Chapter XXXVI: How a Geographic Society Prostituted Its Name 541 (17)

As a matter of fact, the National Geographic, like every other geographic society, had previously rated the merits of an explorer's work by his published reports. Their tactics were now changed to bring about a position where they might focus the controversy to Mr. Peary's and their advantage. There would have been no harm in this effort, if it had been honest; but, as we will see presently, falsehood and deception were evident in every move.

The position of the National Geographic Society is very generally misunderstood because of its pretentious use of the word "National." In reality, it is neither national nor geographic. It is a kind of self-admiration society, which serves the mission of a lecture bureau. It has no connection with the Government and has no geographic authority save that which it assumes. As a lecture bureau it had retained Mr. Peary to fill an important position as its principal star for many years. To keep him in the field as their head-line attraction they had paid $1,000 to Mr. Peary for the very venture now in question. This so-called "National" Geographic Society was, therefore, a stock owner in the venture upon which they passed as an unbiased jury.

Of course Mr. Peary consented to rest his case in their hands; but, for reasons above indicated and for others given below, I refused to have any dealings with such an unfair combination. The Government was appealed to, and every political and private wire was pulled to compel me to submit my case to a packed jury. During all the time when this was done, its moving spirits, Gilbert Grosvenor and Admiral Chester, were publicly and privately saying things about me and my attainment of the Pole that no gentleman would utter. That Mr. Peary was a member of this society; that his friends were absolute dictators of the power of appointment; that they were stock owners in Mr. Peary's enterprise--all of this, and a good many other facts, were carefully suppressed. To the public this society declared they were "neutral, unbiased and scientific"--no more deliberate lie than which was ever forced upon the public.

Of course I refused to place my case in dishonest pro-Peary hands. With shameless audacity this society helped Mr. Peary carry along his press campaign by disseminating the cowardly slurs of Grosvenor, Chester, and others. They watched and encouraged the McKinley bribery; they closed their eyes to the Kennan lies. Through Chester and others, they faked pages of sensational pseudo-scientific news, all with the one centered aim of forcing doubt on opposing interests before the crucial moment, when, behind closed doors, the matter could be settled to their liking.

Thus, when Peary, his club, and his affiliated boosters at Washington were carrying their press slanders to a focus, there came a loud cry from the National Geographic Society for proofs.

With some wrangling, and a good deal of protest from half-hearted men, like Professor Moore, a jury was appointed to pass upon Mr. Peary's claims and mine. My claims were to be passed upon against my will. Unbiased and real Arctic explorers like General Greely and Admiral Schley were carefully excluded from this jury. Instead, armchair geographers, who were closely related to the Peary interests, were appointed as a "neutral jury," as follows:

_Henry Gannett_, a close personal friend of Mr. Peary.

_C. M. Chester_, related to Mr. Peary's fur trader, a member of a coterie that divided the profits of fleecing the Eskimos.

_O. H. Tittman_, chief of a department under which part of Mr. Peary's work was done.

With a flourish of trumpets, including pages of self-boosting news distributed by Mr. Peary's press agents, this commission began its important investigation. At the time, it was said that all of Mr. Peary's original field papers and instruments were under careful scrutiny. Later it was shown that one of the jury saw only COPIES. On November 4, 1909, was issued the verdict of this jury: "That Commander Peary reached the North Pole on April 6, 1909."

This verdict, at its face value, was fair; but the circumstances which surrounded it before and after were such as to raise a doubt that can never be removed. With the verdict came the insinuation that no one else had reached the Pole before Peary; that my claim of priority was dishonest. A nagging press campaign continued to emanate from Washington.

I have no objection to Mr. Peary's friends endorsing him--a friend who will stretch a point is not to be condemned. But when such friends stoop to dishonorable methods to inflict injury upon others, then a protest is in order. My aim here is not to deny that Mr. Peary reached the Pole near enough for all practical purposes, but to show how men sacrificed their word of honor to boost Mr. Peary and to discredit me.

The verdict of this jury which was to settle the controversy for all time was sent out on wires that encircled the globe. Soon after there was a call for the data upon which that jury passed. The public called for it; the Government called for it; foreign geographical societies asked for it. No one was allowed to see the wonderful "proofs." Why?

Officially, that commission said that Mr. Peary's contract with a magazine prevented the publication of the "proofs." But every member of the commission was on the Government pay-roll. Why, may we ask, should a Government official be muzzled with a bid for commercial gain? This contract was held by Benjamin Hampton, of _Hampton's Magazine_. If Hampton's contract muzzled the Government officials, Mr. Hampton thought so little of the so-called "proofs" that he did not print them. For, in _Hampton's_ installment, with the eye-attracting title, "Peary Proofs Positive," the real data upon which the Peary case rests were eliminated. Why? In Mr. Peary's own book that material is again suppressed. Why? For the same reason that the jury was muzzled. _The material would not bear public scrutiny!_

The real difficulty is that, in the haste to floor rival claims, Mr. Peary and all his biased helpers fixed as the crucial test of Polar attainment an examination of field observations. Mr. Peary had his; he had refused to let Whitney bring part of mine from the North; and, therefore, he and his friends supposed that I was helpless, by assuming this false position. But when Mr. Peary's own material was examined, it was found that his position rested on a set of worthless observations--calculations of altitudes of the sun so low that it is questionable if the observation could have been made at all. So long as three men, behind closed doors, could be made to say "Yes, Peary reached the Pole," and so long as this verdict came with the authority of a Geographic Society and the seeming endorsement of national prestige, the false position could be impressed upon the pubic as a _bona-fide_ verdict. But, with publicity, the whole railroading game would be spoiled. These three men could be influenced. But there are a hundred thousand other men in the world whose lives depend upon their knowledge of just such observations as were here involved. They knew publicity would bring the attention of these men to the fact that Mr. Peary's polar claim rests upon the impossible observations of a sun at an altitude less than 7 deg. above the horizon. The three armchair geographers, seldom out of reach of dusty book-shelves, passed upon these worthless observations. Not one of one hundred thousand honest sextant experts would credit such an observation as that upon which Mr. Peary's case rests--not even in home regions, where for centuries tables for corrections have been gathered.

[29]A year later, at the Congressional investigation of the Naval Committee in Washington, Mr. Peary and two of his jurors admitted that in the much-heralded Peary proofs "there was no proof." Members of the Geographic Society acknowledged their "examination" of Peary's instruments was made in the Pennsylvania Station, when they opened Mr. Peary's trunk and casually looked over its contents. Therefore, Mr. Peary's claim for a second victory now rests upon his book.

In forcing the controversy, the press and the public have come to the conclusion that one or the other report must be discredited. This is an incorrect point of view. Each case must be judged upon its own merits. To prove my case, it is not necessary to disprove Peary's; nor, to prove Peary's, should it have been necessary to try to disprove mine.

Much has been said about my case resting in foreign hands. This came about in a natural way. It was not intended to convey the idea that my own countrymen were incompetent or dishonest. In the case of the National Geographic Society they have irretrievably prostituted their name; but the same is not true of other American authorities.

When I came to Copenhagen, the Danish Geographic Society gave me a first spontaneous hearing. The Copenhagen University honored me. It was, therefore, but proper that the Danes should be the first to pass upon the merits of my claim. While these arrangements were in progress, I met Professor Thorp, the Rector of the University of Copenhagen, at the American Legation. I did not know the purport of that meeting, nor of his detailed, careful questions; but on the 6th of September appeared an official statement in the press reports. In these it was stated that the meeting had been arranged to satisfy the University authorities as to whether the Pole had been reached. Among other things, Professor Thorp said:

"As there were certain questions of a special astronomical nature with which I myself was not sufficiently acquainted, I called in our greatest astronomical scientist, Professor Stromgren, who put an exhaustive series of mathematical, technical and natural scientific questions to Dr. Cook, based particularly on those of his contentions on which some doubts had been cast.

"Dr. Cook answered all to our full satisfaction. He showed no nervousness or excitement at any time. I dare say, therefore, that there is no justification for anybody to throw the slightest doubt on his claim to have reached the Pole and the means by which he did it. Professor Stromgren and I are entirely satisfied with the evidence."

I have always maintained that the proof of an explorer's doings was not to be found in a few disconnected figures, but in the continuity of his final book which presents his case. To this end I prepared a report, accompanied by the important part of the original field notes and a complete set of reduced observations. These were submitted to the University of Copenhagen in December of 1909. The verdict on this was that in such material there was no absolute proof of the attainment of the Pole.

The Peary press agents were in Copenhagen, and sent this news out so as to convey the idea that Copenhagen had denounced me; that, in their opinion, the Pole had not been reached as claimed, and that I had hoaxed the world for sordid gain; all of which was untrue. But the press flaunted my name in big headlines as a faker.

"In the Cook data there is no proof," they repeated as the verdict of Copenhagen.

A year later Mr. Peary and his jurors confessed unwillingly in Congress that in the Peary data there was no proof.

This was reported in the official Congressional pamphlets, but, so far as I know, not a single newspaper displayed the news. The two cases, therefore, so far as verdicts go, are parallel.

Wearied of the whole problem of undesirable publicity; mentally and physically exhausted; disgusted with the detestable and slanderous campaign, which, for Mr. Peary, the press forced unremittingly, I decided to go away for a year, to rest and recuperate. This could not be done if I took the press into my confidence; and, therefore, I quietly departed from New York, to be joined by my family later. Out of the public eye, life, for me, assumed a new interest. In the meantime, the public agitation was stilled. Time gave a better perspective to the case; Mr. Peary got that for which his hand had reached. He was made a Rear-Admiral, with a pension of $6,000 under retirement.

By the time I had resolved my case, I received through my brother, William L. Cook, of Brooklyn, and my London solicitor, various offers from newspapers and magazines for any statement I desired to make. Because I had gone away quietly and remained in seclusion, the newspapers had inflamed the public with an abnormal curiosity in my so-called mysterious disappearance. This fact imparted a great sensational value to any news of my public reappearance or to any statement which I might make. Eager to secure a "beat," newspapers were offering my brother as high as one thousand dollars merely for my address. The New York newspaper which had led the attack against me sent an offer, through my London solicitor, of any figure which I might make for my first exclusive statement to the public. One magazine offered me ten thousand dollars for a series of articles.

While in London I received a message from Mr. T. Everett Harry, of _Hampton's Magazine_, concerning the publication of a series of articles explaining my case. Mr. Harry came to London and talked over plans for these. The opportunity of addressing the same public, through the same medium, as Mr. Peary had in his serial story, strongly influenced me--in fact, so strongly that, while I had a standing offer of ten thousand dollars, I finally gave my articles to _Hampton's_ for little more than four thousand dollars.

In order that _Hampton's Magazine_ might benefit by the publicity attaching to my first statement, and in response to the editor's request, I came quietly to the United States with Mr. Harry, by way of Canada, to consult with the editor before making final arrangements. Mr. Harry and I had agreed upon the outline for the articles. They were to be a series of heart-to-heart talks, embodying the psychological phases of the Polar controversy and my own actions. In these I determined fully to state my case, explain the ungracious controversy, and analyze the impossibility of mathematically ascertaining the Pole or of proving such a claim by figures. The articles that eventually appeared in _Hampton's_, with the exception of unauthorized editorial changes and excisions of vitally important matter concerning Mr. Peary, were practically the same as planned in London.

Coming down from Quebec, I stopped in Troy, New York, to await Mr. Hampton, who was to come from New York. While there, a sub-editor, with all a newspaper man's sensational instincts, came to see me. He communicated, it seems, a brilliant scheme for a series of articles. As he outlined it, I was to go secretly to New York, submit myself to several employed alienists who should pronounce me insane, whereupon I was to write several articles in which I should admit having arrived at the conclusion that I reached the Pole while mentally unbalanced! This admission was to be supported by the alienists' purchased report! This plan, I was told, would "put me right" and make a great sensational story!

When I was told of this I felt staggered. Did people--could they--deem me such a hoax that, in order to obtain an unwarranted sympathy, or to make money, I should be willing to admit to such a shameful, mad, atrocious and despicable lie? I said nothing when the suggestion was made. At heart, I felt achingly hurt. I felt that this newspaper man, not hesitating at deceiving the public in order to get a sensation, regarded me as a scoundrel. I was learning, too, as I had throughout the heart-bitter controversy, the duplicity of human nature.

After a talk with Mr. Hampton, who finally arrived, and who, I am glad to say, had no such suggestion himself to offer, I got to work on my articles after the general plan spoken of in London. These were written at the Palatine Hotel, in Newburgh. The articles finished, I returned to London to settle certain business matter prior to my public return to America by Christmas.

Imagine my amazed indignation when, shortly before sailing, the cables brought the untrue news, "Dr. Cook Confesses." Imagine my heart-aching dismay when, on reaching the shores of my native country, I found the magazine which was running the articles in which I hoped to explain myself, had blazoned the sensation-provoking lie over its cover--"Dr. Cook's Confession."

I had made no confession. I had made the admission that I was uncertain as to having reached the exact mathematical Pole. That same admission Mr. Peary would have to make had he been pinned down. He did make this admission, in fact, while his own articles, a year before, were being prepared, in the _Hampton's_ office.

In order to advertise itself, the magazine employed the trick of construing a mere admission of uncertainty as to the exact pin-point attainment of the Pole as a "confession." To the public I had apparently authorized this. The misrepresentation hurt me, and for a time placed me in an unhappy dilemma.

Before the appearance of the January _Hampton's_, in which the first instalment of my articles appeared, a series of press stories supposedly based upon my forthcoming articles were prepared and sent out by the sub-editor who had suggested the insanity plan. These were prepared during the absence of Mr. Harry in Atlantic City. By picking garbled extracts from my articles about the impossibility of a pin-point determination of the Pole, and the crazy mirage-effects of the Arctic world, these news-stories were construed to the effect that I admitted I did not know whether I had been at the North Pole or whether I had not been at the North Pole, and also that I admitted to a plea of insanity. These stories were printed on the first pages of hundreds of newspaper all over the country, under scareheads of "Dr. Cook Admits Fake!" and "Dr. Cook Makes Plea of Insanity!"

In these reports, written by the sub-editor, he gave himself credit for the "discovery" of Dr. Cook and the securing of his articles for _Hampton's_. This claim for the magazine "beat" was as dishonest as his handling of the press matter for _Hampton's_. My dealings with the magazine were entirely through Mr. Harry, whose frankness and fair-dealing early disposed me to give my story to the publication he represented.

The widespread dissemination of the untrue and cruelly unfair "confession" and "insanity-plea" stories dazed me. I felt impotent, crushed. In my very effort to explain myself I was being irretrievably hurt. I was being made a catspaw for magazine and newspaper sensation.

But misrepresentations do not make history. The American people cannot always be hoodwinked. The reading public soon realized that my story was no more a confession than the "Peary Proof Positive" instalment in Hampton's had been the embodiment of any real Polar proofs.

Finding that it was impossible, in magazines and newspapers, to tell the full truth; finding that what I did say was garbled and distorted, I concluded to reserve the detailed facts for this book. There were truths about Mr. Peary which, I suppose, no paper would have dared to print. I have told them here. There were truths about myself which, because they explain me, the papers, preferring to attack me, would not have printed. I have told them here.

I climbed Mt. McKinley, by my own efforts, without assistance; I reached the Pole, save for my Eskimos, alone. I had spent no one's money, lost no lives. I claimed my victory honestly; and as a man believing in himself and his personal rights, at a time when I was nervously unstrung and viciously attacked, I went away to rest, rather than deal in dirty defamation, alone. At a time when the tables seemed turned, when the wolves of the press were desirous of rending me, I came back to my country--alone.

I have now made my fight; I have been compelled to extreme measures of truth-telling that are abhorrent to me. I have done this because, otherwise, people would not understand the facts of the Polar controversy or why I, reluctant, remained silent so long. I have done this single-handedly. I have confidence in my people; more than that, I have implicit and indomitable confidence in--Truth.

RETROSPECT

Returning from the North, in September, 1909, while being honored in Copenhagen for my success in reaching the North Pole, there came, by wireless from Labrador, messages from Robert E. Peary, claiming the attainment exclusively as his own, and declaring that in my assertion I was, in his vernacular, offering the world a "gold brick."

On April 21, 1908, I had reached a spot which I ascertained, with as scientific accuracy as possible, to be the top of the axis around which the world spins--the North Pole.

On April 6, 1909, a year later, Mr. Peary claimed to have reached the same spot.

To substantiate his charge of fraud, Peary declared that my Eskimo companions had said I had been only two sleeps from land. Why, he further asked, had I not taken reputable witnesses with me on such a trip?

I had taken, on my final dash, two expert Eskimos. Mr. Peary had four Eskimos and a negro body servant.

Before launching further charges, Mr. Peary delayed his ship, the _Roosevelt_, at Battle Harbor, on the pretext of cleaning it, that he might digest my New York _Herald_ story, compare it with his own, and fabricate his broadside of abuse. There he was in constant communication with the New York _Times_, General Thomas Hubbard--president of the Peary Arctic Club and financial sponsor of the "trust"--and Herbert L. Bridgman. The _Times_, eager to "beat" the _Herald_, was desirous of descrediting me and launching Peary's as the _bona-fide_ North Pole discovery story. General Hubbard, Mr. Bridgman, and the "trust" were eager for a publicity and acclaim greater than that which might attach to any honorable second victor. Dishonor and perjury, to secure first honors, were not even to be weighed in the balance.

When I arrived in New York, I was confronted by a series of technical questions, designed to baffle me. These questions, I learned, had been sent to the _Times_ by Mr. Peary with instructions that the _Times_ "get after" me.

I answered these questions. I had answered them in Europe. Mr. Peary, when he arrived at Sydney, and afterward, refused to answer any questions. He continued simply to attack me, to make insinuations aspersing my honesty, playing the secret back-hand game of defamation conducted by his friends of his Arctic Club.

Why had I not, on my return from my Polar trip, told anyone of the achievement, Mr. Peary asked in an interview, aiming to show that my Polar attainment was an afterthought.

On my return to Etah I had told Harry Whitney and Pritchard. They, in turn, told Captain Bob Bartlett. Captain Bartlett, as well as the Eskimos, in turn told Peary at Etah that I claimed to have reached the Pole. At the very moment when this charge was made, Peary had in his pocket Captain Adams' letter which gave the same information. Why did Mr. Peary suppress this information, convicting himself of insinuating an untruth from three different sources to challenge my claim. Returning from the North with the negro, Henson, and Eskimos, Mr. Peary himself had not told his own companions on the _Roosevelt_ of his own success. Why was this?

In a portentous statement Mr. Peary and his party declared my Eskimos said I had not been more than two sleeps from land.

I had instructed my companions not to tell Peary of my achievement. He had stolen my supplies. I felt him unworthy of the confidence of a brother explorer. I had encouraged the delusion of E-tuk-i-shook and Ah-we-lah that almost daily mirages and low-lying clouds were signs of land, so as to prevent the native panic and desertion on the circumpolar sea. They had possibly told this to Peary in all honesty; but other natives also told him that we had reached the "Big Nail."

Why was the news to Mr. Peary's liking given, while that which he did not like was ignored?

Not long ago, Matthew Henson, interviewed in the south, was quoted as saying that Peary did not get to the Pole. In another interview he said that Peary, like a tenderfoot, rode in a fur-cushioned sledge until they got to a place which was "far enough." I still prefer to believe Peary rather than Henson. Peary's Eskimo companions of a former trip positively deny Peary's claimed discovery of Crocker Land. I still prefer to believe that Crocker Land does deserve a place on the map. Peary's last Eskimo companions say that he did not reach the Pole. But I prefer to credit his claim. Mr. Peary's spirit has never been that of fairness to others when a claim impinges upon his own. He has always adopted the tactics of the claim-jumper.

In a like manner, and with similar intent, Mr. Peary had attacked many explorers before me. To prevent his companions from profiting by their own work, members of each expedition were forced to sign contracts that barred press interviews, eliminated cameras, prohibited lecturing or writing, or even trading for trophies. To insure Mr. Peary all the honor, his men were made slaves to his cause.

In a quarrel which resulted from these impossible conditions, Eivind Astrup was assailed. Broken-hearted, he committed suicide. Captain Otto Sverdrup was made to feel the sting of the same grasping spirit. General A. W. Greely has been unjustly attacked. All of this detestable selfishness culminated in the treatment of Captain Bob Bartlett. When the Pole, to Peary, seemed within reach, and the glory of victory was within grasp, the ever-faithful Bartlett was turned back and his place was taken by a negro, that Peary might be, to quote his own words, "the only white man at the Pole."

When, on my return to New York, I found myself attacked by a man of this caliber, I decided that the public, without any counter-defamation on my part, would read him aright and see through the unscrupulous and dishonest campaign. So I remained silent.

Coming down to Portland from Sydney, where he had landed, Mr. Peary gave out an interview insinuating that I had had no instruments with which to take observations. "Would Dr. Cook," he asked, "if he had had instruments, have left them in the hands of a stranger (Harry Whitney), when upon these depended his fame or his dishonor?"

On his return to this country, Mr. Whitney corroborated my statement of leaving my instruments with him. Mr. Peary's own captain, who had cross-questioned my Eskimos for Mr. Peary, later stated to two magazine editors that my companions had described to him the instruments I had had. Is it reasonable to suppose that Mr. Peary did not know of this? I know that he knew. If he is an honest man, why did he stoop to this dishonesty? Even if he believed me to be dishonest, dishonest methods only placed him in the class of the one he attacked as dishonest.

By using the same underhand methods, as when he got the New York _Times_ to cross-question me for himself, Peary now got his friends of the Geographic Society, who had boosted him, to call for "proofs." Such proofs, it appeared, should always be presented before public honors were accepted or the returns of a lecture tour considered. But Peary had engaged in exploration for twenty years, and had always given lectures at once, without ever offering proofs. I was asked to cancel lecture engagements and furnish what Peary knew neither he nor anybody else could furnish offhand. For the proof of an explorer's doings is his final book, which requires months and years to prepare.

With much blaring of trumpets, the Peary "proofs" were submitted to his friends of the National Geographic Society. With but a casual examination of copies of data, claimed at the time to be original field notes, with no explanation of the wonderful instruments upon which it had been earlier claimed Polar honors rested, an immediate and favorable verdict was rendered.

A huge picture was published, showing learned, bewhiskered gentlemen examining the Peary "proofs," and reaching their verdict. Mr. Peary's case for a rediscovery of the Pole was won--for the time. The public were deceived into believing that positive proofs had been presented; that the society, acting as a competent and neutral jury, was honest. Later it was shown that its members were financially interested in Mr. Peary's expedition, and still later it was admitted that the Peary proofs contained no proof. All of this later development has had no publicity.

In the meantime, I was attacked for delay. My data was finally sent to the University of Copenhagen. A verdict of "Unproven" was rendered.

Thereupon, Mr. Peary and his friends at once shouted "Fraud!" The press parrot-like re-echoed that shout. With this unfair insinuation there came to me the biting sting of a burning electric shock as the wires quivered all around the world. At the Congressional investigation, a year later, the Peary data was shown to be useless as proof. It was a verdict precisely like that of Copenhagen on mine, but the press did not print it. Did the Peary interests have any control over the American press or its sources of news distribution?

After the call for "proof" came charges, from members of the Peary cabal, that I was unable to take observations. Mr. Peary was so much better equipped than I to do so! Moreover, he had had the able scientific assistance of Bartlett and--the negro.

When I was at the Pole the sun was 12 deg. above the horizon. At the time Peary claims he was there it was less than 7 deg.. Difficult as it is to take observations at 12 deg., because of refracted light, any accurate observation at 7 deg. is impossible. It is indeed, questionable if an observation could be made at all at the time when Peary claims to have been at the Pole.

Finding that, despite all charges, the public believed in me, Mr. Peary, through his cooeperators, attempted to discredit my veracity. An affidavit, which was bought, as I have evidence to prove, was made by Barrill to the effect that I had not climbed Mt. McKinley. The getting of this affidavit is placed at the door of Mr. Peary.

Do honest men, with honest intentions, buy perjured documents?

Do honest men, believing in themselves, besmirch their own honor by deliberate lying?

Dunkle and Loose came to me, offered to look over the observations in my _Herald_ story, and--suddenly--to my amazement--offered a set of faked observations, manufactured at the instigation of someone. I refused the batch of faked papers, and turned the two nefarious conspirators out of my hotel.

A comparison of my Copenhagen report with the Dunkle perjured story, later printed in the New York _Times_, proves I used not one of their figures. Mr. R. J. McLouglin later proved that the hand which signed "Dunkle" also signed "Loose" to that lying document. It is, therefore, not only a perjury, but a forgery.

Recently, Professor J. H. Gore, a member of the National Geographic Society, and one of Peary's friends, acknowledged to Evelyn B. Baldwin that he had in his possession the faked observations which were made by Dunkle and Loose.

How did he come by them? Why does he have them? What were the relations between Dunkle and Loose, Peary's friends, the New York _Times_, and the National Geographic Society? Do honest men, with honest intentions, conspire with men of this sort, men who offered to sell me faked figures--most likely to betray me had I been dishonest enough to buy them--and who, failing, perjured themselves?

Disgusted, I decided to let my enemies exhaust their abuse. I knew it eventually would rebound. Determined to retire to rest, to resolve my case in quietude and secrecy, I left America. My enemies gleefully proclaimed this an admission of imposture.

Yet, after they had turned almost every newspaper in the country against me, having rested, having resolved my case, having secured damaging proofs of the facts of the conspiracy against me, I returned to America.

Realizing my error in so long remaining silent; realizing the power of a sensation-seeking press, which has no respect for individuals or of truth, I determined, painful as would be the task, to tell the unpleasant, distasteful truth about the man who tried to besmirch my name. This may seem unkind. But I was kind too long. Truth is often unpleasant, but it is less malicious than the sort of lies hurled at me.

After I had left America, the newspapers, desirous of sensation, had played into the hands of those who, with seeming triumph, assailed me. But meanwhile, however, I was taking advantage of the opportunity to rest and gain an accurate perspective of the situation. I thought out my case, considered it pro and con, puzzled out the reasons for, and the source of, the newspaper clamor against me. Through friends in America who worked quietly and effectively, I secured evidence, which is embodied in affidavits, which laid bare the methods employed to discredit me in the Mt. McKinley affair. I learned of the methods used, and just what charges were made, to discredit my Polar claim. Damaging admissions were secured concerning Mr. Peary's fabricated attacks from the mouths of Mr. Peary's own associates. Knowing these facts, at the proper time, I returned to my native country to confront my enemies. I have proceeded in detail to state my case and reveal the hitherto unknown inside facts of the entire Polar controversy. I have stated certain facts before the public. Neither Mr. Peary nor his friends have replied. One point in the Polar controversy has never reached the public. Both Mr. Peary and many of his friends asserted that I left the country just in time to escape criminal prosecution. They said the charge was to be that I had obtained money on a false pretence by accepting fees for lecturing on my discovery. I returned to America. I have been lecturing for fees on my discovery since; I have not yet been prosecuted.

Were Mr. Peary not the sort of man who would stoop to dishonor, to discredit a rival in order to gain an unfair advantage for himself, were he not guilty of the gross injustice I have stated, he would have had all the opportunity in the world for effectively coming back at me. But he has remained silent. Why?

I have, as I have said, absolute confidence in the good sense, spirit of fair-play, and ability of reasoning judgment of my people. My case rests, not with any body of armchair explorers or kitchen geographers, but with Arctic travelers who can see beyond the mist of selfish interests, and with my fellow-countrymen, who breathe normal air and view without bias the large open fields of honest human endeavor.

In this book I have stated my case, presented my proofs. As to the relative merits of my claim, and Mr. Peary's, place the two records side by side. Compare them. I shall be satisfied with your decision.

FREDERICK A. COOK.

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Accused of being the most colossal liar of history, I sometimes feel that more lies have been told about me than about anyone ever born. I have been guilty of many mistakes. Most men really true to themselves admit that. My claim to the North Pole may always be questioned. Yet, when I regard the lies great and small attached to me, I am filled almost with indifference.

As a popular illustration of the sort of yarns that were told, let me refer to the foolish fake of the gum drops. Someone started the story that I expected to reach the Pole by bribing the Eskimos with gum drops--perhaps the idea was that I was to lure them on from point to point with regularly issued rations of these confections.

Wherever I went on my lecture tour after my return to the United States, much to my irritation I saw "Cook" gum drops conspicuously displayed in confectionery store windows. Hundreds of pounds of gum drops were sent to my hotel with the compliments of the manufacturers. On all sides I heard the gum-drop story, and in almost every paper read the reiterated tale of leading the Eskimos to the Pole by dangling a gum drop on a string before them. I never denied this, as I never denied any of the fakes printed about me. The fact is, that I never heard the gum-drop yarn until I came to New York. We took no gum drops with us on our Polar trip, and, to my knowledge, no Eskimo ate a gum drop while with me.

[2] Among the many things which the public has been misled into believing is that Mr. Bradley and I together connived the trip for the purpose of essaying this quest of the Pole. The fact is, not until I reached Annoatok, and saw that conditions were favorable for a long sledge journey, did I finally determine to make a Poleward trip; not until then did I tell my decision definitely to Mr. Bradley.

One of the big mistakes which has been pounded into the public mind is that the proposed Polar exploit was expensively financed. It did cost a great deal to finance the planned hunting trip. Mr. Bradley's expenses aggregated, perhaps, $50,000, but my journey Northward, which was but an extension of this yachting cruise, cost comparatively little.

[3] The killing of Astrup.--The head of Melville Bay was explored by Eivind Astrup while a member of the Peary expedition of 1894-1895. Astrup had been a member of the first expedition, serving without pay, during 1891 and 1892 and proving himself a loyal supporter and helper of Mr. Peary, when he crossed the inland ice in 1892. As a result of eating pemmican twenty years old, in 1895, Astrup was disabled by poisoning, due to Peary's carelessness in furnishing poisoned food. Recovering from this illness, he selected a trustworthy Eskimo companion, went south, and under almost inconceivable difficulties, explored and mapped the ice walls, with their glaciers and mountains, and the off-lying islands of Melville Bay. This proved a creditable piece of work of genuine discovery. Returning, he prepared his data and published it, thus bringing credit and honor on an expedition which was in other respects a failure.

Astrup's publication of this work aroused Peary's envy. Publicly, Peary denounced Astrup. Astrup, being young and sensitive, brooded over this injustice and ingratitude until he had almost lost his reason. The abuse was of the same nature as that heaped on others, the same as that finally hurled at me in the wireless "Gold Brick" slurs. For days and weeks, Astrup talked of nothing but the infamy of Peary's attack on himself and the contemptible charge of desertion which Peary made against Astrup's companions. Then he suddenly left my home, returned to Norway, and we next heard of his suicide. Here is one life directly chargeable to Peary's narrow and intolerant brutality. Directly this was not murder with a knife--but it was as heinous--for a young and noble life was cut short by the cowardly dictates of jealous egotism.

[4] The Death of John M. Verhoeff.--As we passed Robertson Bay, there came up memories of the tragedy of Verhoeff. This young man was a member of Peary's first expedition, in 1891. He had paid $2,000 toward the fund of the expedition. Verhoeff was young and enthusiastic. He gave his time, his money, and he risked his life for Peary. He was treated with about the same consideration as that accorded the Eskimo dogs. When I last saw him in camp, he was in tears, telling of Peary's injustice. Mrs. Peary--I advert to this with all possible reluctance--had done much to make his life bitter, and over this he talked for days. Finally he said: "I will never go home in the same ship with that man and that woman." It was the last sentence he uttered in my hearing. He did not go home in that ship. Instead, he wandered off over the glacier, where he left his body in the blue depths of a crevasse.

[5] Before he sailed on his last Northern expedition Mr. Peary, learning that I had preceded him, took the initial step in his campaign to discredit me by issuing a statement to the effect that I was bent upon the unfair and dishonest purpose of enlisting in my aid Eskimos which he had the exclusive right to command. Mr. Peary's attitude that the Eskimos, because he had given them guns, powder and needles, belong to him, is as absurd as his pretension to the sole ownership of the North Pole. Although Mr. Peary had spent about a quarter of a century essaying the task by means of luxurious expeditions, he had done little more than other explorers and did not, in my opinion, either secure an option on the Pole or upon the services of the natives. In giving guns, etc., to the natives he also did no more than other explorers, and the Danes for many years, have done. Nor was this with him a magnanimous matter of gracious bounty, for, in prodigal return for all he gave them, Mr. Peary on every expedition secured a fortune in furs and ivory. The Eskimos belong to no one. For ages they have worked out their rigorous existence without the aid of white men, and Mr. Peary's pretension becomes not only absurd but grotesque when one realizes that following the arrival of ships with white crews, the natives have fallen easy victims of loathsome epidemics, mostly of a specific nature, for which the trivial gifts of any explorer would ill repay them.

[6] One of the charges which Mr. Peary circulated before he returned North in 1908, was, that I violated a rule of Polar ethics by not applying for a license to seek the Pole, nor giving notice of my proposed trip. There is no such rule in Polar ethics. The following letter, however, to his press agent, Mr. Herbert Bridgman, dated Etah, August 26, 1907, answers the charge:

"My dear Bridgman: I have hit upon a new route to the North Pole and will stay to try it. By way of Buchanan Bay and Ellesmere Land and northward through Nansen Strait over the Polar sea seems to me to be a very good route. There will be game to the 82 deg., and here are natives and dogs for the task. So here is for the Pole. Mr. Bradley will tell you the rest. Kind regards to all--F. A. Cook."

"It will be remembered," continued Mr. Bridgman, in his press reports, "that Dr. Cook, accompanied by John R. Bradley, Captain Moses Bartlett, and a number of Eskimos, left North Sidney, N. S., early last July on the American Auxiliary Schooner Yacht _John R. Bradley_, which landed the party at Smith Sound. Mr. Bradley returned to North Sydney on the yacht on October 1. _The expedition is provisioned for two years and fully equipped with dogs and sledges for the trip. The party is wintering thirty miles further north than Peary did two years ago._"

And yet Bridgman, in line with the indefatigable pro-Peary boosters, later tried to lead the public to believe that I had nothing but gum drops with which to undertake a trip to the Pole. This same Bridgman also printed in what Brooklyn people call the "Standard Liar" the fake about my using, as my own, photographs said to belong to the newspaper cub, Herbert Berri.

For fifteen years Bridgman used my photographs and my material for his lectures on the Arctic and Antarctic, generally without giving credit. Evidently, my work and my results were good enough for him to borrow as Peary did. So long as my usefulness served the Bridgman-Peary interests, there was no question of my credibility, but when my success interfered with the monopoly of the fruits of Polar attainment, then I was to be striped with dark lines of dishonor.

The most amusing and also the most significant incident of the Bridgman-Peary humbug was the faked wireless message which Bridgman printed for Peary in his paper. Peary claims he reached the Pole on April 6, 1909. In the Standard Union, Brooklyn, of April 14, 1909 (eight days after the alleged discovery), Peary's friend H. L. Bridgman, one of the owners, printed the following:

"PEARY DUE NORTH POLE TWELVE M., THURSDAY"

(APRIL 15, 1909).

Is Mr. Bridgman a psychic medium? How, with Peary thousands of miles away, hundreds of miles from the most northerly wireless station, did he sense the amazing feat? Were he and Peary in telepathic communication? Or, rather, does this not seem to point to an agreement entered into before the departure of Peary, about a year before the attempt was made, to announce on a certain day the "discovery" of the Pole?

From other sources we learn that the timing of the arrival of the ship at Cape Sheridan seems to have been made good, but in an apparent effort on the part of Peary to keep faith with Bridgman on April 15, we find him in trouble. If Peary arranged his "discovery" for this agreed date, he would have had to take nine days for his return trip from the Pole. This would increase his speed limit 50 per cent., and since he is regarded with suspicion on his speed limits, to make his "Pole Discovery" story fit in between the known time when he left Bartlett and the time when he got back to the ship, he was compelled to break faith with Bridgman and went back nine days on his calendar, placing the date of Pole reaching at April 6.

[7] _Game List._--The following animals were captured from August 15, 1907, to May 15, 1909:

Two thousand four hundred and twenty-two birds, 311 Arctic hares, 320 blue and white foxes, 32 Greenland reindeer, 4 white reindeer, 22 polar bears, 52 seals, 73 walrus, 21 narwhals, 3 white whales, and 206 musk oxen.

[8] Auroras in the Arctic are best seen in more southern latitudes. The display here described was the brightest observed on this trip. Not more than three or four others were noted during the following year, but in previous trips I have witnessed some very wonderful color and motion displays.

The best illustrations of this remarkable color of aurora and night come from the brush of Mr. Frank Wilbert Stokes. These were reproduced in the _Century Magazine_ of February, 1903. After their appearance, Mr. Peary accorded to Mr. Stokes (a member of his expedition) the same sort of treatment as he had accorded Astrup--the same as that shown to others. In a letter to the late Richard Watson Gilder, editor of the _Century_, he denounced and did his utmost to discredit Mr. Stokes by insisting that no such remarkable colors are displayed by the aurora borealis. Mr. Gilder replied, in defense of Mr. Stokes, by quoting from Peary's own book, "Northward," Vol. II, pages 194, 195, 198 and 199, descriptions of even more remarkable color effects.

[9] The so-called "Jesup" sled, which Mr. Peary used on his last Polar trip, is a copy of the Eskimo sledge, a lumbering, unwieldy thing weighing over one hundred pounds and which bears the same relation to a refined bent-hickory vehicle that a lumber cart does to an express wagon. In this "Jesup" sledge there is a dead weight of over fifty pounds of useless wood. The needless weight thus carried can, in a better sledge, be replaced by fifty pounds of food. This fifty pounds will feed one man over the entire route to the Pole. Mr. Peary claims that the Pole is not reachable without this sled, but Borup, in his book, reports that most of the sledges were broken at the first trial.

Since an explorer's success is dependent upon his ability to transport food it behooves him to eliminate useless weight. Therefore, the solid runner sled is as much out of place as a solid wood wheel would be in an automobile.

[10] A great deal of careful search and study was prosecuted about Svartevoeg, for here Peary claims to have left a cache, the alleged placing of which he has used as a pretext for attempting to take from the map the name of Svartevoeg, given by Sverdrup, when he discovered it, to the northern part of Heiberg Land. Peary, coming later, put on his map the name Cape Thomas Hubbard, for one who had put easy money in his hands. But no such cache was found, and I doubt very much if Peary ever reached this point, except through a field-glass at very long range.

[11] On their return to Etah, and after I had left for Upernavik, my Eskimos, questioned by Mr. Peary, who was anxious to secure anything that might serve towards discrediting me, answered innocently that they had been only a few sleeps from land. This unwilling and naive admission was published in a pretentious statement, the purpose of which was to cast doubt on my claim. Other answers of my Eskimos, to the effect that I had instruments and had made constant observations, it is curious to note, were suppressed by Mr. Peary and his party on their return. Every insinuation was made to the effect that I had had no instruments, had consequently taken no observations, and had, therefore, no means of ascertaining the Pole even had I wished to do so.

[12] My enemies credit me with a journey of two thousand miles, which is double Peary's greatest distance; but then, to deny my Polar attainment, they keep me sitting here, on a sterile waste of ice, for three months. Would any man sit down there and shiver in idleness, when the reachable glory of Polar victory was on one side and the get-at-able gastronomic joy of game land on the other? Only a crazy man would do that, and we were too busy to lose our mental balance at that time. When leg-force controls human destiny, and a half-filled stomach clears the brain for action, for a long time, at least, insanity is very remote. Furthermore, the Eskimo boys said we traveled on the ice-pack for seven moons, and that we reached a place where the sun does not dip at night; where the day and night shadows were of equal length. Has Mr. Peary reached that point? If so, neither he nor his Eskimos have noted it.

[13] After my return to Copenhagen I was widely quoted as declaring that I had discovered and traversed 30,000 square miles of new land. What I did report was that in my journey I had passed through an area wherein it was possible to declare 30,000 square miles--a terrestrial unknown of water and ice--cleared from the blank of our charts. I have been quoted as describing this land as "a paradise for hunters" and criticised on the ground that animal life does not exist so far north. Whether animal life existed there, I do not know, for the impetus of my quest left no time to investigate. I passed the last game at Heiberg Land.

In my diary of the day's doings, only the results of observations were written down. The detail calculations were made on loose sheets of paper and in other note books--wherein was recorded all instrumental data. Later all my observations were reduced in the form in which they were to be finally presented. Therefore, these field papers with their miscellaneous notes had served their purpose, as had the instruments; and for this reason most of the material was left with Harry Whitney. A few of the important calculations were kept more as a curiosity. These will be presented as we go along. Those left I thought might later be useful for a re-examination of the results; but it never occurred to me that Whitney would be forced to bury the material, as he was by Peary. I do not regard those buried notes as being proof or as being particularly valuable, except as proving Peary to be one of the most ungracious and selfish characters in history.

In the subsequent excitement, because Peary cried fraud on the very papers which he had buried for me, an agitated group of American armchair explorers came to the conclusion against the dictates of history that the proof of the Polar quest was to be found in the re-examination of the figures of the observations for position.

Part of mine were buried. Peary had his. Thus handicapped, because blocks of my field calculations were absent, with the instruments and chronometer corrections, I rested my case at Copenhagen on a report, the original notes giving the brief tabulations of the day's doings, and the complete set of reduced observations.