My attainment of the Pole

by Frederick Albert Cook

With the advance of winter, storms of frightful ferocity began to arise. Inasmuch as we had stored meat and blubber in large quantities about our camp, it was not necessary at these times to venture out to dig up supplies from great depths of snow drift. During these periods hands were employed busily inside the igloos. Although a large quantity of animals and furs had been gathered by the hunters before our arrival, we now unexpectedly discovered that the supply was inadequate. According to my plans, a large party of picked natives would accompany me to land's end and somewhat beyond on the Polar sea when I started for my dash in the coming spring. As spring is the best hunting season, it was therefore imperative to secure sufficient advance provisions for the families of these men in addition to preparing requisites for my expedition. So the early days of the winter would have to be busily occupied by the men in a ceaseless hunt for game, and later, even when the darkness had fully fallen, the moonlight days and nights would thus have to be utilized also.

In the Polar cycle of the seasons there are peculiar conditions which apply to circumstances and movements. As the word, seasons, is ordinarily understood, there are but two, a winter season and a summer season—a winter season of nine months and a summer of three months.

But, for more convenient division of the yearly periods, it is best to retain the usual cycle of four seasons. Eskimos call the winter "ookiah," which also means year, and the summer "onsah." Days are "sleeps." The months are moons, and the periods are named in accord with the movements of various creatures of the chase.

In early September at Annoatok the sun dips considerably under the northern horizon. There is no night. At sunset and at sunrise storm clouds hide the bursts of color which are the glory of twilight, and the electric afterglow is generally lost in a dull gray.

The gloom of the coming winter night now thickens. The splendor of the summer day has gone. A day of six months and a night of six months is often ascribed to the Polar regions as a whole, but this is only true of a very small area about the Pole.

As we come south, the sun slips under the horizon for an ever-increasing part of each twenty-four hours. Preceding and following the night, as we come from the Pole, there is a period of day and night which lengthens with the descent of latitude.

It is this period which enables us to retain the names of the usual seasons—summer for the double days, fall for the period of the setting sun. This season begins when the sun first dips under the ice at midnight for a few moments. These moments increase rapidly, yet one hardly appreciates that the sun is departing until day and night are of equal length, for the night remains light, though not cheerful. Then the day rapidly shortens and darkens, and the sun sinks until at last there is but a mere glimmer of the glory of day. Winter is limited to the long night, and spring applies to the days of the rising sun, a period corresponding to the autumn days of the setting sun.

At Annoatok the midnight sun is first seen on April 23. It dips in the sea on August 19. It thus encircles the horizon, giving summer and continuous day for one hundred and eighteen days. It sets at midday on October 24, and is absent a period of prolonged night corresponding to the day, and it rises on February 19. The Arctic air, with its low temperature and its charge of frosted humidity, so distorts the sun's rays that when low it is frequently lifted one or two diameters; therefore, the exact day or hour for sunrise or sunset does not correspond to mathematical calculations. Then follow days of spring.

In the fall, when the harmonizing influence of the sun is withdrawn, there begins a battle of the elements which continues until stilled by the hopeless frost of early night.

At this time, although field work was painful, the needs of our venture forced us to persistent action in the chase of walrus, seal, narwhal and white whale. We thus harvested food and fuel.