From Hero to Humbug

This is the 21st in a series examining significant unpublished documents related to the Polar Controversy.

As we have already seen, the newspapers carried an account saying Ed Barrill had been bribed with $5,000 to make his affidavit against Cook, but that General Hubbard was quoted several times as denying he had received anything for his signature. James Ashton’s only known public comment appeared in the New York Times on October 30, 1909. There he was quoted as saying that Barrill had received $100-$200 for expenses, but that he would have to look it up in his expense books to be sure.

In his chapter “The Mt. McKinley Bribery” in My Attainment of the Pole, Cook contended that Barrill visited Seattle, and in the presence of Seattle Times editor, Joe Blethen, dickered for sums ranging up to $10,000 for an affidavit that would discredit him. Eventually, Cook said, Barrill failed in this attempt, and decamped to Tacoma to meet with James Ashton. Soon after, Cook alleged, he was seen at a Tacoma bank by a witness who claimed he had been passed $1,500 in large bills. For this and “other considerations,” Cook claimed, Barrill had signed the affidavit published in the Globe.

These statements were based on solid evidence. It came in the form of a long letter from one C. O. Anderson, an attorney in Kennewick, WA, who claimed to have interviewed the witness to the Barrill payoff:

H. Wellington Wack, Cook’s lawyer, followed up by visiting this witness in Indiana. He forwarded a summary of what he had found to assist Cook as he was finishing up the text of his book in early 1911:

The affidavits Wack mentions here have as yet not come to light.

Early in October 1909, rumors of plans to bribe Barrill had already induced Cook to take countermeasures. He wrote Barrill enclosing $200 and asking him to meet him in St. Louis on October 6, cautioning him to “Kindly give no press interviews whatsoever.” He also sent Printz $500, paying him his full back wages.

When Cook’s serial story of his conquest of the North Pole had begun to appear in the New York Herald, Roscoe C. Mitchell, one of the paper’s reporters, had been assigned to accompany Cook as his “confidential agent” to watch over the Herald’s interests. Cook now dispatched him, under the direction of his attorney to Missoula, Montana.

At the new Savoy Hotel there, two local lawyers, Col. Tom Marshall of Missoula, and “General” Elbert D. Weed, of Helena, assisted Mittchell in finding witnesses to counter any potential statements made by Barrill.  The lawyers took affidavits from Barrill’s real estate business partner, C. G. Bridgeford and several others. Fred Printz, who reportedly was doing some dickering himself for as much as $1,000, also was interviewed by Cook’s lawyers at the Savoy.  Mitchell was later joined there by Cook and his private secretary, Walter Lonsdale.

Statements by Bridgeford had been published in the New York Herald on October 12. He claimed that Barrill had shown him his Alaskan diary a number of times, and that the story it contained corroborated Cook’s account. When Barrill’s diary was published in the Globe, this proved to be the case, as was Bridgeford’s physical description of the diary, which was completely accurate, giving evidence that he had indeed seen it. He also testified that Barrill had held forth on the climb a number of times and that his story had been consistently the same: that he and Cook had reached the summit of Mt. McKinley. Others in the community verified this was true as well.

These moves did not go unnoticed by Ashton, who had his own agents working the ground in Montana. He wrote to General Hubbard about what he found out and also sought to discredit Bridgeford.

In the copy of My Attainment of the Pole that Cook gave to Weed in 1912, the lawyer made a number of annotations in red ink throughout. On page 534 he confirmed Ashton’s statements, but made the Freudian slip of writing “Bridgman” for “Bridgeford” as one of the men from whom Cook’s contingent obtained affidavits.

“In October 1909, Col. Tom Marshall and myself, at Missoula, Montana, took the affidavits of a number of men – among others of Printz and Bridgman – fully sustaining Dr. Cook in the matter.
(signed) E. D. Weed”

Some have assumed, based on press reports and the discovery of the $5,000 Hubbard bank draft drawn by Ashton among Peary’s papers, that Barrill received the full $5,000 (about $150,000 today), but it should be remembered that Ashton had told Hubbard the amount was to cover “everything.” Everything would include paying off not only Barrill, but also the other four persons whose affidavits the Globe eventually published. It also would include the expenses of various parties, including Walter Miller, who sought out and brought the various wintnesses to Ashton, or arranged the taking of their affidavits. Then there was the cost of having Barrill’s lengthy diary accurately deciphered and transcribed, paying for Barrill and his wife’s trip to New York City, and other expenses such as transportation, lodging and meals for the various sworn witnesses, etc. And this is assuming that none of Ashton’s fees were included in the sum, which well they might have been.

It’s probably accurate then, based on the witness, that Barrill actually received only $1,500, but still a substantial sum. Cook claimed that Printz eventually got $500, after being promised more, and that both Miller and Beecher “were promised large amounts, but were cheated at the ‘showdown.’” Just exactly what the others got is unknown. Cook also claimed Printz tried to sell Roscoe Mitchell an affidavit supporting him for $1,000, was turned down, and later solicited $350 in a letter dated October 12. The letter, which is quoted in Cook’s book on page 525, was among the holdings of the Frederick Cook Society before they were transferred to Ohio State, and presumably is there now.

However, it’s curious that it says it is a “copy” and is on the stationary of the Chittendon Hotel in Columbus, OH, when it is said to have been written at the Savoy in Missoula. For Printz’s part, he denied ever having written such a letter. Because he ended up signing an affidavit for Ashton, we can assume he got nothing from Cook’s side.

The Anderson and Wack letters were in the collection of the Frederick A. Cook Society, presumably now at Ohio State. The undated letter from Cook to Barrill enclosing $200 and the Ashton letter are at NARA II. Weed’s copy of My Attainment of the Pole is the possession of the author.

This is the 20th in a series examining significant unpublished documents related to the Polar Controversy.

During the Barrills brief visit to New York, they swore out additional affidavits on October 14, 1909, concerning a letter Fanny claimed her husband had received from Dr. Cook, sent from Labrador in July 1907, but which had been misplaced. In their separate affidavits, each claimed the letter in question had promised Barrill “a chunk of the Pole,” and in Ed Barrill’s, if only he would “keep still” about Cook’s Mount McKinley hoax. Here are those two affidavits, published here for the first time:

A third affidavit was sworn by Ed Barrill the same day saying that he had received six letters from Cook since his return from Alaska, affixing five of them to the affidavit, swearing the one that was missing was the fifth in the sequence and was the one to which his wife made reference in her affidavit.

Ashton and Hubbard were very interested in the recovery of this letter. Once back in Montana, the Barrill’s looked high and low and eventually found it. This is what it said:

July 15, ‘07
Battle Harbor, Labrador

Dear Barrille
I am very much surprised at the
tone of your letter. The whole thing has been
to me a drag and a loss. Your money and that
of the others I have picked up dollar after
dollar by hard work but Printz more than
the others has been hired by Disston and I know
he will pay in time. If not when I come
back in Oct. I will go to Philadelphia
and sit down until I get it. I have no
more money in sight. I am trying to make
up for my losses this summer by a trip to
Labrador and Greenland, whether I succeed
or not I will not know until I return in
October.
By this same mail I am writing to a friend
who owes me a hundred dollars to send it
to Printz. This will reach him soon after this
letter.

2

but do urge Printz to write to Disston
often. I am also writing Disston by this mail
to send Printz $400 and thus close the account.
I can do no more – until I return.
I will write you at once when I
get back and will expect you to tell
me about it then but during my absence
do not write about as the letter will
not get to me and only go from place
to place and will be opened by others.
We go from here to Greenland with the arctic
ice and if all goes well the party will
return in about 3 months.

Yours very truly
F. A. Cook

There is not only no mention of “a chunk of the pole,” but Dr. Cook gives no hint that he has any intention of even trying for the North Pole, instead saying twice that he expects to return in October. But what subject did Cook not want Barrill to write about in a letter that might “be opened by others”?

This must be the letter in question, since it fits in by place and by date with the other five, and it is unlikely that Dr. Cook would write another letter to Barrill from Battle Harbour—the last place visited before leaving for Greenland, from which no mail could be sent—on the same day he sailed for the Arctic. And Barrill himself said there was only one letter missing. Therefore, there does not seem to have been a “chunk of the pole” letter at all.

After reading this letter, in a letter dated November 20, Ashton told Hubbard that “I do not see  much to it,” and that “I have Barrill still searching for that lost paper.”   The letter was never published and, apparently, no other letter was ever recovered by the Barrills.

The affidavits and Cook’s letter are in NARA II, College Park, MD.

This is the 19th in a series examining significant unpublished documents related to the Polar Controversy.

On October 5, after he had taken affidavits from four others bedsides Barrill, Ashton wrote to General Hubbard, misdating his letter by a month as September 5.

Ashton had proposed to General Hubbard that Walter Miller bring the affidavits he had obtained to New York, but Hubbard insisted Ashton, himself, bring them. It would take a few more days to wind up the business, Ashton thought, and wired Hubbard on October 6 that he would be leaving on the Burlington Northern’s Lake shore Century, Friday, October 8.

Meanwhile, the New York Herald, which first announced Cook’s North Pole claim to the world and was then running his serialized account of his conquest, had gotten wind of Ashton’s activities. On October 12th the paper reported from Missoula, Montana: “Edward Barrille, the guide who accompanied Dr. Frederick A. Cook to the top of Mount McKinley, Alaska, in 1906, has been approached, it is asserted here, with an offer of $5,000 to make an affidavit to the effect that the Brooklyn explorer never completed the ascent.”

When the question was put by reporters in New York as to whether an affidavit had been bought, General Hubbard dismissed such reports as “all bosh.” “No money was given to him for his signature,” the general maintained.

Hubbard was eager to publish Barrill’s statement, but when Ashton arrived, Barrill’s affidavit was intentionally held back until Peary published his “proof” that Cook was a liar in the form of alleged testimony given by the only two witnesses along on his polar journey, the two Inuit, Etukishook and Ahwelah.  They were said to have stated that they had never been at the North Pole, and in fact had never been out of sight of land on their entire journey with Cook. This statement was slated for release by the Peary Arctic Club on October 13, so publication of the affidavit was delayed to the next day, October 14. In that way the two statements, Peary and Hubbard hoped, would be the one-two punch that would be a knockout blow to Cook’s credibility.

Barrill’s affidavit was printed in full in the pages of Hubbard’s own newspaper, The New York Globe and Commercial Advertiser.

This was followed the next day by a complete transcription of Edward Barrill’s entire 1906 diary.

The fact that the account sworn in the affidavit did not match that written by Barrill in 1906 was explained away by saying Cook had induced Barrill to doctor his diary to match Cook’s eventual account. Thus Barrill admitted he had conspired to lie at Cook’s direction.

On the 16th, the rest of the affidavits secured by Ashton, those of Fred Printz, Walter Miller, Samuel Beecher and John Shore, were printed in the Globe.

Ed Barrill, himself, accompanied by his wife, Fanny, had followed closely behind his sworn statement, arriving in the city on October 12th . Hubbard brought him to his office, where he conducted a personal interview. The general promised to make Barrill available to a committee of the Explorers Club, of which Peary was the sitting president, that was investigating the doubts being expressed about Cook’s McKinley ascent, which he did the next day at the rooms of the Century Club. Barrill was not made available to the New York press, however. When asked, Hubbard denied knowing where Barrill was staying, and Frederick Dellenbaugh, one of the Explorers Club committee members, said he knew, but refused to disclose Barrill’s location. On October 15th, Hubbard sent word that he saw no need for Barrill to remain longer. Barrill went home with alacrity, never to return, without giving a single press interview.

But in an interview published in the New York Times, General Hubbard elaborated on his intentions in obtaining the affidavits and again discounted any speculation on money being exchanged. He told the Times’ reporter that Barrill “had turned over the diary and made the affidavit impugning Dr. Cook’s word without any monetary inducement as Dr. Cook had intimated in interviews at Atlantic City.” “Barrill told me,” the general went on, “he was tired of hearing Dr. Cook say he had climbed Mount McKinley. That was why he was willing to make the affidavit and give up his diary. He was not coaxed with money. He did it all of his own free will.” And when the reporter persisted, saying, “Dr. Cook has suggested that $5,000 was paid as a bribe to get the affidavit,” Hubbard answered, “Does he? Well let him prove it. It is not so. The affidavit was obtained exactly as every other affidavit is obtained. It was a simple piece of business—that’s all. And what’s more, every word in the affidavit is true.”

Many of the Globe’s readers and other neutral parties remained unconvinced that this was so, however, pointing out that in his affidavit Barrill openly admitted he had been willing to conspire to support a lie concocted by Cook by assenting to it himself. As a result, the immediate impact of Hubbard’s large cash outlay, an amount equivalent to $150,000 today, was far smaller than he and Ashton expected.

Ashton’s misdated letter and telegram are in the National Archives II, College Park, MD

This is the 18th in a series examining significant unpublished documents related to the Polar Controversy.

In all of the Polar Controversy, perhaps the most telling piece of evidence produced against Frederick Cook’s claim to have discovered the North Pole had nothing to do with his 1908 polar expedition. It came instead out of his previous expedition to Alaska in 1906, which was aimed at the first ascent of the tallest peak in North America. At its conclusion, he announced that he and his burly packer, Edward N. Barrill, were the first to reach the summit of Mt. McKinley on September 16 of that year. That claim led directly to Dr. Cook being feted at the annual dinner of the National Geographic Society in Washington, being elected the second president of the Explorers Club of New York, two well-remunerated articles in Harper’s Monthly Magazine and a contract to write a book about the exploit. It also led indirectly to his obtaining the backing of the wealthy gambler John R. Bradley for his attempt to reach the North Pole the following year. But in its immediate wake, it had left Cook flat broke.

Cook’s Alaskan journey had been sponsored by the millionaire Philadelphia saw manufacturer, Henry Disston, who gave him financial support in exchange for Cook’s organizing a big game hunt for him at the expedition’s conclusion. However, Disston had a change of mind, failed to show up for the hunt, and so did his money. But Cook had already contracted to rent a pack train for the prospective hunt, and when he tried to cancel this arrangement without paying, he was hauled into Alaskan court and lost, wiping out all his cash on hand. As a result, he could only give the men he had hired to enable his attempt to climb the mountain promises to pay in the future rather than what he owed them then and there. When Cook went off with Bradley to the Arctic in July 1907 and didn’t come back, all those debts were still outstanding, and remained so until after his return to the United States in September 1909, after claiming he had attained the North Pole on April 21 of the previous year. Those unpaid debts were to be his undoing as it turned out.

As there were doubts from his first announcement of his polar conquest, there had also been doubts in Alaska that Cook had actually made the summit as he claimed. Some of these were simply the result of envy. Many Alaskans thought the mountain unclimbable, and resented the idea that some “effete” Easterner from “the Outside” could have come and so easily plucked the prize that the Sourdoughs and Pioneers of Alaska coveted for themselves. No one had real evidence that Cook had not actually done the deed, but there were some reasons that fed these suspicions beyond pure jealousy. Cook’s timetable for the climb, which he gave before a meeting of the Mazamas in Seattle shortly after his return, seemed too short and too pat for the accomplishment of such a titanic undertaking. The only member of Cook’s own expedition who voiced public doubt, however, was Herschel Parker, who had returned from Alaska after being assured by Cook that no further attempt to climb the mountain would be made that season. But after Cook met with him upon reaching New York, Parker seemed persuaded that Cook had indeed climbed the mountain, but the nature of his accomplishment, Parker felt, was only that of a sporting event, with few of the scientific results Parker hoped to obtain from the conquest.

But as the Polar Controversy grew between Cook and Robert Peary over who had been first to the Pole, many saw opportunities developing to exploit their former associations with Frederick Cook in Alaska and get their back pay they were due—or perhaps even more. J. E. Shore, a U.S. Commissioner in Leavenworth, WA, alerted Herbert L. Bridgman, Secretary of the Peary Arctic Club, that Cook’s unpaid debts might provide useful fodder to use against Cook.

Bridgman passed on Shore’s letter and enclosures indicating that several of Cook’s former expedition members had complained of Cook still owing them back wages to General Thomas H. Hubbard, the Peary Arctic Club’s president. Hubbard immediately engaged his law correspondent in Tacoma, James M. Ashton, to act on his behalf to obtain affidavits concerning what they knew about Cook’s Alaskan claims. After all, if it could be shown that Cook had not actually reached the summit of Mt. McKinley, that would set a glaring precedent for a dishonest claim to have reached the North Pole. No doubt, however, Hubbard realized that the key figure among those named by Shore in his letter was Barrill, because he alone had been with Cook in the days immediately before and after September 16, 1906, and so he alone knew for sure the truth or falsity of Cook’s claim to “the top of the continent.”

James M. Ashton

Ashton later reported that he had indeed been hired by Hubbard to seek out these men, but denied his efforts had a predetermined agenda. “I received word from Gen. Hubbard to ascertain the exact truth concerning Dr. Cook’s climb of Mount McKinley and had not the remotest idea what side I was on or would be on,” he told the New York Globe on October 16. “I sent [Walter] Miller [who had been the photographer on Cook’s 1906 expedition] to Barrill and other members of the expedition and had them brought to Tacoma. They were all carefully examined. Barrill spoke openly and squarely from the start.” However, this is not exactly the way things actually went down.

As Ashton met with the various expedition members, he kept up a running report on his progress via telegraph with Hubbard. On September 21 he reported:

[“Armstrong” was William Armstrong, one who assisted Cook with his 1906 pack train.]

September 25:

September 27:

September 30:

[Difficulties account parties increasing claims Make sure protect drafts which will run over amount stated [i.e. $2,000]. Many interferences causing continuance wild demands and indecision of parties.]

October 1:

On that day Ashton drew a customer’s draft for $5,000 on the Fidelity Trust Company of Tacoma, charged to the account of Thomas H. Hubbard, 60 Wall St., NY.

All the items reproduced here except the portrait of James Ashton are in the Peary Family Papers at National Archives II, College Park, MD.

This is the 17th in a series examining significant unpublished documents related to the Polar Controversy.

Of all the bizarre incidents of the Polar Controversy, perhaps none has more unanswered questions surrounding it than the Dunkle-Loose affidavits. On December 7, 1909, the day after the so-called “proofs” of Dr. Cook’s polar attainment had been locked away in a Copenhagen bank vault, two men signed a lengthy affidavit at Westchester, NY, claiming that they had been hired by Frederick Cook to fabricate a set of astronomical observations that would convince a panel of Danish scientists about to sit to consider Cook’s proofs that he had reached the North Pole on April 21, 1908. Cook had agreed to send them first to the University of Copenhagen in appreciation for the acclaim and honorary degree he had received there when he landed at the Danish capital in September 1909, after wiring from Lerwick, Shetland Islands, that he had attained the Pole.

The New York Times, which had been vehemently pro-Peary since the start of the controversy, ran the exclusive story December 8; it covered nearly three full pages—by far the most space devoted to any one story on a single day that whole year—that spared its readers no details of the alleged transaction. Those details are related fully in the pages of Cook and Peary, the Polar Controversy, resolved, so there is no need to take them up again here. In the end, after the Danes had examined the materials submitted by Cook, they ruled that they did not contain any proof he had reached the North Pole, but no trace of the calculations Loose said he had provided the doctor, a copy of which the Times had thoughtfully forwarded to Copenhagen, could be found in them either. As a result, although the University’s verdict on the value of Cook’s proofs was devastating to his credibility, the elaborate affidavit became a non-factor in settling the questions surrounding the explorer’s claims.

In their affidavit, the two men claimed that Cook paid them only a fraction of the agreed upon $4,000 price ($100,000 in today’s money) that they asked if their efforts resulted in the explorer’s claim being accepted by the Danes. In all, they received a mere $240 from Cook. What they may have received for their affidavit from the Times is unknown, but considering the length of it, one could reasonably conclude it was considerably more than they got from Cook. The unnatural recall of detail included in their statement indicates they kept very precise notes and that their real intention may not have been to help the explorer prove his claim, but rather was designed to destroy his credibility by exposing his secret efforts to artificially bolster what inadequate original proofs he already had, if any. Even so, that same detail make it unbelievable that the story their affidavits contained was a fabrication. And even Cook’s private secretary acknowledged that Cook had met with Dunkle and Loose.

It is even possible that the pair was put up to it by William C. Reick, an editor at the Times who had an old score to settle with his former employer, James Gordon Bennett, owner of the rival New York Herald. Letters in the National Archives II between Reick, Bridgman and Peary suggest as much. The Herald was the most important paper in the city at the time, and had printed Cook’s original dispatch claiming his discovery, and it also ran his detailed serialized account of his feat. It therefore had a large stake in the establishment of the legitimacy of Cook’s claim, which from its first announcement had been questioned by pro-Peary forces, and it had much to lose if Cook’s claim was discredited.

William C. Reick

Whatever they got from Reick, it was apparently all they got. As a result of the unwanted publicity, George W. Dunkle, who worked for a New York insurance company, and who had originally approached Cook with a proposition of insuring his original “proofs,” was dismissed from his job. August Wedel Loose, an itinerant sea captain who Dunkle introduced to Cook, and who claimed that he worked up the bogus calculations, seems to have fared little better. In January 1910 he wrote to Herbert L. Bridgman, editor of the Brooklyn Standard Union and secretary of the Peary Arctic Club, which bankrolled Peary’s attempts to reach the North Pole:

Shortly after, Loose left the United States, never to be heard of again.

Not only are the exact origins of the Dunkle-Loose affidavits shrouded in mystery, but also are the men themselves. After their 15 minutes of fame in the Times, the pair dropped totally from sight—literally and figuratively. During the years of research I spent in preparing Cook & Peary, I never saw a single photograph of either man. None appeared in the New York Times, or apparently anywhere else, until recently I recovered a copy of a press photo from an Ebay auction site that sells off photographs from the morgues of various defunct newspapers. As far as I know, it is published here for the first time and gives us our first look at these two slippery characters in the flesh. (Loose is the one with the mustache on the left).

The origins of the picture can be surmised from the back of the photo, which bears this penciled inscription: “Capt. Loose and Dunkle who revealed Dr. Cook’s effort to have them prepare a ‘log’ for him.” The photo is backstamped “Nov. 16, 1910,” or nearly a year after the New York Times story broke. Apparently, it came from the morgue of the Cleveland Press, indicated by another backstamp, which reads: “N.E.A. Reference Department, Press bldg, Cleveland.” N.E.A. stands for the Newspaper Enterprise Association, a syndication service started in 1902 that supplied comics and pictorial matter to hundreds of newspapers nationwide. It is the only such syndication service still in business.

The Loose letter is in the Peary Family Papers at NARA II, College Park, Md.  The photo of Dunkle and Loose is the possession of the author.

Happy 113th Anniversary of Dr. Cook’s non-arrival at the North Pole.

Of all the souvenirs that were marketed in the wake of the Polar Controversy, perhaps the most artistic are the porcelain items produced in Germany, then a leading exporter of such wares. The two character mugs have already been highlighted in the February 2022 post of this blog. Two other pieces symbolize the struggle between the two claimants for first rights to the North Pole.

The first is a figurine showing the two explorers gripping a world globe from opposite sides. Cook, on the right, wears a confident smile, while Peary on the left seems to be throwing his head back, mouth open, howling in outrage. The explorer’s name is written below each figure’s outstretched arm on the globe.

The suit of each explorer is covered with tiny porcelain grains, which has led many to confuse this piece with the later, so-called “snow babies” of the 1920s, which use a similar decoration technique.

Here is a strip of photos showing the figurine from all sides and in detail.

The piece is found in two sizes; one is 3.75 inches x 5.5; the other is 4.5 inches by 6.25. Whether these are both original 1909 figures is not certain. One or the other may be a later copy. That there are later copies is suggested by the wide difference in the quality and color of the painted decoration on this figurine. All of these German porcelain exports were hand painted before firing, but in the portrait mugs these decorations are much more uniform in color and quality. Several specimens are shown here to illustrate this point. I suspect the cruder looking pieces are not originals.

At least one specimen exists that does not have the granular coating on the explorers fur suits and the faces are not decorated, but left plain white. This piece allows an appreciation of the care taken to realistically reproduce each of the explorers facial features on this item. Cook’s face, for instance, even takes into account the droop in his right eyelid, that gave his face an asymmetrical, quizzical expression.

This figurine has been incorrectly ascribed to Gebruder Heubach, a German porcelain manufacturer best known for porcelain doll heads. The generic “Made in Germany” maker’s mark on the bottom of the figurine (see above) is the one most commonly encountered, but some bear the mark of Heber and Co., a manufacturer based in Neustadt, Bavaria, Germany. Heber not only produced doll heads, but also a wide variety of other porcelain wares as well.

This piece is fairly common, falling somewhere between the Peary portrait mug, which is more common, and the Cook portrait mug, which is much less common.

Scarcer still is another little known piece. It shows the two explorers in fur suits reaching for a pinnacle of “ice” labeled “North Pole.”

The fact that the inscription is in English shows this piece was intended for export. The explorers are not identified by name as they are on the first piece, but are merely indicated by a large “P” for Peary on the left and “C” for Cook on the right. Like the first, that this piece also favors Cook’s claim over Peary’s is indicated by the date on the “North Pole” as 21.4.08 = April 21, 1908, the date Dr. Cook claimed he attained his goal. Below the figures is an “ice cave” which indicates the piece may have been designed as a pin or trinket holder.

The back of the piece bears the style number near the base. The painted decoration is sparse beyond the faces, consisting of black dabs to the fur suits and several tan “rocks” below the opening of the snow cave.

The faces are less true to the explorers actual features than the previous piece, but make each recognizable. The position of the hands indicate that each of the explorers originally grasped a small flag. Peary lifts his toward the “Pole,” only to find Cook has his firmly atop the Pole already.

Again, Cook looks confident, while Peary looks dismayed. Although born in New York, Cook was a pure German, the son of two recent immigrants, so naturally he would be favored in Germany over Peary.

In 1909, the rival claims of Cook and Peary to have reached the North Pole produced scores of individual postcards, many pairs of related designs and several series. By far the largest was that issued by Kawin & Co., mostly known for its stereopticon views, based in Chicago. It issued a series of 50 cards entitled How Cook and Peary Discovered the North Pole, divided equally between the two explorers. About half the cards were either photographs or drawings based on photographs. The rest were drawings, some of them total fantasies, that purported to show scenes from the expeditions. The cards have a different frame for the vertical and horizontal designs.

They came in a red cardboard box with one of the card’s images reproduced on the cover.

This picture shows 46 of the cards along with the box’s top and bottom. It doesn’t show the cards numbered 22, 23 or 24, and leaves out card 33, erroneously reproducing 28 twice.

The cards have a common reverse with a short text elaborating on the card’s image.

Illustrations of each card in the set follow, along with some comments concerning the individual cards.

1-3

Card 2 is the only card with a unique frame design.

4-6

Card 5 has Capt. Bartlett marked with and “x.” In the front row from the left are Ross Marvin, Peary’s private secretary, murdered on the expedition by an Inuit, Dr. John Goodsell, the expedition’s surgeon, Donald B. Macmillan, and George Borup, assistants to Peary.

7-9

Card 9 shows Josephine Diebitsch Peary, Robert E. Peary, Jr. and Marie Ahnighito Peary. Although Peary’s son was called “Jr.”, they actually had different middle names. Peary’s was Edwin, his son’s was Emile, named after Josephine Peary’s brother, Emile Diebitsch.

10-12

13-15

Card 13 shows the catch-as-catch-can accuracy of many cards in the set. This view, because of the in-line hitching of the dog team, the dress of the figures, and the presence of a river steam boat in the background, indicates that it was taken probably in Alaska.

16-18

The first two cards are examples of many fantasy scenes in the set based on no known photograph.

19-21

22

This scene is probably based on a photograph taken in Danish Greenland. Notice the house.

23

24

25-27

Card 26 is based on a photograph of Dr. Cook made after he returned from his service on the Belgian Antarctic Expedition in 1899. Card 27 does not show the Bradley, but rather the Roosevelt. The Bradley was never “ice bound” at any time on Cook’s expedition. The view is a reworking of the view used on Card 12.

28-29

Cook did not use sails on his way to the Pole, or carry an odometer to measure distance.

30-32

Card 32 is based loosely on a photo of John R. Bradley with a polar bear trophy.

33

34-36

Card 36, another fantasy, shows permanent Inuit dwellings in Greenland rather than a “polar camp.”

37-39

Card 38 is also a fantasy. Cook had no “aluminum sledge” on his expedition. All of his sleds were made of hickory after a design of his brother, Theodore.

40-42

Card 42 shows Helen Cook, Dr. Cook’s natural daughter, Marie Fidel Cook and Ruth Cook, Marie’s daughter by a previous marriage.

43-45

46-48

Card 46 is based on a photo taken on Cook’s 1903 expedition to Alaska. Card 48 is a fantasy. The Bradley was a small schooner that did not require so large a crew.

49-50

Card 49 is based on an illustration that appeared on the cover of the French magazine Le petit Journal.

Twenty-five years ago today, February 17, 1997, Cook & Peary, the Polar Controversy, resolved, was published.

I’d first taken an interest in the titanic dispute over who first reached the North Pole in the mid-1970’s and read the narratives Cook and Peary had written about their attainments of the North Pole. I also made an effort to read all the books that had been written about the dispute going back to Captain Thomas F. Hall’s pioneering analysis of 1917, Has the North Pole been Discovered? I had also read many magazine articles published during the controversy, so that I had a good grounding in the primary published sources on the subject. There things rested until the controversy was rekindled by a discovery in Peary’s papers at the National Archives in 1989 that seemed to indicate he had fallen far short of the Pole in 1909. With Peary’s claim in doubt, the claim of his rival, Dr. Frederick A. Cook to have beaten him to the Pole, though long discredited, received new attention.

I made contact with the Frederick A. Cook Society to see if access could be had to comparable papers of his discredited rival. I was told Janet Vetter, Cook’s only direct descendant, owned Dr. Cook’s papers, and after writing to her, I received a letter hinting that she might grant such access. But before I could arrange anything more concrete, Ms. Vetter died suddenly on August 10, 1989, at the age of 51. Under the terms of her will, her grandfather’s papers were to go to the Library of Congress, just 40 miles from my home.

When I read of the gift, I wasted no time in contacting the Library of Congress and was told that Vetter’s papers would be arriving sometime in early 1990. A further inquiry revealed, however, that there were no plans to catalog the papers in the near future, but that some of the most important ones, including Cook’s original field diaries had already arrived and could be seen by appointment. After I examined these, I urged the head of the manuscript division, Dr. James H. Hutson, to expedite processing of Cook’s papers, and by that Summer I was at work reading the entire gift.

Not far into this examination, I began a parallel examination of the vast Peary gift, housed just seven blocks away from the Library of Congress at the National Archives. For a person as steeped in the published Cook-Peary literature as I was, I quickly realized that despite all the previous articles and books already written on the Polar Controversy, there was much significant that had never been known about the dispute between the two explorers. I was certain that I could make an original contribution to the subject through a systematic and careful examination of these original materials. I decided then and there to write a book evaluating their content and how they related to the historical controversy and the larger question of it as an example of historical truth.

The result was published seven years later as Cook & Peary, the Polar Controversy, resolved. It was the fruit of three years of intensive research into not only the papers housed in Washington, to which I commuted three times a week for nearly six months, but also into just about every accessible collection of primary documentation on the subject, including a detailed reading of much of the massive printed literature, primary and secondary, personal interviews with living connections to the story, hundreds of letters of inquiry, tens of thousands of miles of travel and eventually eight years of writing and revision. All this primary material was documented by more than 2,400 source notes at the book’s end. By 1993 the manuscript, which filled an entire box of continuous-feed computer paper, was in reasonably good shape, and I set off on another three-year quest to find a publisher for it.

Many publishers were enthusiastic after they read my cover letter; they were less interested when they weighed my manuscript. Eventually, I sent only the first three chapters to Stackpole Books after getting a positive response to my proposal, avoiding mentioning the bulk of the whole manuscript. There I found an editor on the same page as I, Sally Atwater; she asked for three more chapters, and by the time she had read them, she was hooked. A contract was signed. But even as I prepared my manuscript for actual publication, new things came to light, new leads developed and new revisions were made as a result, some even after the galley proofs were printed.

The book got a lot of attention upon its release, with feature articles in the Washington Post ’s “Style” section and the US news section of the New York Times. These led immediately to a number of interviews, including segments the night of publication aired on ABC World News Tonight and MSNBC, and later, appearances on NPR’s The Diane Rehm Show and The World, as well as in two documentaries produced by the BBC.

Apparently, however, few absorbed the import of the new evidence I had uncovered, let alone that of the whole sweep of my 1,000+ page book, even those with prior knowledge of the subject or those who had the patience just to study my book thoroughly. It was dismissed out of hand, of course, by Cook’s partisans. They had convinced themselves that I was writing a book that would vindicate Cook and were shocked that it produced convincing evidence that he had lied about the results of his attempt to climb Mt. McKinley, and his real, but equally failed, attempt to reach the North Pole. But even some others scoffed at the subtitle, “The Polar Controversy, resolved.”

They may not have been Cook partisans, but they had some stake in wanting to see the controversy continue, like proprietors of “adventure” companies that promoted ultra-expensive “Last Degree” treks to the North Pole, and persons with some previous self-interest in justifying their version of the controversy that they had put into print, or others who simply liked to argue over it interminably. They said there would never be an end to the controversy, simply because there would never be possible to produce actual documentary evidence that proved Cook’s story a lie—the proverbial “Smoking Gun” that would end it, absolutely.

In the wake of my publication of Cook’s fake “summit” photo in DIO, following my recovery of it from a badly faded copy and its subsequent publication in the New York Times in 1998, Cook’s McKinley claim, that also still had its advocates even beyond The Frederick A. Cook Society, and which was called in mountaineering circles, “The Lie that Won’t Die,” finally breathed its last.

After my book was reviewed widely, reference after reference published subsequently cited Cook & Peary in their evaluation of the rival explorers’ claims. By the time of the centennial of the outbreak of the dispute between the two explorers in 2009, it had become a virtual consensus that certainly neither Cook nor Peary reached the Pole when he said he did, or ever. Even the National Geographic Society had nothing officially to say in support of Peary on the 100th Anniversary of his supposed attainment or to commemorate it, something they had never failed to do on any significant occasion in the past involving Peary’s alleged discovery.

Even the publication of what was, in effect, a feeble rewrite of Andrew Freeman’s The Case for Doctor Cook, that appeared in 2005 under the title True North, did nothing to stem the tide of dismissing Cook’s polar claim out of hand, as it had been early on, reversing the trend of a more positive consideration of Cook’s polar attempt in the light of the collapse of Peary’s claim.

However, my subsequent publication of The Lost Notebook of Dr. Frederick A. Cook in 2013, which closely analyzed a notebook whose existence had been unknown to scholars before the publication of Cook & Peary, finally provided the “Smoking Gun” that skeptics doubted would ever be produced, proving Cook could not possibly have reached the North Pole in 1908. Between the two books, the greatest geographic controversy in history, The Polar Controversy, had finally and truly been resolved.

Among the handsomest items that was marketed in the wake of the Cook-Peary dispute were small portrait mugs of the explorers made in Germany. Germany was the leading exporter of inexpensive bisque and decorative pottery items at the beginning of the 20th century.

The mugs are made of glazed pottery and hand decorated. The one of Dr. Cook is based on a widely published photograph of him from 1894. It shows him in a fur outfit, fully bearded. The mug shows his right, mitted hand holding a pair of binoculars. At its bottom it has “COOK’ inscribed in block letters.

The Peary mug is based on a photograph taken about 1898 showing him in a seal-fur hat and fur coat. He has a small pouch strapped across him which he is clutching with his left hand, and a curved brown object in his pocket. Just what this object is supposed to represent is not obvious. “PEARY” is inscribed at the bottom.

Each mug stands about 5 inches tall and is about 4 inches at the broadest. They hold about 10 oz. of liquid. That these two were issued as a pair is not only obvious from their common design but from the positioning of the arms so they can be stood next to each other in a balanced array.

The back of the mugs have the inscription “Germany” and a style number. The Cook mug is #5568 and the Peary #5569. They also say “Déposé” and “Ges. Gesch;” “depose” means “deposit” in French; “gesh” is an abbreviation for Geschützt, which means “protected” in German. Both are similar to “Copyright” in meaning, and might be translated as “legally protected.” No maker is indicated.

There is a similar portrait mug of William Howard Taft. Whether it is directly related to the explorers’ mugs is doubtful. It’s style number is #5440, indicating it was made in advance of the ones of Cook and Peary. Taft assumed the presidency on March 4, 1909, six months before the start of the Polar Controversy, so the mug was probably issued to commemorate Taft’s inauguration. The close similarity in style and coloring indicate that Taft’s mug was issued by the same company, however. Instead of just saying “Germany” on the back, it says “Made in Germany Ges Gesch 5440 Déposé.”

Although probably unrelated to the Cook and Peary mugs, the Taft makes a fine show standing as a buffer between the two rival explorers.  Considering the relative frequency the Peary comes onto the market compared to the Cook indicates that the Cook mug is far, far more scarce.

Dr. Cook returned to America aboard S. S. Oscar II after a week of adulation in Denmark. At half-past midnight the ship proceeded to quarantine, arriving at 4 AM. There she was dressed in flags to meet the reception committee aboard The Grand Republic, chartered by the secretary of the Arctic Club, B.S. Osbon. During the night a number of boats bearing newspaper men tried to board the ocean liner, but were unsuccessful. The best they could do was shouting questions at Dr. Cook who was standing at the gangway as he awaited the arrival of his wife, Marie, and children, Ruth and Helen, aboard the tug John K. Gilkinson.

At dawn, as the tug approached, the Gilkinson was accompanied by a number of boats including the New York Herald’s dispatch boat Owlet. The Herald was then running a serial of Dr. Cook’s narrative of his expedition. As the tug came along side, Cook descended the rope ladder and leapt to its deck. For half an hour the tug lay dead in the water while Dr. Cook visited with his family in the cabin, while the passengers on the Oscar II broke out into a chorus of “For he’s a jolly good fellow.”

The Grand Republic soon appeared, and at 9 AM Dr. Cook and his party transferred to the steamer, which was visibly listing to one side from the weight of its 424 passengers lining the deck rail.

In this postcard view, left to right are: The Grand Republic, John K. Gilkinson, Owlet, and Oscar II.

It was planned that the doctor would pass through an honor guard of the 47th Regiment, where he was supposed to be met with a wreath of white tea roses, to be placed ceremoniously around his neck by Miss Ida A. Lehmann of Brooklyn, daughter of the secretary of the Dr. Cook Celebration Committee of 100. As it was, the honor guard in their white and blue dress uniforms were too busy trying to help Captain Osbon keep the guest of honor from being crushed to death to perform their designated function, and Miss Lehmann barely managed to lasso the doctor with the wreath, which itself was soon crushed to lifelessness as he was buffet around on the deck by the happy crowd.

Cook managed to take refuge on the hurricane deck, from which he gave a short speech that was all but inaudible over the shrieking whistles of all the ships in the harbor that had been assembled for a naval parade as part of the Hudson-Fulton Celebration.

It was now 9:30, and the reception was not set until noon, so to kill time The Grand Republic cruised slowly up the North River as far a Spuyten Duyvil, then docked briefly at 130th street to let off some of its passengers before passing back down the river. After one more turn, she docked at Williamsburg’s South Fifth Street wharves below the sugar refineries to a tremendous cheer from the thousands waiting on shore, accompanied by a great blast of whistles from the factories and the ships on the river.

With the assistance of 100 police officers, Cook’s party struggled through an estimated crowd of 5,000 on the wharf to enter a car to start a parade, led by a flatbed truck with a brass band, to start along the five-mile route to the Bushwick Club, where the official reception was to be given.

Left to right: Bird Coler (with hat in hand), Brooklyn Borough President, B.S. Osbon, Ruth Cook, Dr. Cook, Mrs. Cook; William Cook, his brother, stands behind the policeman.

Along the parade route stood 100,000 people. It seemed everyone in the whole borough was in the streets, and as he passed along, Cook acknowledged their plaudits by raising his hat, smiling and bowing.

As the procession turned the corner directly opposite his old home on Bushwick Ave., the doctor caught sight of the triumphal arch erected by his neighborhood association over the intersection of Myrtle and Willoughby. It was a huge canvas and wood frame structure as high as the El viaduct next to it. Surmounted with laurel wreaths and garlands, it bore a giant golden globe with a flag flying from its top. It dripped with painted icicles and electric lights and was decorated with arctic scenes, shields, more flags, and a portrait of Cook crowned with the words “We Believe in You.” Four snow white pigeons were released as the doctor’s car passed under the archway by a man atop the arch. (both sides of the arch are shown here)

Eventually the motorcade of 200 autos reached the flag-enshrouded Bushwick Club and as the police kept back the crowds, Cook alighted from his car and entered the club. He appeared briefly on the building’s balcony, but despite cries for a speech, he could not be heard and once again simply bowed.

Then, after a light lunch, the doors of the Club were opened, and more than 5,000 passed by the doctor. He could not shake hands with so many, however, so he kept them firmly clasped behind his back as he nodded to each passerby. After three hours the doors of the club were closed to the disappointment of thousands more waiting to get in. Dr. Cook’s day ended at 9:30 PM, with a formal dinner at the club before finally retiring, under police escort, to a suite reserved for his family at the Waldorf-Astoria.

Cook’s momentous day produced very few souvenirs. In fact, the only one I have ever seen is this small celluloid pinback that was doubtless hawked to the enormous crowd waiting for Cook to pass by. Other than that, only some hastily prepared postcards were produced and sold after the events of the day.

This one from the author’s collection is inscribed by Dr. Cook in his distinctive handwriting to a man sharing his given name, “Best Regards from another Fred,” and dated October 3, 1909.

Another showing Cook’s former home on Bushwick Ave. taken from the El viaduct above it and the triumphal arch spanning the street below, was also on sale a few days after the parade.

While Cook was off on his polar expedition, Cook’s wife was forced to sell their  three-storey red brick house when her considerable personal funds were lost in the collapse of the Knickerbocker Trust Co. during the Panic of 1907. However, it still stands today on Bushwick Ave., where it is divided into several apartments. Shortly after the parade, it was announced that on the small triangular plot across from it, a monument to the Discoverer of the North Pole would be placed, but due to Cook’s downfall, it was never built. Instead, a monument to the fallen of World War I now occupies that space.