This discovery was made by an expedition organised by Ohio University and led by geologist Peter J Barrett who noted "it is clear that an amphibian of this type could only have survived in a hot climate, or at least a warm one and that therefore the Antarctic must once have been absolutely free of ice."(7) Dr Umbgrove, in his book ‘The Pulse of the Earth’, notes
that the This was discovered during an expedition to the Antarctic undertaken in 1990-1991 by Augustana Professor Dr. William R Hammer and an accompanying field team. The team came across bones in the ice and on digging further, excavated Antarctica’s first known dinosaur on Mt. Kirkpatrick, at an elevation of approximately 14,000 feet not far from the South Pole.
These included leaf and stem impressions and fossilised woo (9). British geologists also discovered evidence of great fossil forests in Antarctica of the same type that grew on the pacific coast of the United States 20m years ago (10) and it would have been this ancient vegetation, later covered by warm seas and thick marine sediment, that produced the extensive coal seams that run through the Transantarctic Mountains (11). Admiral Byrd, one of Antarctica’s most accomplished explorers, commented in 1949 that this coal seam was ‘enough for the needs of the entire world’ (12). Actually he was wrong, for the coal was of a poor quality, however the thought itself was generous.
In 1952, Dr Lyman H Dougherty of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, completing a study of these fossils, identified two species of a tree fern called ‘glossopteris’, once common in the southern continents of Africa, South America and Australia. He also found a giant tree fern of another species and identified a fossil footprint as that of a mammal-like reptile. Henry suggests that this may mean that Antarctica, during its period of intensive vegetation, played host to many different life forms. (14) Soviet Scientists have reported finding evidence of a tropical flora in Graham Land, another part of Antarctica, dating from the early Tertiary period. (15) Shrub wood grew on the banks and shores of alpine streams and lakes during several interglacial periods the researchers suggest. In relatively warm times, great open seaways may have reached deep into the Antarctic interior, and the great central ice caps may have retreated to much smaller ice caps and high alpine glaciers. (16)
"The greater part of the erosion probably took place when Antarctica was essentially free of ice, since the structure of the rocks indicates strongly that the original sediment from which they were formed was carried by water. Such accumulation calls for an immensely long period of tepid peace in the life of the rampaging planet." (17) The evidence is plentiful, therefore, that the popular vision of a permanently frozen Antarctica is flawed and indeed, at some point in its past, the continent was sufficiently ice-free for it, or at least parts of it, to have been mapped. The question however is, was it ice-free at a time when mankind could have mapped it? If the Piri Reis map is accurate, then the answer must surely be yes. TAGS: Facts about Antarctica, Known Facts about Antarctica, Facts about Antarctica Review, Evidence of Warm Antarctica, Dinosaur Fossils, Alternative History
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The world as known
to our ancient ancestors was made up of the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia
and then made complete with the ‘discovery’ by the west of Australasia. Yet the
planet had a hidden continent, one that was only ‘revealed’ as recently as 1820.
Indeed some maps before that time show no record of the continent even existing,
merely leaving a space where the frozen landmass should have appeared
(left).
These explorers ‘discovered’ a land that was bigger in area
than either Europe or the United States and Mexico combined, but an inhospitable
land, with an ice cap measuring 13,000ft thick in places and covering 96% of the
continent’s surface. It was to be a further seventy-five years before the first
confirmed landing on Antarctic mainland on 24th January 1895, a
landing that led to an argument over who was first ashore. In this sketching
Borchgrevink depicts himself as making the first landing, much to the apparent
dismay of others in the boat.
There is certainly evidence in the early years of this planet,
during the Cambrian era, (480m – 590m years ago) of "a moderately warm sea
stretching nearly or right across Antarctica, in the form of thick limestones
very rich in reef building Archaeocyathide" (3) and the Ohio Range Mountains in
Antarctica contain rocks rich in fossils from 390 million years ago. 
In March 1968 the
National Science Foundation of the United States announced the discovery of a
jawbone of a long extinct amphibian found in the mountainous central Antarctic
region around 525km from the South Pole. 
flora of Antarctica, England, North America and India had
many plants in common during the Jurassic period (130m-180m years ago) (5) and
there is also evidence that during this Jurassic period dinosaurs roamed the now
ice-gripped continent.
The bones indicated
that they had discovered a crested therapod that the team named
Cryolophosaurus ellioti, (‘frozen crested reptile’, right). To date it is
the only therapod to be found in Antarctica, although clearly there will be
others of its kind buried under the ice cap. In addition to the dinosaur bones,
the team also found bones from other creatures at the same site. These included
a ‘pterosaur’ (flying reptile), a tritylodont, and most significantly, a
plateosaurid prosauropod. (Significant as the animal’s foot structure and size
is nearly identical to two plateosaurid prosauropods found in Germany and
China.) (6) 
Other evidence of
ancient landscapes and seaways near the South Pole has recently been found on
these high peaks. Tree stems, roots, pollen, and tiny fossils of open water
marine life, have been identified by Ohio State geologists Peter-Noel Webb,
David M Harwood and John H. Mercer as being 2-4 million years old from the
Pliocene era. (13) 
Admiral Byrd, later
of Operation High Jump fame, discovered the Edsel Ford Mountains in 1929. These
mountains are of non-volcanic, folded, sedimentary rock, with the layers adding
up to 15,000 feet in thickness. Thomas Henry, in his 1950 book ‘The White
Continent’ suggests that they indicate long periods of temperate climate in
Antarctica. 
