THE MENTOR
SERIAL NUMBER 37

THE CONQUEST OF THE POLES

BY
REAR ADMIRAL ROBERT E. PEARY
Discoverer of the North Pole

Ten years ago many, perhaps the majority, of intelligent people doubted if the Poles of the earth would ever be reached by man. From east to west, and west to east, the world seemed small. Jules Verne’s “Round the World in Eighty Days” dream of not so many years ago had been cut in two; but from north to south the world still stretched in apparently unattainable infinity.

Within the last four years the two Poles have been reached three times, and in their attainment the globe has shrunk to commonplace dimensions. With the attainment of the Poles the climax of polar discovery has been reached, the last of the splendid series of great world voyages and mighty adventures has been finished. But while the glamour, the mystery, the speculation, as to what exists at the ends of the earth are gone, the work of detailed explo­ra­tion, of continuous scientific observations and investigations, will continue until to the scientist and geographer the polar regions will be as well known as the more favored regions of the earth.

EARLY POLAR EXPLORATION

It is nearly four hundred years (1526) since the first recorded expedition went forth to seek the North Pole under the initiative of England.

Trade, the great prize of the commerce of the opulent East, land lust, and the spirit of adventure in turn played their part as incentives for the earlier expeditions. It seems to be generally accepted that nothing had a more powerful influence on the work than England’s determination to have a trade route of her own to the riches of the East, independent of the southern routes controlled by Spain and Portugal. It was this determination that made the terms Northeast Passage and Northwest Passage historic, and brought about years of search that, though latterly scientific, have been largely the acme of adventure and sentiment.

TRAVELING IN THE FAR NORTH

Dog sledges used by Peary on his expedition to the North Pole.

From the misty date of Pytheas (325 B.C.) down through the succeeding centuries, the record of polar explo­ra­tion contains much of interest, of mystery, of superstition, followed by some of the grandest epics, most heroic efforts and sacrifices, and somberest catastrophes and tragedies in all the wide field of explo­ra­tion. Briton and Scandinavian, Teuton and Latin, Slav and Magyar, and American, have entered the lists and struggled for the prize.

THE ROOSEVELT

Peary’s ship, in which he sailed to discover the North Pole.

In the earlier years of this long record occurred the strange voyages of the Zeni, and Eric the Red,