Customer Reviews

Cook and Peary

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Don't be put off by bulk: despite its 1,151 pages, "Cook and Peary" is a real page-turner. In elegant, concise language, it tells the compelling story of not one but two of the great hoaxes of all time. The story of the two men who falsely claimed to have reached the North Pole is one of mendacity and gullibility and of the victory of faith over knowledge. It highlights the shakiness of the foundations of what we think of as common knowledge. This year marks the 90th anniversary of the start of the great polar controversy, and it shows that the balance is tipping yet again. It began favoring Cook, then swung decisively to Peary, despite many initial doubters. The idea that both men were fakers dates from the 1970s, and it seems to be finally prevailing. Today, the New York Times, once a passionate defender of Peary, reported last November, "most historians believe both explorers lied." In the first part of the book, Robert Bryce, a meticulous researcher who has the wisdom to trust absolutely no one, tells thhis eye-opening story without making any judgments. He leaves you to make your own. In the second part, he examines the available evidence, some of which he was the first to examine, and tries to answer the two essential questions: Did either reach the pole? He concludes that Cook's own long-hidden journals prove he turned back after 100 miles or so on the floating Arctic Ocean ice pack, or less than a quarter of the way. On Peary, he shows convincing evidence that Peary stopped short of the pole, probably between 100 and 50 miles from the northern axis of the Earth. Bryce explains how Peary used his powerful friends to press his case, while Cook relied on his charm, saying over and over, in effect, "trust me." Bryce shows how either would have been believed, even without the proofs that are ordinarily required, if the other hadn't been there to challenge him. But most amazing, he shows the phenomenal chutzpah of both and the credibility of a world before which most of the damning facts were out in plain view. "Cook and Peary" details the slow collapse of the two claims despite a still-vigorous Peary defense by the National Geographic magazine and persistent lobbying work by the Cook Society. It is this collapse that led the Guinness Book of Records to get rid of Peary, replacing him in 1997 by a 1948 Soviet airplane expeditions. The World Almanac, which once tersely reported Peary's conquest of the pole, as had virtually all world reference books since the Encyclopaedia Britannica found for Peary in 1911, now mentions that there are serious challenges to his claim. But this debate is too old to ever die, and someone will no doubt eventually come out with new facts to illuminate a partisan point of view.

This book by Bryce is full of fascinating information. One of its most valuable features is its appendix of documents cited (the diamond mine analogy); helpful to a person wishing to study this topic.

However, the organization of book sections is variable and not helpful (the landfill analogy). Inconsistent format makes it hard to sort important facts about the attainment of the North Pole by either Cook or Peary from details of their lives. Other reviewers have spoken to some of these "character of the times and family history" issues, so I will not add any more observations on those subjects.

This book is potentially excellent but needs an especially ruthless editor! One obvious reason is to editorially tame and organize the jumbled structure of the text. An equally compelling reason for editing is that explanatory graphics are unreadably tiny in many cases and have no figure numbers or legends. This is unfortunate in a book which intends to help readers figure out (visualize) what is likely to have happened.

Images are often no larger than a big postage stamp and are incompletely described. For example, an image central to understanding navigational difficulties encountered on a moving sea ice pack is a diagram of both North poles. It shows three sets of lines on the teensy graphic, only two of which are discussed. Lines of force centered on the magnetic north pole combined with the standard grid centered on the geographic north pole are included with a third set of tenuous lines not discussed in the text.

Issues of faked photos are also important to the discussions of evidence. While reproduced photographs are apparently correctly cross-referenced, it is difficult for a reader to compare when an original and a fake are not shown on the same page. At minimum, issues of page printing press consistency arise, along with questions concerning how prints might be altered from original negatives (glass slides or film) before the Digital Age of computer imaging. In general, important landscape features are difficult to locate from text discussions of photos. In particular, the entire Mount McKinley series of photos and maps of glaciers, ridges and camps is hard for a reader to assess.

This book is a huge labor which falls somewhat short of its goal of making whopping amounts of information intelligible. I look forward to the next edition with more readable graphics and reworked text.

The book's title promises a "resolution" to the great Cook/Peary debate, and resolution is indeed to be found: but I had so much fun along the way that I was sorry when the book ended.

The author carefully and dispassionately relates and evaluates events, claims, counter-claims, and rhetoric surrounding the flamboyant career of Fred Cook, with rather less emphasis on Robert Peary. One is not really surprised to find the bulk of the text taken up with following Dr. Cook's career in light of the fact that his has been the more controversial vita.

My previous exposure to this controversy has been all on the Peary side and I found this narrative to be a real eye-opener in multiple respects. My understanding of the issues, and my sympathies for both men, are quite altered as a result of having read this book.

The partisan passion that Cook versus Peary still arouses in the hearts and minds of intelligent and otherwise rational people is astounding. This book is a real gem on multiple levels: not just for its careful assembly of facts, claims, and suppositions, but for what it has to say about media -- mass communications -- and the psychology of explorers and the people who support them.

Finally, I found this to be an amazingly graceful read for a book of its size -- so absorbing that I found myself regretfully approaching the end of the book in half the time expected. Well written, well researched, carefully presented -- a great book to have in the library!

I came to this book after reading an illustrated article in a climbing magazine showing the photographs of Bradford Washburn to disprove Cook's claim to have climbed Mt. McKinley. That issue is thoroughly covered in this book by Robert Bryce but it is very much secondary to the larger issue of the discovery of the North Pole. It is true that the book could have used some editing to lesson the author's habit of mixing unimportant facts with the important. Still, a reading of the book and a review of the bibliography and source notes, along with a recognition of the number of books already written on this topic, made me realize the heroic task the author undertook to bring this book in under 2,000 pages. The fact that there is enough information to publish a 2,000 page books explains why this book is readable, and even compelling, at almost 1,000 pages in the main text. It is not a sterile recitation of a long series of facts. We become acquainted with American society as it existed at the turn of the last century, the habits of the newspaper industry, the lecture circuit and vaudeville as prime entertainment, and there is even a long digression into oil stock fraud. We learn the history, character and motives of numerous minor players in the polar fraud controversy. I even found much of Cook's writings and personal philosophy to be compelling. The long trail to the conclusion that fraud was perpetrated by both men leaves the reader with not only with the facts, but with an explanation. I think that understanding why these men did what they did is as valuable as the feeling that the mystery has been solved.

First of all, you must know that this is much more of a Frederick A Cook book than a Robert E Peary book. In fact, I got the sense that Peary was a supporting character to Cook. Some chapters were truly gripping, such as the Groenland Expedition where Cook and Peary worked together.

Page after page, the obvious main theme is that Doctor Cook was a very good human being, that his accomplishments were awesome and that, even if he may have faked his Mount McKinley climb and his North Pole discovery, his name should light the Southern and Northern skies in letters of fire. Many are those who owned him their lives. He was respectful of all the Natives he ever encounter.

On the other hand, what positive thing is there to say about Peary? He faked his North Pole attainment as well, exagerated many of his discoveries, abandonned to hunger and cold 2 of his own child in the frozen North, believed that Eskimos were his slaves to command...Not the kind of person you would want as a friend.

I don't want to say too much because there is so much to learn from this book. Read it and make you own mind as to who really get to the Pole and who was best.

As a piece of scholarship, this is a definitive book. I am using it and related materials in a seminar about research methods. It is not an "easy read" and the numerous relevant illustrations are sometimes smaller than is comfortable to examine. However, it is one of the few sources where you can find reams of verifiable references to the lives of Cook and Peary. Those who believe that Cook and Peary told the truth about their polar "adventures" will probably find ways to discount the mountain of evidence that Bryce has made available. The density of detail takes patient reading, but leaves a reader free to compare interpretations with Bryce's clearly marked conclusions. The author has covered the controversy thoroughly, including taking the trouble to evaluate a copy of Cook's diary archived in Denmark. Those wishing to spend time with this book will be rewarded with credible information about one of the fascinating human stories of the last two centuries.

One of my favorites among my polar exploration books, this ginormous slab of a tome might chill the reader's initial interest with its iceberg-like heft--were it not so absorbing on every page. The author plumbs deeply into the motivations of these two different, yet equally conflicted and complicated men and sketches in fine detail their cultural milieu.

When reading of Cook's later career, I was fascinated to get a sense of the vaudeville and chautauqua worlds, not to mention the wildcat oil world in Texas. The icy, haughty Peary comes off as a less sympathetic character, but still fascinating, with a nature of such crusty cast iron that he explored Arctic regions while missing seven frozen-off toes.

I like to reread this book every other year or so to reacquaint myself with the frenzied quest for the Pole and the whole bubbling societal swirl accompanying that quest.

Favorite quote: "Cook was a liar and a gentleman, and Peary was neither."

Mr. Bryce has done an excellent job , both in research and commitment to "historical fact" in bringing together such an easily read book on such a controversial topic. I especially enjoyed the way he kept the reader firmly entrenched in the 19th century, which is imperative I believe, as it allows for a better understanding of the social causes and events of that day.

I am sure that it is with some humor that Mr. Bryce reads the reviews of his labor, as it is quite obvious that the controversy still has more than one camp, human nature ensures it. His proofs to me are only partly in that I hear these new voices of disagreement in a 19th century flavour and now have the tools to make my own decision. Thank you Mr. Bryce.

In early 1909, Frederick A. Cook emerged from the arctic wastes to claim primacy in attaining the North Pole. Five days later, Cook's former mentor, Robert E. Peary, emerged to claim the same while systematically attempting to destroy the claim of his newfound rival. What followed was a controversy of bitter and lasting enmity that raged through the press, the public, and the scientific community here and abroad.

Robert Bryce has compiled a painstakingly detailed analysis of the Cook/Peary controversy that is awesome in its' depth. Separated into two parts, he first submits a complete biography of the two explorers and then follows with his resolution of fact and fiction regarding their two respective claims. Bryce not only peered closely at these two antagonists, but at the institutions within which the controversy swirled. His commentary on the roles played by the New York Times and the National Geographic Society are highly illuminating as are his depictions of the ardent supporters and detractors of either side.

Both Peary and Cook are tragic figures displayed in the throes of their obsessions and, yet, Bryce admirably presents an impartial, objective picture. His final analysis is shrewd, though compassionate. Frederick A. Cook, regardless of final resolution, remains an enigma. The depth of this man's psyche is plumbed so exquisitely by Bryce that Cook's mental machinations ultimately outweigh the question the book attempts to answer.

Who truly stepped first upon the North Pole? Surprisingly, by the time Robert M. Bryce completes his fascinating story, this is not the foremost question in the readers' mind. One can rest assured, however, that Bryce's effort is as thoroughly fulfilling a treatment of the subject as one may hope to find.

While Mr. Bryce starts out being fair to both Cook and Peary, the loveable charlatan Fred Cook exercises a spell over him he cannot break. Fairminded people for decades have believed neither man reached the pole, and this book is the closest we can reach to proof -- a logical train of evidence that leads to the inescapable conclusion that both men, for their own reasons of pride, lied about their achievements. And this is a shame, since both showed courage, patience, perseverance, and both managed to survive conditions that are unimaginably horrid to most of us. Both men earned some honor in their own way, and both marred it with lies and recriminations. A truly great book, but perhaps too intricate for the novice in polar studies -- or for those with their own axes to grind.