The Last Secrets: The Final Mysteries of Exploration

by John Buchan

On the south these glaciers were drained by the Susitna River, with its tributaries the Yentna and the Chulitna, and on its northern face by the affluents of the Yukon. If the traveller attempted to reach it in summer he might find a difficult waterway up to the beginning of the glaciers, but then he had thirty miles of ice to cross before he reached the base, and over these he must transport everything on his back. In winter the journey might be made by dogs, but winter in those latitudes was scarcely the time to travel. Moreover, Mount McKinley, unlike the other great peaks in the world, rose from a low elevation. In the case of the South American and Himalayan peaks climbing does not begin until an altitude of at least 10,000 feet has been reached, and their line of perpetual snow is very high. It is possible, for example, to cover the 22,860 feet of Aconcagua without ever touching snow. But in Mount McKinley the snow-line was not much more than 2,500 feet, and there was something like 15,000 feet of climbing. Again, its position so far north did not permit the snows to melt properly in the summer, or to grow hard and pack. Its snowfall was so great that the snow never got into the condition which eases the path of the mountaineer. Finally—and this applied especially to a winter journey—it was situated in a land of desperate storms. The severest weather conditions ever recorded by the American Meteorological Bureau occurred at Mount Washington, which is only 6,000 feet above the sea, where the temperature was 40 degrees below zero and the wind 180 miles an hour. What might the climber expect 20,000 feet up in the sky, with nothing between him and the North Pole?

The attempt on Mount McKinley, therefore, was not a thing to be lightly undertaken. It meant a journey to the remote Alaskan coast, and then some 200 miles through difficult and little known country before even the base was reached. What the climbing would be like no one could tell. The obvious route, as the map will show, was the Susitna River, by which, indeed, its first explorer, a young Princeton graduate called Dickey, had approached it in 1896. It was he who christened it Mount McKinley. He fell into an argument with another prospector who was a rabid champion of free silver, and after many weary days' dispute retaliated by naming the mountain after the champion of the gold standard. In 1903 an expedition, led by the too famous Dr. Cook, reached the base from the north, but failed to do any climbing. Then, in 1906, began the explorations of Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Browne, who were destined six years later to be the conquerors of the peak.

I

The 1906 expedition may be roughly sketched, for, though it was a failure, it at least taught its leaders what routes were not possible. They started with pack-horses and a motor-boat, with the intention of trying the north-western face. They ascended the Yentna River, which enters the Susitna from the west, but found it impossible to cross the southern flanks of the Alaskan range. They then turned up the south side of the range, and reached the glacier out of which the Tokositna River flows. By this time their transport was in a precarious condition, and their horses could go no farther. They were within view of Mount McKinley, and saw not only the impossibility of the southern face, but the extraordinary difficulties of approaching even its base from that direction. They accordingly returned to the coast, where Dr. Cook left them, announcing that he intended to make one final desperate attempt on the mountain.

Mount McKinley.

Presently Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Browne heard, to their surprise, the rumour that Dr. Cook had succeeded. Knowing that the feat was impossible in so short a time, they disbelieved the tale, and stated their views publicly in New York. Then appeared Dr. Cook's notorious book; but before it was published he had departed for the Arctic regions. Geographical circles in America were torn with the controversy. A committee of the Explorers' Club investigated the question, but Dr. Cook refused to give evidence. Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Browne were meantime busy with their own plans for another attempt.

The 1910 expedition was again directed to the southern face. Their reasons were that for most of the journey to that face a water route was possible, and that if they failed there they believed they would be able to go on to the southern North-East ridge, which, from what they had heard and seen, they believed to be the most promising avenue of attack. They also wished to duplicate the photographs which Dr. Cook had published, and so prove or disprove his bona fides. Also, the northern side of the great mountain had been already fairly well mapped, but nothing had been done on the south side.

The notion of a pack train was discarded, and all their energies were directed towards designing the right kind of boat in which to ascend the Susitna and its tributary the Chulitna till they reached the glaciers. The party consisted of eight, including a young man from Seattle, Mr. Merl La Voy, who was exceptionally fitted by Providence for the work of a pioneer. The present writer had many dealings with Mr. La Voy during the Great War, and can confidently say that he never met any one more intrepid, audacious, and resourceful.