcliff, Sydney N., Jungle Islands: The Illyria in the South Seas (New York: The Knickerbocker Press, 1930).