Robert Haskins Thomas Dodson
Antarctic Explorer

Robert Haskins Thomas (Bob) Dodson died on December 12th, 2022 in White River Junction, Vermont. He was born on March 15, 1926 in Mount Vernon, New York to Louise Swift Dodson and Captain Harry Leluce Dodson, US Navy. Bob grew up around the world as his father served as a mechanical engineer aboard battleships in WW I and as chief engineer aboard aircraft carriers in WW II. Bob's most memorable homes were in Shanghai, China and Baguio in the Philippines. He was educated at Phillips Exeter Academy, Harvard College, Dartmouth College, Harvard Business School and the Centre des Études Industrielles in Geneva, Switzerland. He served in the Navy at the end of WW II.

Bob is best known as one of the last Antarctic explorers of the dog team era. He was an assistant geologist and dog team driver on the 1947-48 Ronne Antarctic Expedition, the last US Antarctic expedition to use dog teams for land transportation. The Dodson Peninsula on the ice-bound Weddell Sea at the eastern base of Antarctica's Palmer Peninsula was named for his father. While on a lengthy ski expedition to the Antarctic plateau in the winter of 1948, Bob and a colleague crossed a dangerous ice field riddled with deep fissures called crevasses. Suddenly his friend fell into the bottom of a 150' deep crevasse and miraculously survived, though he was wedged upside down in the ice. In the darkness of a star-studded night, Bob skied across the jagged glacial landscape 12 miles to the expedition's base camp and then led a rescue team back to the crevasse. A mountain climbing team roped down to the trapped skier and pulled him out safely. Bob was recognized for his bravery and orienteering skills.

Bob was a life-long Fellow of the Antarctican Society and served as the society's president in the 1980's. On his retirement in 1998, he again "went south", serving as a lecturer on cruise ships more than a dozen times over the years. He has been, since 1948, a Fellow of The American Geographical Society, a member of The American Alpine Club, and for many years a member of The Alpine Club (London), The Himalayan Club (Mumbai) and the Swiss Alpine Club. Throughout his life he was a keen mountaineer, having climbed in the Rockies and the Alps as well as in the Himalaya where, in 1952, he organized and led an expedition into the high peaks of the Sikkim Himalaya in India.

After returning from Antarctica, Bob was invited by a friend to attend the Dartmouth Winter Carnival where he met the love of his life, Gertrude "Robbie" Robertson, who was singing The Weaver's Song next to an ice sculpture. They were married at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco in 1950 and enjoyed 68 years of loving, adventure-filled marriage

After his wedding Bob joined ALCAN, a large Canadian aluminum firm. He spent two years at the company's subsidiary, Indian Aluminum Company, in Kolkata, India. After six years in Chicago and St. Louis managing ALCAN's south-central sales office, he left ALCAN to become an executive at the Acco corporation in Ogdensburg, NY. He later served as general manager of the Bemis Company in Belgium and then as general manager of the Singer Company in Istanbul, Turkey. He later held positions with the U.S. Agency for International Development as an attaché in the Persian Gulf for the Trade and Development Program and later as Private Enterprise Development Officer at the U.S. embassy in Rabat, Morocco.

In 2018 Bob was predeceased by his beloved wife Robbie, the "light of my life" as he often called her. He is survived by three sons, each of whom was born in a different country: Harry, born in 1952 in Kolkata, India and now living in Ashfield, Massachusetts; Philip born in 1955 in Geneva, Switzerland and now in the French village of Aleu in the foothills of the Pyrenees and Christopher, born in Brussels, Belgium and now of Greenfield, Massachusetts. A fourth son, Nicholas, born in Illinois, predeceased him. His six grandchildren live across the globe: Erwan in Los Angeles, Noah in Taiwan, Lena and Elsa in France, Eleanor in Shelton, Connecticut and Abbott in New York City. He has two great grandchildren: Sonya in Connecticut and Elliott in France.

Bob's memorial service will be held at 11 am on Saturday, January 21st at St. Thomas Episcopal Church, 9 West Wheelock Street, Hanover, New Hampshire. It will be followed in the spring by an interment in a palm-studded cemetery overlooking the Pacific in Santa Barbara, California beside the graves of his wife, Robbie and his son Nicholas.

In remembrance, donations can be made to St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Hanover.