Product Description
The United States Antarctic Program (USAP) wasn’t always known by its’ current four-letter acronym. From the establishment of the country’s first permanent Antarctic research station during the International Geophysical Year in 1959 through approximately 1986/’87, the program was referred to as the “United States Antarctic Research Program”, or “USARP”. The Original USARP patch has been out of production for decades, is a faithful reproduction based on the patch from a 50-year-old vintage USARP parka found in storage in the Antarctic.
The patch features the outline of Antarctica with the meridians converging at the Geographic South Pole, with the lettering “United States Antarctic Research Program – National Science Foundation”. The vintage design shows a converging group of latitude and longitude lines that resembles a ship’s wheel (possibly in reference to the US Navy, which supported Operation Deep Freeze in Antarctica from 1955 through their replacement by the Air National Guard in 1998).
