A History of Polar Exploration in 50 Objects

Anne Strathie: A History of Polar Exploration in 50 Objects, From Cook’s Circumnavigations to the Aviation Age 

Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, UK. The History Press, 2024, 320p.

Reviewed by Frank M. Schuster

When museum director Neil MacGregor decided in 2010 to tell nothing less than the history of the world on radio, no longer chronologically based on events, but rather on 100 objects from his museum, it was like a big bang, especially as a richly illustrated book  was also published shortly thereafter for listeners to have the objects in front of their eyes. Telling history through objects is what museums are for and what they have been doing for centuries. But once you’ve left the museum, you forget what you’ve seen relatively easily. It is mostly local or regional, at best national, (hi)stories that museums present. Telling world history is usually left to history books, in which objects are merely an illustration and visualisation, since few have the collections needed to tell a broader story. One exception, though, would be the British Museum in London, which rightly sees itself as a world history museum – and indeed, MacGregor was its director.

Just as the universe continues to expand and matter to spread since the big bang, so too has the number of well-made illustrated books that tell history using 50 or 100 objects. Apart from the history of love, culture or the future, most authors no longer devote themselves to the really big issues and things. There are books on almost every country, on many phenomena and even on some objects themselves, such as the RMS Titanic. Hardly any region of the globe has been forgotten, not even Antarctica.  The only thing missing is its counterpart: the Arctic as such. Up until now, there has been only one -- a 500-page work on expeditions to High Arctic Greenland between 1850 and 1925 based on as many as 102 (!) objects. 

Anne Strathie, to whom we owe three well-researched, very readable biographical works on the so-called “Heroic Age of Antarctic Discovery”, takes a similar approach in her book, which includes many additional illustrations, historical maps, and a bibliography. However, her book is more comprehensive in terms of both time and space – running from the late 1760s to the early 1930s. 

Since Strathie covers both polar regions in just over 300 pages, using ‘only’ 50 objects from a period of 175 years, her stories are naturally not as detailed as those about the Greenland expeditions. Whether one is satisfied with the book depends, on the one hand, on how well one knows polar history and, on the other, on what one expects from a history in objects. In the last 15 years, since the publication of MacGregor’s book, two ways of telling history in objects have emerged, depending on the background of the authors. While historians and journalists tend to use the object as a starting point to tell the story associated with it, archaeologists and museum people focus more closely on the object itself in order to build the story around it. Both approaches are perfectly legitimate and have their supporters among readers, who tend to have different expectations.

All that aside, anyone who wants an interesting, beautifully illustrated overview of the history of the discovery of the polar regions will certainly be well served by Strathie's book. Those who are well acquainted with one historical period will discover interesting facts from another. Someone who was previously interested in the Arctic can learn something new about the Antarctic, or vice versa. 

Even experts will discover the odd unfamiliar object, as Strathie’s selection of objects is very wide-ranging. ‘The sizes of objects range from that of a tiny box to a massive ice-shelf.’ (p. 9) No wonder that the RRS Discovery, the expedition ship of the ‘British National Antarctic Expedition’ (1901-1904), better known as ‘Scott’s Discovery Expedition’, is one of the objects. ARA Uruguay, which also still exists, is less known, as is its role in the Argentinian rescue operation of Otto Nordenskjold’s Swedish expedition (1901-1903). That the chapter on aviation focuses on aeroplanes or illustrations of them is also not surprising at all. But it’s the little things, such as Elizabeth Cook’s Ditty Box, are more of a surprise.

© Dixson Library, State Library of New South Wales

Like all the other objects in this coffee-table book, this one, too, is beautifully presented visually; in addition it is explained that it is a small box of the kind that sailors traditionally crafted to store personal valuables to prevent them from being lost at sea, and that this particular box was specially made by sailors from the wood of James Cook’s HMS Resolution for his widow. Furthermore, as the text notes: “It was carved with Polynesian symbols and decorated with miniature silver plates etched with inscriptions relating to the box and Cook’s career.” (19) If Anne Strathie had also been an archaeologist, ethnologist, anthropologist or came from a museum, she would certainly not have missed the opportunity to tell the story of Cook’s expeditions on the basis of what is written on the box, as many other authors with such a background have done telling history in objects. Anyone, who expects that kind of book may be slightly disappointed. Others, by contrast, will surely be pleased that Strathie chooses a different path by using the box as an opportunity to retell the oft-told (hi)story, this time from Elisabeth’s point of view as a family story. It’s a challenging task for Strathie, as for any author, to write a history in objects nowadays, given the sheer number of them and the different ways in which they can be told. 

Nevertheless, her objects are well chosen, and provide a good introduction to a concise, sometimes known, sometimes unknown, vivid and often exciting tale, which is illustrated not only with period photographs, but often also with comparative photographs taken by the author during her own travels to the polar regions. 

You can tell that Strathie comes from Antarctic history and from the United Kingdom. Her book more or less covers all the expeditions of the so-called heroic age, even if sometimes, as with Filchner’s German expedition, only in passing. You can find out what a Japanese explorer’s samurai sword has to do with Antarctica and Australia, but some major Antarctic expeditions of the early 19th century are featured only in the context of the voyages of James Weddell and James Clark Ross. The Weddell seal and Francis R. M. Crozier’s almost forgotten penguin are honoured here, yet, names such as Fabian von Bellingshausen (who led the only Russian Antarctic expedition), Americans Nathaniel B. Palmer and Charles Wilkes and Frenchman Jules Dumont d’Urville, do not figure large. This is surprising given the author’s expertise, but forgivable, as they appear in Antarctica: A History in 100 Objects, where, by contrast, James Weddell hardly ever appears.

As far as the Arctic is concerned, Strathie focuses even more on the British expeditions. People you would expect, such as William Edward Parry, John and James Clark Ross, John Franklin, Clements Markham or Frederick G. Jackson and their (hi)stories, appear; of course also the Norwegians Fridtjof Nansen and Roald Amundsen, or the Americans Robert E. Peary and Frederick Cook. Strathie often uses world-famous objects, such as the photograph of the ‘Three Polar Stars’ Amundsen, Peary and Ernest Sheckleton from 1913, to tell a well-known story, but not always. For example, a fur suit made by an Inuk is the starting point for the story about the American North Pole expedition (1908-1909), but not Peary’s, but Matthew Henson’s, which also sheds light on people who are otherwise not so much in the limelight. She also does not approach John Franklin’s 1845 expedition via its leader, but via a daguerreotype of the assistant surgeon and naturalist of HMS Erebus, Harry Goodsir, presenting not only the well-known daguerreotype, but all three pictures of him. 

As with Antarctica, some non-British Arctic expeditions are not mentioned, among them the Russian ones, which in the early 19th century were involved in the exploration of the North Pacific and Alaska, which was ultimately Russian at the time. But in this case the author can hardly be blamed for this, as it is a general blind spot in both popular and academic historical research on the discovery of the Arctic, ignoring the research on the North Pacific, even if it is available in English. It is therefore not surprising that although there even is a history of the discovery of the North Pacific in 44 objects, written by a German ethnologist, it was not translated into English. 

Anne Strathie thus provides an insight into well-known expeditions, but by often choosing unfamiliar objects, she does it from an unusual perspective. 

Additionally anyone who uses the book not just as a reference work to find out about this or that polar expedition – for which it is also excellent – but actually reads it from cover to cover, will realise something that is not obvious even if you have read many works on discovery expeditions in the polar regions: Firstly, that the discovery and exploration of the Arctic and Antarctic cannot really be separated from each other; and secondly that the expeditions are interconnected in one way or another and built on each another over time.

Therefore, it's surely no coincidence that the third object, following the two introductory ones connected to James Cook’s polar expeditions, is the Barrel Crow’s Nest invented by the whaler William Scoresby, Sr. in 1812, and the 50th and final object is the crow’s nest from Shackleton’s the Quest, the ship of his 1922 final expedition.

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Mentioned in this review

Neil MacGregor: A History of the World in 100 Objects. London: Allen Lane, 2011. 

Gudrun Bucher: Die Entdeckung des Nordpazifiks: Eine Geschichte in 44 Objekten. [The Discovery of the North Pacific: A History in 44 Objects.] Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern,  2017.

Jean de Pomereu and Daniella McCahey: Antarctica: A History in 100 Objects. London: Conway, 2022.

Peter R. Dawes: Expedition relics from High Arctic Greenland – eight decades of exploration history told through 102 objects. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2023.

Give Me Winter, Give Me Dogs: Knud Rasmussen and the Fifth Thule Expedition

Give Me Winter, Give Me Dogs: Knud Rasmussen and the Fifth Thule Expedition

by Kenn Harper

Iqaluit, Nunavut: Inhabit Media Inc., 2024

Reviewed by Dave Woodman

One set of matched covers dominates the space on many bookshelves of Arctic expedition accounts. The seven-volume Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition, detailing the expedition conducted by the Danish Greenlander Knud Rasmussen and his companions between 1921 and 23, is densely packed with specialized scientific detail. During my early research concerning Inuit recollections of the Franklin expedition, these hefty tomes, amounting to over five thousand pages, seemed peripheral to my purpose. Rasmussen’s collected traditions dealing with Franklin were readily available in secondary sources, so I took the easier alternative of reading his more accessible overview Across Arctic America. I always thought I would return to the primary volumes when I had time.

Thanks to my friend Kenn Harper, I feel less pressure to make such a time investment. After decades of patient study, Kenn was inspired by the approaching centennial of the Fifth Thule expedition to produce his new book Give Me Winter, Give Me Dogs. He does such a masterful job of retelling the story of Rasmussen’s expedition that only the most obsessed readers need to revisit the original report.  

Kenn Harper is perhaps the most appropriate person to publish a popular summary of this large corpus of research, which he calls “a virtual encyclopedia of knowledge on Inuit culture.” A long-time resident of the Arctic, called by the Inuit Ilisaijikutaaq (“tall teacher”), Harper embodies many of the same characteristics as his hero Rasmussen. Both men’s long experience among the Inuit engendered great respect and sympathy for their hardships and the difficulties of coping in a rapidly changing social environment. Harper is fluent in English, Danish and Inuktitut and, in many favourable ways, resembles Rasmussen, who was told, “You have the face of a white man, but our tongue.” 

Harper is also a well-established author. He is well known to readers of Arctic history through his excellent books Give Me My Father's Body and In Those Days. For ten years, he wrote "Taissumani," a regular column on Arctic history in Nunatsiaq News, which he has recently revived.

Harper’s book treats the Thule expedition in two sections. The first revolves around Danish Island, the self-named camp established near modern Naujaat (Repulse Bay). From here, he and his associates conducted forays into the field individually and collectively to pursue their research goals. The primary impetus of the expedition was to validate Steensby’s contention that the coastal Inuit were descendants of earlier inland populations. Their work partially disproved this idea, although they failed to realize this. The modern consensus is that contemporary Inuit migrated east along the coast from Siberia to Greenland, and the second section of the book relates Rasmussen’s trek, accompanied by the young hunter Qaavigarsuaq and his widowed cousin Arnarulunnguaq, along this coast in the opposite direction.

Harper lauds the purely scientific purpose of this Danish expedition:

“It was not to explore for new lands, to claim sovereignty over any lands and plant a flag, to search for mineral wealth and claim that, to convert the people through Christianity, to trade for furs — it was not any of those things … It was to meet new people that had been at that time largely untouched by missionaries, traders, and this expedition happened sort of at the 11th hour before a horde of outside influences arrives in the formerly isolated parts of the Arctic.”

Although Harper clearly recounts the Fifth Expedition's archaeological activities and scientific work, he does not dwell on the details. While lauding the efforts and accomplishments of his Danish scientific travelling companions, Kaj Birket-Smith (anthropology) and Therkel Mathiassen (archaeology), Rasmussen is most effusive in his praise of his Greenlandic companions, including Kalaaleq Jacob Olson (native west Greenlander) and his Inughuit (Greenland Inuit) assistants. He unequivocally stated that “the Eskimo is the hero of this book. His history, his present culture, his daily hardships, and his spiritual life constitute the theme and the narrative.” Harper agrees that these Inughuit were “the largely unsung heroes and aides who helped to make Rasmussen’s expedition a success,” repeatedly demonstrating their essential contributions. 

Rasmussen, modestly self-described as “folklorist," nevertheless provides the book's primary focus. Harper lauds Rasmussen’s effort to preserve and catalogue the beliefs, customs, and traditions of the Inuit he encountered. The difficulties of the era in which Rasmussen worked, when southern culture increasingly encroached on traditional Inuit life, are sympathetically retold by Harper with his valuable insight from having been immersed in both worlds. He tells of the murders committed by Alikammig and Tatamirana, their trial and execution, as the great tragedy in intercultural misunderstanding and incompatibility that it is now recognized to be. He also relates how Umiq brought his idiosyncratic version of Christianity to the Iglulimiut, integrating it with older traditions and practices. 

Rasmussen’s “salvage ethnography” is brought forth from the wonderful stories and magic songs of the Inuit with whom he interacted. Much of his work centered around interviews with powerful shamans who were valuable sources of traditional Inuit philosophy, practices and beliefs. Others, including Ivaluarjuk, Urulu and Igsivalitaq “the Outlaw” tell their gripping stories of lives lived in a culture now sadly displaced. Most of these individuals are brought to life by inclusion in the excellent section of photographs included in the end matter. However, these might have been more efficiently spread throughout the text and keyed to the individual stories. 

Although the Inuit recollections relayed to Rasmussen form the basis of the book, Harper expands the context by including stories of the lively and engaging characters of the era, many of whom deserve, and some have benefitted from, complete book-length treatment. These include the southern traders, George Comer, George Cleveland and Patsy Klengenburg. Other well-known characters make cameo appearances, such as Ada Blackjack and the explorers  Vihljarmar Stefansson and Rasmussen’s own companion Peter Freuchen. Their interactions within the context of the Thule Expedition are emphasized. The latter two are both prolific authors and subjects of books themselves. Stefansson emerges in this book as somewhat of a bête noire, while Rasmussen’s friend Peter Freuchen’s adventures add colour. The latter’s popular books would eventually eclipse Rasmussen himself among the general public. After reading Harper’s excellent overview, I am sure many readers will be inspired to follow up with these.

A section of helpful maps is useful, but again, they may have been more efficiently scattered throughout the book in accordance with the narrative of the various excursions from the base at Danish Island and the eventual crossing of the entire Arctic coast from Greenland to Siberia. Although no index is provided, Harper includes an excellent glossary and references for those inspired to further reading and research. 

In addition to popularizing a somewhat obscure expedition on its centenary, Harper believes that the book is relevant to modern Inuit as well, who “are now coming to realize their indebtedness to him [Rasmussen] as well for the documentation he made of their ancestor’s lives and beliefs.” These traditions and the many collected artifacts preserved worldwide form an essential and enduring legacy.