A Wretched and Precarious Situation - In Search of the Last Arctic Frontier

In 1906, from the ice fields northwest of Greenland, Commander Robert E. Peary spotted an unknown land in the distance. He called it "Crocker Land". Scientists and explorers agreed that Peary had found a new continent. Several years later, two of his disciples, George Borup and Donald MacMillan-with the sponsorship of the American Museum of Natural History-assembled a team to investigate. They pitched their two-year mission as a scientific tour de force to fill in the last blank space on the globe. But the Crocker Land Expedition became a five-year ordeal that endured a fatal boating accident, a drunken captain, a shipwreck, marooned rescue parties, disease, dissension and a crewman-turned-murderer. Based on a trove of unpublished letters, diaries and field notes, A Wretched and Precarious Situation is a harrowing adventure.

About the author

David Welky is the author of The Thousand-Year Flood: The Ohio-Mississippi Disaster of 1937, The Moguls and the Dictators: Hollywood and the Coming of World War II, and other books. He is a professor of history at the University of Central Arkansas.

Summary

A remarkable true story of adventure, betrayal and survival set in one of the world’s most inhospitable places.

Product details

• Authors: David Welky, Welky David
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 22.12.2017
• EAN: 9780393354829
• ISBN: 978-0-393-35482-9
• Dimensions: 140 mm x 211 mm x 33 mm
• Weight: 395 g
• Illustrations: 16 pages of illustrations
• Subjects: Natural sciences, medicine, IT, technology > Geosciences > Geography; Non-fiction book > History > Miscellaneous; 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000, HISTORY / Polar Regions, HISTORY / Expeditions & Discoveries, Geographical discovery & exploration, Geographical discovery and exploration, c 1914 to c 1918 (including WW1), Arctic regions, C 1900 - C 1914, c 1900 to c 1909, c 1914 to c 1918 (World War One period), History of other geographical groupings and regions, History of other lands