A tin of Horlick’s was one of the odder and cheaper lots in the $3m sale of material from the Martin Greene library on ‘Russian America and Polar Exploration’ held by Christie’s New York (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium) on December 7.
Horlick’s was a major sponsor of the 1926 expedition in which Roald Amundsen, the first man to reach the South Pole, and American polar explorer Lincoln Ellsworth flew from Svalbard across the Arctic to Alaska in the Norge, an airship designed by Umberto Nobile. In the previous year an attempt they made using Dornier flying boats had failed.
There is also a Horlick mountain range in Antarctica, named by Admiral Byrd in acknowledgement of the company’s sponsorship of his 1930s Antarctic explorations.