Icebound in the Siberian Arctic: The Story of the Last Cruise of the Fur Schooner

Gleason, Robert J. Nanuk and the International Search for Famous Arctic Pilot Carl Ben Eielson . Anchorage, AK: Alaska Northwest Pub. Co., 1982.
  • 1928-29 Soviet Trading Voyage in Northwest Passage (aboard Nanuk).
  • Arctic Reading: Russia
 Preview 

The story of a fur trading vessel that wintered over at North Cape near the Bering Straits among Chukchi Eskimos, together with an account of the rescue attempt by air of Carl Ben Eielson, founder of Alaskan Airlines. In 1929, Eielson died alongside his mechanic Earl Borland in an air crash while attempting to evacuate furs and personnel from the Nanuk , then trapped at North Cape.

The Arctic Grail: The Quest for the North West Passage and the North Pole, 1818-1909

Berton, Pierre. New York, Viking, 1988. [Penguin Books ed., 1989].
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

The late Pierre Berton (d. 2016) was a Canadian writer on northern affairs combining a lyrical capacity to capture the history of the North with a critical sympathy and perhaps undue haste. Here he covers a century of exploration, ending in the middle of the “Heroic Age” with Peary’s last expedition.

In the Land of White Death: an Epic Story of Survival in the Siberian Arctic.

Albanov, Valerian. Preface by Jon Krakauer…. New York, Modern Library, 2000.
  • Arctic Reading: Russia
 Preview 

p. 17: I have already mentioned that there were no maps on board that were of any use to us, and that I had copied our only existing map out of Nansen’s book. Other than that volume and Kolchak’s The Ice of the Siberian Sea , we had no other relevant works. Although Lieutenant Brusilov had bought a small library for hundreds of rubles before our departure, it contained only novels, stories, and old journals—not a single book of any use to us except Nansen’s Farthest North . Nansen was our only guide, and provided everything we knew about Franz Josef Land…. Drawing all our knowledge from Nansen’s experiences, we treated his book like a precious treasure. I had reread it so often that I could cite entire passages from memory. [Albanov also mentions an English technical journal that had charts for the altitude of the sun and astronomy charts for the period (p. 18).]

A Voyage Around the World 1826-1829.

Litke, Frederic. Edited by Richard A. Pierce. Kingston, ONT: Limestone Press, 1987.
  • Arctic Reading: Russia
 Preview 

Trip on Seniavin to survey coast of Kamchatka, the Okhotsk Sea, and the Shantar Islands. Travels from Kronstadt to Portsmouth, Rio, Valparaiso, Sitka, & Kamchatka. Stop in Sitka to observe the Russian colonies there under the Russian-American Company in New Archangel. Baron Wrangell was governor and the fort itself had been rebuilt after being destroyed by the Americans.

A Narrative of Four Voyages, to the South Sea, North and South Pacific Ocean…and Antarctic Ocean. From the Year 1822 to 1831

Morrell, Benjamin, Jr. New-York: J. & J. Harper, 1832.
  • 1822-31 Four US Voyages to South and North Pacific Seas and Antarctica (Capt. Benjamin Morrell aboard Various Ships).
  • Arctic Reading: United States
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Morrell opens the work with a brief sketch of his own life, eldest son of a Stonington ship-builder, born in 1795 at Rye, NY. His merchant service seems to have taken him throughout the world.

Across the Top of Russia

Petrow, Richard. . New York: David McKay, 1967.
  • 1965 US Coast Guard Surveillance Voyage to Russia’s Kara Sea (aboard USCGC Windward).
  • Arctic Reading: United States
 Preview 

On the 1965 Coast Guard icebreaker, CGS Northwind, trip to the Kara Sea for scientific and spying purposes.

In the Heart of the Arctics.

Senn, Nicholas. Chicago, W. B. Conkey, 1907.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

This rather charming account of a voyage with Peary to Greenland in 1905 aboard Erik. Senn was a Professor of Surgery at the University of Chicago, and a veteran medic of the Spanish-American War.

To the Sixth Continent: The Second German South Polar Expedition.

Filchner, Wilhelm. Bluntisham, UK: Bluntisham Books, 1994.
  • 1911-13 Second German Antarctic Expedition (Filchner).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Filchner’s original plans mirrored Shackleton’s Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition a few years later, with two ships and men starting from both the Weddell Sea and the Ross Sea then meeting mid-way. Shackleton and Nordenskjöld helped him get a ship, the Deutschland, but he could get only one and went only to the Weddell Sea. He named the iceshelf after Kaiser Wilhelm II, but the Kaiser renamed it after Filchner. The ship was trapped in ice but was freed in the austral summer of 1912. The expedition is noted for its animosities, hostility not indicated in the passages here.

South with Shackleton.

Hussey, L. D. A. London: Sampson Low [1949].
  • 1914-16 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition (Shackleton on Endurance).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

A rather saccharine account of Endurance and Shackleton, with very little critical self-assessment. Nonetheless, it mainly conforms to most stories of the expedition.