Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in event of success. — Ernest Shackleton

The first published appearance of this "ad" is on page 53 of Quit You Like Men by Carl Hopkins Elmore (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1944), appearing to be an admitted paraphrasing of Shackleton. ("Sir Ernest Shackleton when he was about to set out on one of his expeditions, printed a statement in the papers, to this effect: 'Men wanted for hazardous journey to the South Pole. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success.' In speaking of it afterward he said that so overwhelming was the response to his appeal that it seemed as though all the men of Great Britain were determined to accompany him.")

It also appears on the first page of a 1949 book by Julian Lewis Watkins, The 100 Greatest Advertisements: Who Wrote Them and What They Did. (Moore Publishing Company). | "Ernest Shackleton’s Famous Job Ad, ‘Men Wanted for Hazardous Journey,’ Is Probably a Myth", Smithsonian Magazine (January 30 2025)