Polar Pathways: Robert E. Peary's Arctic Expeditions
The North Pole - Supporting Parties
A supporting party crossing a lead
"Supporting parties are essential to success because, a single party, comprising either a small or a large number of men and dogs, could not possibly drag (in gradually lessening quantities) all the way to the Pole and back (some nine hundred odd miles) as much food and liquid fuel as the men and dogs of that party would consume during the journey. It will be readily understood that when a large party of men and dogs starts out over the trackless ice to the polar sea, where there is no possibility of obtaining a single ounce of food on the way, after several days' marching, the provisions of one or more sledges will have been consumed by the men and dogs... Later on, still other divisions must be sent back for the same reason."- Robert E. Peary in The North Pole, published in 1910
"Team traveling on North Pole trip" by Donald B. MacMillan, 1909, Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum Collections
