The Jones Mountains are an isolated group of

mountain A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited Summit (topography), summit area, and ...

s, trending generally east–west for 43 km (27 mi), situated on the Eights Coast,

Ellsworth Land Ellsworth Land is a portion of the Antarctic continent bounded on the west by Marie Byrd Land, on the north by Bellingshausen Sea, on the northeast by the base of Antarctic Peninsula, and on the east by the western margin of the Filchner–Ron ...

, about 80 km (50 mi) south of

Dustin Island Dustin Island is an island about long, lying southeast of Cape Annawan, Thurston Island. The feature forms the SE limit of Seraph Bay. It was discovered by Rear Admiral Byrd and other members of the USAS in a flight from the ''Bear'' on Feb ...

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest contine ...

. The charts of the USAS, 1939–41, show mountains in this approximate location and relationship to Dustin and

Thurston Island Thurston Island is an ice-covered, glacially dissected island, long, wide and in area, lying a short way off the northwest end of Ellsworth Land, Antarctica. It is the third-largest island of Antarctica, after Alexander Island and Berkner Isl ...

s, indicating they were sighted in the flight from the ship ''Bear'', February 27, 1940. The mountains appear in distant air photos taken by US Navy

Operation Highjump Operation HIGHJUMP, officially titled The United States Navy Antarctic Developments Program, 1946–1947, (also called Task Force 68), was a United States Navy (USN) operation to establish the Antarctic research base Little America IV. The opera ...

, December 30, 1946, and were observed from USN aircraft by Edward Thiel and J. Campbell Craddock, January 22, 1960. The naming was proposed by Thiel and Craddock after Dr. Thomas O. Jones (1908–93), American chemist; senior

NSF NSF may stand for: Political organizations *National Socialist Front, a Swedish National Socialist party *NS-Frauenschaft, the women's wing of the former German Nazi party *National Students Federation, a leftist Pakistani students' political gr ...

official in charge of the U.S. Antarctic Research Program, 1958–78; Director, Division of Environmental Science, NSF, 1965–69; Deputy Assistant Director for National and International Programs, NSF, 1969–78. The Christmas Cliffs are a set of south-facing cliffs with two prominent rock outcrops, located south-southeast of

Pillsbury Tower The Jones Mountains are an isolated group of mountains, trending generally east–west for 43 km (27 mi), situated on the Eights Coast, Ellsworth Land, about 80 km (50 mi) south of Dustin Island in Antarctica. The charts of th ...

in the Jones Mountains. They were mapped by the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

Jones Mountains Party, 1960–61, and so named by the party because the cliffs were visited on

Christmas Day Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year, ...

of 1960.

References

* Mountain ranges of Ellsworth Land Volcanoes of Ellsworth Land Miocene volcanoes {{EllsworthLand-geo-stub

See also

References