“I shall find a way, or make one.” – Robert Edwin Peary, 1898
Numerous people in our society are not conscious of significant events in history that have affected our lives still, over 100 years subsequent to the occurrence. An example of this is “Who exactly was the first person to successfully reach the North Pole?” A number of people would answer this question by stating the explorer Frederick Albert Cook, several would say Robert Edwin Peary, and various wouldn’t even have a clue as to who it was. The true answer, as confirmed by scientists, researchers, and other explorers, is Robert Edwin Peary, also known as Bert by his mother. Cook had claimed he had reached the Pole one full year before Peary. Was Cook’s story a ruse, or was it the absolute truth? Society may never know, but whether or not Peary actually did reach the North Pole first, the story of how he got there is exceptionally extraordinary and it illustrates his perseverance to achieve his goal, set in the year 1885.
Bert had an extended life before and after his expedition to the North. He was born on May 6th, 1856 in the rural town Cresson, Pennsylvania to his mother and father, who died 3 years later in 1859. As a child, he had stunning curly scarlet colored hair and sapphire colored eyes; he was found very handsome. He and his mother relocated to Maine after his father’s premature death. He graduated from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine with a degree for civil engineering in 1877. 4 years later, Peary joined the U.S. Navy as a lieutenant in the corps of civil engineers. For a few years, he was stationed in Nicaragua. He joined an odyssey to the country for a ship canal that would supposedly connect the Pacific Ocean with the Caribbean Sea. In Nicaragua, Bert found an aged pamphlet from a Swedish surveyor stating adventures and information about his expeditions to Greenland, which was thought to exist as a continent throughout those times until Peary identified it as a country. This pamphlet lured Peary to become fascinated in reaching the northern parts of Greenland, which were uncharted dangers to explorers who dared to jeopardize their lives in order to observe the majestic lands of Greenland.
Peary’s first journey to Greenland was in the subsequent summer, in 1889. He investigated the western coast of the so called “continent”. He was accompanied by a Danish lieutenant, whose name is not known. These two dragged their own sledges, which was a particular sled used for shipping equipment and goods. They had to endure agonizing snowstorms and winds during their 6 months in Greenland. The two men hiked an average of 5 miles each day. One hundred miles into the journey, the two men had to turn back, with only 6 days of food remaining and intact. This odyssey, according to Peary, was in preparation for his next goal: to lead the first ever expedition across the interior range of Greenland. This goal was eventually ruined, because Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen became the first explorer to do this in 1889. After hearing of this, Bert modified his plans, and produced a new goal; determining how far north Greenland extended.
On July 27 in 1891, 2 years after Peary revised his goals, he once again reached the western coast of Greenland, this time accompanied by his wife Josephine aka Jo (he married her in 1889), his assistant who was an African-American named Matthew Henson, Frederick Albert Cook, who at the time was planning on being the expedition’s doctor and ethnologist, and 3 others. For one year and 1 month, the seven of them studied and observed Greenland and its inhabitants, the Inuit. In April of the following year, the crew traveled 1,200 miles to the northeast of Greenland. Instead of pulling it himself, Peary’s sledge was hauled by a multitude of canines. This is when Peary discovered that Greenland was an isle, rather than a continent. After this journey ended and Peary and crew were back home, he was hailed for educating the world his new observations about Greenland. He returned to Greenland in the month of August in 1893, when Jo gave birth to their daughter, Marie. The Inuit called Marie the “Snow Baby” in their language, because of her pale white skin. He stayed in Greenland for another 18 months, struggling to arrive at the interior. The weather was once again a difficulty, so that expedition couldn’t be considered a success. In 1896 and 1897, he explored Greenland again, observing it. He found meteorites in one of his journeys and sold them for 40,000 dollars to the New York City Museum of Natural History, where the meteorites are still accessible on exhibit today.
His next arctic journey lasted for 4 years, from 1898 to 1902. This was his first journey to the North Pole. His main focus on this particular exploration was in fact to be the first man to stumble upon the Pole. In December of 1898, he produced a base camp at the northern end of Ellesmere Island in Canada. Countless amounts of storms and blizzards debilitated Peary and his crew. One blizzard was so brutal that Peary got frostbite in his feet, causing 8 of his 10 toes to become amputated. While recovering, Bert imprinted, on his cabin wall, the illustrious Latin motto Inveniam viam aut faciam, which in English is translated to “I shall find a way, or make one.” He continued his journey, struggling even more than ever before, from blizzards and leads, which were bulky channels that were constructed whenever ice broke apart. These leads were often too broad for crossing. This soon had to have his second journey discontinued. His next journey centering on reaching the Pole was in 1905 to 1906. This expedition ended similarly to the last, without reaching the North Pole. But, Peary did set another type of record. He, as of April 21, 1906, traveled the farthest north than anyone else in history, travelling to 87 degrees north latitude. That point was about 30 miles ahead of the previously set record. When returning home from this journey, the explorer reached 174 miles away from the North Pole.
It was the third and final attempt to the North Pole that made Robert Peary world-famous. On July 6, 1908, Robert Peary sailed out of the New York Harbor on the ship, the Roosevelt (named after the president, whom Peary admired greatly). He set a camp in Cape Columbia and started his history-making voyage. This voyage held the largest crew, with a people population of 24, 19 sledges, and 133 Huskies. Eventually, Peary’s crew was shortened drastically to only 5 men and 40 dogs. The others had made advanced camps to make traveling faster. The 5 men, including Bert, traveled about 30 miles per day on their journey. Peary believed that the only reason for that high speed was the unusually smooth ice that was traveled on. On April 6, 1909, Robert Edwin Peary and his comrades reached the North Pole. There, he placed the hand-sewn American flag made personally by his wife, Jo. On his trip back home, Peary was surprised to hear Frederick Albert Cook claim that he and 2 others had reached the Pole one full year before Peary. Investigators did research and concluded that Cook was lying, that he had not reached the Pole. They declared Peary the true Pole discoverer. The U.S. House of Representatives believed Peary, too, and granted him the rank of Rear Admiral. Peary later retired in 1911, still with his rank as admiral. He wrote 3 books, entitled Northward Over the “Great Ice”, Nearest the Pole, and Secrets of Polar Travel. He died at the age of 65 on February 20, 1920. His body, as well as his wife’s, was buried in the Arlington Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, where this great and courageous explorer, father, and husband will always, rest in peace.
