The Age of Explorers Is Not Over

The Verge has an interesting article today taking us inside New York’s Explorer’s Club, that bastion of adventures who boldly dared to go where no man (or woman) had gone before. Today, as that Star Trek reference implies, the Explorer’s Club is not collecting dust on the artifacts of Arctic expeditions, but inspiring the next generation of hopeful space travelers.

From the article:

In many ways the Explorer’s Club feels like a relic of bygone age. Crammed into an ornate Manhattan townhouse, its history goes back 110 years. The elegant map room and radio center were once actively used by expeditions to plot their routes and stay in contact with far-flung parties. “Google Maps and GPS have made them more or less unnecessary now,” says Roseman ruefully.

And yet the club still holds a powerful allure for some of the biggest names in science and technology. Its annual dinner, held every March at the Waldorf Hotel in New York, will feature talks this year from Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking, along with attendees like Jeff Bezos and James Cameron, who spoke last year. “Some people think we’re a bit old-fashioned,” says Roseman. “But for a lot of today’s brightest and most successful people, there is a still no greater excitement than to travel to the ocean’s depth or attempt a voyage to Mars.”

To learn more about the club and tour its rooms, head to The Verge.

Image credit: BiblioArchives/LibraryArchives/Flickr