Polar Pathways: Robert E. Peary's Arctic Expeditions
The North Pole - The Glacial Fringe
A difficult trek through a snow field
"When we dropped off the edge of the glacial fringe onto the pressure ridges of the tidal crack already described... the trail was a most trying one for men, dogs, and sledges, especially the old Eskimo type of sledge. The new "Peary" sledges, by reason of their length and shape, rode much more easily and with less strain than the others... As soon as we struck the old floes the going was much better... Still the surface over which we traveled was very uneven, and in many places was distinctly trying to the sledges, the wood of which was made brittle by the low temperature, now in the minus fifties. On the whole, however, I felt that if we encountered nothing worse than this in the first hundred miles from the land we should have no serious cause for complaint."- Robert E. Peary in The North Pole, published in 1910
"Working sledges over pressure ice" by Donald B. MacMillan, 1909, Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum Collections
