Polar Pathways: Robert E. Peary's Arctic Expeditions

The North Pole - Inaction

 peary arctic macmillan camp dogs
A campsite where the teams and dogs rested

"During those five days I paced back and forth, deploring the luck which, when everything else was favorable—weather, ice, dogs, men, and equipment—should thus impede our way with open water...
"Only one who had been in a similar position could understand the gnawing torment of those days of forced inaction, as I paced the floe in front of the igloos most of the time, climbing every little while to the top of the ice pinnacle back of the igloos to strain my eyes through the dim light to the south, sleeping through a few hours out of each twenty-four, with one ear open for the slightest noise, rising repeatedly to listen more intently for the eagerly desired sound of incoming dogs—all this punctuated, in spite of my utmost efforts at self-control, with memories of the effect of the delay at the "Big Lead" on my prospects in the previous expedition. Altogether, I think that more of mental wear and tear was crowded into those days than into all the rest of the fifteen months we were absent from civilization."- Robert E. Peary in The North Pole, published in 1910

"Camp on sea ice - our tents" 1909, Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum Collections

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