From Cape to Cairo. The First Traverse of Africa from South to North.

GROGAN, Ewart S. and Arthur H. Sharp; Illustrations by A. D. McCormick.

Item Number: 111856

London: Hurst & Blackett, 1900.

First edition of this travel work which details a log between Capetown to Cairo. Octavo, original publisher’s cloth, with photogravure portrait frontispiece, 2 color-printed folding route maps and 48 plates. Presentation copy, inscribed by Arthur Sharp on the front pastedown, “To E. Percy Henderson from Arthur H. Sharp Dec. 1900.” The recipient, Major Percy E. Henderson was the author of A British Officer in the Balkans. From the library of James Stephen “Steve” Fossett with his bookplate to the pastedown. American businessman and record-setting aviator Steve Fossett became the first person to fly solo nonstop around the world in 2002 in his 10-story high balloon Spirit of Freedom. He completed the 2002 trip in 13 days, 8 hours, and 33 minutes and set records for both the Longest Distance Flown Solo in a Balloon and Fastest Balloon Flight Around the World. Fossett was also one of sailing’s most prolific distance record holders set the Absolute World Speed Record for airships with a Zeppelin NT in 2004. He received numerous awards and honors throughout his career including aviation’s highest award, the Gold Medal of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI), which he was awarded in 2002. Fossett disappeared on September 3, 2007 while flying a light aircraft over the Great Basin Desert, between Nevada and California. Rare and desirable signed and inscribed.

Grogan and Sharp embarked on one of the most perilous treks in Africa, from the Cape of Good Hope to Cairo, Egypt, on foot, establishing that Africa could ostensibly be crossed by railway. They traveled to the Zambezi, then through the lake districts of central Africa, on to the Upper Nile, to Khartoum and on to Cairo. Marching up the Pungwe, the party hunted buffalo and lion. On the Chiperoni, they bagged sable and rhinoceros, while in the Rusisi Valley near Lake Albert, the pair succeeded in bagging several elephant. Grogan ran into particular difficulty with the Dinkas and Nuers in the upper reaches of the Nile before finally making his way to Cairo. The illustrations are stunning, as is the elaborate pictorial binding. An excellent work of sporting adventures and exploration.