Eivind Astrup explorer of North(1890-1895)

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Anatol
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Joined: Sun Apr 12, 2009 2:13 pm

Eivind Astrup explorer of North(1890-1895)

Post by Anatol » Thu Jan 12, 2017 9:52 pm

Eivind Astrup (1871-1895) could easily have become one of the pillars of Norwegian polar history - if not to say the polar history of the world. At nineteen years-old, he joined (with very poor English skills) Robert Peary's two expeditions to North Greenland, and it was primarily his meticulous observations and documentation that finally established Greenland as an island and not part of an Arctic continent as many had believed. In his lifetime, Astrup became as popular, if not more popular than Fritjof Nansen himself. For Roald Amundsen, Astrup was the great ideal of a successful polar explorer.
Astrup crafted sleds for the Peary expedition - copied from the nearby Inuit families - and taught Peary and the other explorers how to ski. His only book, With Peary Near the Pole , reveals a deep respect and understanding of the local Inuit culture. He was the first to combine dog sleds with skis - and thus laid the ground for the future success of both Nansen and Amundsen.
Once returned to Norway, Astrup planned great expeditions, combining native equipment such as sleds and reindeer clothing with modern tools like hot air balloons to conquer the poles. However, he was infected with typhoid fever, almost certainly obtained by eating rotten pemmican during the second Peary expedition, and became very ill. During Christmas weekend of 1895, he went for a ski trip in the mountains and never returned.
Although some newspapers soon speculated suicide, Astrup's death was covered up for many years. It was said that he fell and slipped on some ice and cracked his head on a rock. However, rumors of a gunshot soon grew in a nearby village, and that a fired gun had been taken from the death scene. Today Astrup's suicide is a fact, though the reasons are not fully understood. It is more likely that he could not cope with the fact that he was ill and never would be well enough to achieve his goals as a polar explorer.

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Source: http://thefanhitch.org/V15N1/V15,N1Astrup.html
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