Margot Morrell's Blog

A leader who inspires the "respect and confidence" of his team.

1908 - 1909 Nimrod Expedition “In the long winter months, when the scientists toiled in darkness and cold at their routine tasks outside, the help and company of our leader might always be relied upon. ... Any jest or argument of unusual interest was sure to draw ‘the Boss’ from his cabin. … He was a sociable man and liked company, and was always the life and soul of any group in which he happened to be.” Raymond Priestley, Geologist, Nimrod Expedition #LeadingbyExample #KeepingUpMorale...

The Southern Party, 1909 aboard Nimrod - Frank Wild, Ernest Shackleton, Eric Marshall, Jameson B. Adams Summing up their attempt to reach the South Pole on Shackleton's 1908 - 1909 Nimrod expedition, Frank Wild wrote in the 1930s, "All through this journey, Shackleton strained every muscle and nerve to the limit as he always did in the twenty years I knew him when strenuous action was called for." #LeadingByExample

“He was a tower of strength and endurance, and he never panicked in any emergency. And he was the most generous man I ever came across.” Walter How, sailmaker, Endurance

Living on the Ice “Any and every duty is undertaken cheerfully and willingly and no complaint or whining is ever heard no matter what hardships or inconvenience may be encountered. The principal credit of this is due to the tact and leadership of the Head of the Expedition and the cheery happiness and bonhomie of Wild. They both command respect, confidence and affection.” Frank Worsley, Captain, Endurance

First published January 4, 2001 by Viking. It was a massive amount of hard work. Delighted the lessons from Shackleton's story of leading a team successfully through a grueling ordeal have been an asset to so many people around the world.

Endurance trapped This is one of Dr. Macklin's wonderful and insightful comments that point to Shackleton's leadership strategies of leading by example and maintaining a positive attitude. In the years following the Endurance expedition, some crew members refused to talk about their experience. In some cases, they couldn't share what they had been through because they saw it as sacred. In one case, the crew member thought it would be bragging to talk about it. In the 1950s, when a crew...

1860 Aerial View of Boston I came across this 1860 image when I was working on the Sam Adams project. In the lower left corner, you can pick out Old South Meeting House with the steeple and follow the path of the Tea Party patriots along Milk Street, which runs along side the Meeting House, to what was once Griffins wharf where they jumped into rowboats to get out to the three ships, anchored at sea, that were loaded with crates of tea.

On December 17, 1775 - From Fort George, New York, north of Saratoga, Henry Knox wrote to General Washington, " I have made forty two exceeding strong sleds & have provided eighty yoke of Oxen to drag them as far as Springfield where I shall get fresh Cattle to carry them to Camp. The rout will be from here to Kinderhook, from thence into Great Barrington, Massachusetts Bay & down to Springfield—There will Scarcely be any possibility of conveying them from here to Albany or Kinderhook but on...

On this day in 1773, patriots in Boston, led by Sam Adams, were organizing the Boston Tea Party. An estimated crowd of 7,000 pressed into Old South Meeting House (the pews are a later addition) and jammed the surrounding streets. The heart of the issue was "no taxation without representation." The provocation was the arrival of the Dartmouth on November 28, the first of three British ships to arrive loaded with crates of tea that would be subject to tax. Custom officials had refused to allow...