As a schoolteacher and founder of the Geelong College Exploration Society in the 1930s, John Bechervaise led parties of schoolboys on expeditions all over Australia, ranging from the first ascent of Federation Peak in south-west Tasmania to the tors of Central Australia and the ridges of Hinchinbrook Island in North Queensland. He was part of three Australian National Antarctic Research Expeditions (ANARE) and lectured extensively in Australia and the United States. His diaries and papers, held in the State Library of Victoria and the National Library of Australia, document the 1953-1954 Heard Island expedition, and the 1955-1956 and 1958 Mawson expeditions.
Although Bechervaise lived for long periods in Europe, including teaching in England, his writings focused on Australia. His Antarctic publications included ANARE - Australia's Outposts (with P.G. Law), The Far South, Antarctica and Blizzard and Fire. He also wrote about various areas of Australia, including the goldfields of Ballarat and Bendigo, writing the text for Bendigo and Eastern Goldfields Sketchbook. Bechervaise published a book of poems, Barwon and Barrabools, contributed more than forty articles to Walkabout, and was editor of that magazine for three years from 1949 to 1952.
