The Race to the White Continent.

Gurney, Alan. New York: Norton, 2000.
  • Antarctic Reading: General
 Preview 

Describes and compares three major Antarctic expeditions of the late 1830s, one French (d’Urville), one British (Ross), and one American (Wilkes).

Little America: Town at the End of the World

Carter, Paul Allen. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979.
  • 1928-56 Expeditions of Rear Admiral Richard Byrd.
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Carter’s is a fairly well-written although wholly derivative account of the various bases known as Little America, including a solid chapter on the first winterover experience.

The Hazen Court-Martial: The Responsibility for the Disaster of the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition Definitely Established with Proposed Reforms in the Law and Practice of Courts-Martial.

Mackey, Thomas J. New York: Van Nostrand, 1885.
  • 1881-84 International Physical Year US Expedition to Lady Franklin Bay (led by Adolphus Greely).
  • Arctic Reading: United States
 Preview 

Mackey held Secretary of War Robert T. Lincoln responsible for the tragedy by withholding necessary support because of his animosity to Hazen, Chief Signal Officer. Secondly he blamed Garlington for not following the plan as ordered, a plan on which Greeley depended for survival. (p. 7). On p. 6 Mackey refers to the North Pole as “the crown jewel of the Arctic dome.”

New Land: Four Years in the Arctic Regions.

Sverdrup, Otto. Two volumes. London: Longmans, Green, 1904.
  • 1898-1902 Swedish Ship and Sledging Expedition to Northern Greenland (Led by Otto Sverdrup aboard Fram).
  • Arctic Reading: Europe including Scandinavia
 Preview 

Volume I:

Voyage to Desolation Island.

Kauffmann, Jean-Paul. London, Harvill Press, 2000.
  • 1970 French Expedition to Kerguélen Islands.
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

This Frenchman seems a bit obsessed with boredom, as shown on his travel book to the Kerguélen Islands. The week-long voyage provides “the indispensable prelude to getting to know any unknown country: waiting and boredom.” “Isn’t having nothing to do the supreme test, more even than suffering? Whoever can fill the emptiness of his being, where there is nothing more to occupy it, will survive. He will overcome the cruelest torture: time without limit and without end. Pain keeps one occupied; the man who suffers sees himself in his torment.

Libris Polaris.

Jones, Bassett. Columbia University Library Collection. Notes.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

Collection of Bassett Jones at Columbia University Library. [MS CollLibris Polaris]. Bassett Jones was a collector and member of both Explorers and Grolier Clubs. He and Stefansson did a major exhibit of polar exploration literature in English at the Grolier Club in January 1932. In that year Jones was also Acting President of the Eplorers Club. He then lived at 1088 Park Avenue. Bartlett in the National Geographic says: “ We stopped for a couple of days at Nantucket, and there, through the generosity of Bassett Jones, electrical engineer in charge of the lighting at the New York World’s Fair, we acquired an otter trawl, which later enabled us to bring back a wealth of specimens from the floor of the ocean.”

The Three Voyages of Edmond Halley in the Paramore 1698-1701.

Halley, Edmond. Edited by Norman J. W. Thrower. (London: The Hakluyt Society, 1981). [Vol. II is a Portfolio of Maps].
  • Global Circumnavigations and Cape Horn Transits.
  • Maritime Reading
 Preview 

[Note]: Despite an unsuccessful first voyage, Halley retained the confidence of the Admiralty, and his second cruise from September 1699 to September 1700 was successful. He went south as far as 52° into the ice field north of the site of the modern Halley Bay Geophysical Observatory and was in considerable danger, as he was later from a storm off the coast of Africa. (ODNB). Though they were in iceberg infested waters with fogbound conditions, the journals indicate no unusual events.

The Real Story of the Whaler: Whaling, Past and Present.

Verrill, Alpheus Hyatt. New York: D. Appleton, 1916.
  • Whalemen's Reading
 Preview 

A general history of New Bedford and its whalers. The book is both a useful compendium of knowledge about New Bedford, and a sentimental threnody for its whalers and whalemen.

Books Afloat & Ashore: A History of Books, Libraries, and Reading Among Seamen During the Age of Sail.

Skallerup, Harry Robert. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1974.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

p. 4: In 1631, when Captain Thomas James fitted out his vessel in Bristol for a voyage in search of the Northwest Passage, he purchased ‘A Chest full of the best and choicest Mathematicall bookes that could be got for money in England; as likewise Master Hackluite and Master Purchase, and other books of Journals and Histories. [See C. Miller, ed. Voyages of Captain Luke Fox of Hull, Hakluyt Soc. London 1894, p. 265-67, 606 p.]

The Rescue of Greely.

Schley, Winfield Scott. By Commander W. Scott and Professor J. R. Soley. New York: Scribner’s, 1885.
  • 1881-84 International Physical Year US Expedition to Lady Franklin Bay (led by Adolphus Greely).
  • Arctic Reading: United States
 Preview 

The author sums up the expedition on p. 142 as follows:

Children of the Light: The Rise and Fall of New Bedford Whaling and the Death of the Arctic Fleet

Allen, Everett S. Boston: Little, Brown, 1973.
  • Whalemen's Reading
 Preview 

A somewhat elegiac tale of the decline of whaling and New Bedford, contrasted with descriptions of the life of the Inuit, before and after the coming of the whalers to the Beaufort Sea area. Main focus at the end is on the disastrous season at Pt. Barrow of the whaling fleet which abandoned over 25 ships, but managed to rescue over 1200 whalemen.

Narrative of the Adventures and Sufferings of John R. Jewitt: Only Survivor of the Crew of the Ship Boston, During a Captivity of Nearly Three Years among the Savages of Nootka Sound… .

Jewett, John R. New York: Printed for the Publisher [1840].
  • Whalemen's Reading
 Preview 

Jewett’s first voyage in 1803 involved some whaling and sealing in the Pacific Northwest, but it was a short time before the ship was captured by the Nootka people and most of the crew killed. Most of the book is devoted to his 28 months of captivity, and his analysis of the Nootka natives.

The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore.

Hutchinson, John Robert. (London: Eveleigh Nash, 1913).
  • Maritime Reading
 Preview 

p. 42-3, description of life of impressed seaman: With books he was for many years ‘very scantily supplied.’ It was not till 1812, indeed, that the Admiralty, shocked by the discovery that he had practically nothing to elevate his mind but daily association with the quarter-deck, began to pour into the fleet copious supplies of literature for his use. Thereafter the sailor could beguile his leisure with such books as the Old Chaplain’s Farewell Letter, Wilson’s Maxims, The Whole Duty of Man, Secker’s Duties of the Sick, and, lest returning health should dissipate the piety begotten of his ailments, Gibson’s Advice after Sickness. Thousands of pounds were spent upon this improving literature, which was distributed to the fleet in strict accordance with the amount of storage room available at the various dockyards. [Footnote: Ad. Accountant-General, Misc. (Various), No. 106—Accounts of the Rev. Archdeacon Owen, Chaplain-General to the Fleet, 1812-7.]

Voyages of a Modern Viking.

Hanssen, Helmer. London: George Routledge, 1936.
  • Antarctic Reading: General
 Preview 

For someone who participated in Amundsen’s three major expeditions, went to the South Pole with him in 1910, and was captain of Maud on the later Northeast Passage expedition, Hanssen sounds generally as boring as extreme weather reports, at least in this version. There is no indication of a translator, nor any indication that Hanssen and Amundsen may have had a falling out on the 1918-1920 Northeast Passage trip. So the Fram Museum suggests on its website, citing the journals of other participants as claiming Amundsen fired Hanssen because the designation of Hanssen as captain went to his head. If so, even that excitement is concealed in this book.