[NORTH POLE]
[Three Government Printing Office offprints about the Cook vs. Peary race for the North Pole].
Three offprints relating remarks and speeches made in the House of Representatives concerning the controversy surrounding Robert E. Peary and Dr. Frederick Cook’s competing and contradictory claims on the North Pole.
Cook’s claim that he reached the Pole on April 21 1908 is supported in these remarks by Hon. Fields and Hon. Hegelsen, the former endorsing Peary’s counter claim to have reached the Pole on April 6 1909 as an equally viable achievement. The latter however repudiates Peary’s evidence entirely, and lobbies to have Peary’s erroneous geographical and hydrographical findings removed from Government printed maps. The third offprint, that of Hon. Fess, vehemently condemns Cook’s claims with the sentiment that “American History must not be perverted”. This is followed by a strongly biased presentation of the evidence for Peary and against Cook.
An interesting and ephemeral group relating to a lively series of Congressional hearings. Though hindsight would ultimately discredit Peary’s evidence as almost certainly falsified, his political connections and grasp of public relations would see him officially recognised by congress as the first man to reach the North Pole. Cook did not fair so well, and his reputation never recovered from these hearings.
