Decks of Endurance. From the top: bridge deck, main deck, and lower (tween) deck (Framnæs Mekaniske Værksted, 1911). Reproduced by kind permission of the Vestfoldmuseene.
Endurance was a wooden three-masted barquentine with a length of 43.9 m, beam of 7.6 m and draught of 3.5 m. The ship had also a 350 hp steam engine. Endurance was designed by Ole Aanderud Larsen and built at the Framnæs shipyard in Sandefjord, Norway, where Johan Jacobsen was responsible for the construction. The original name of the vessel was Polaris, given by Adrien de Gerlache and Lars Christensen, who were the first owners together with other investors. Construction of Polaris started in early 1911, and the ship was launched in December 1912 (Verlinden, Reference Verlinden2017; Mitchener, Reference Mitchener2015, p. 190).
The structure of Polaris is shown in Figures 1–3. The ship had three decks: Lower (tween) deck, main deck and, above those, a short bridge deck. Only the main deck covered the whole ship’s length. The lower deck was interrupted at the machine room to make space for the steam engine and boiler.
