Nearest the Pole / a narrative of the polar expedition of the Peary Arctic Club in the S.S. Roosevelt, 1905-1906

by Robert E. Peary

To keep even these heavy sides from being crushed in, they were reinforced by heavy deck beams placed unusually close together, and a lower tier of heavy beams just below the water-line forming with steel rods and inclined posts and struts to the ship’s sides and bilges, a strong truss at an interval of every four feet in the length of the ship.

The housing of the personnel of the expedition in light structures on deck, which personal experience has shown to be much the simpler and better plan than below decks, permits a stronger and more effective arrangement of these trusses than has been attained in previous ships. The interior of the bow, which is to the ship what the cestus was to the ancient gladiator, is filled in solid with timbers and iron.

The stern also, as well as the stem, is iron-plated, and the rudder post, which is the Achilles’s heel of an Arctic ship, is of unusually strong construction. The rudder is so arranged that it can be hoisted on deck out of the way of the ice if necessary. The propeller is so arranged that it can be used either as a two-bladed or a four-bladed propeller, and is made of unusual strength. Powerful deck appliances in the shape of windlass, steam capstans and winch, enable the ship to warp herself out of a dangerous place, or pull herself off the bottom should she get aground.

The whole plan and theory of the ship was, first, that her strength, her power, her weight, her carrying capacity, should all be below the main deck, and that everything above deck—houses, bulwarks, spars, sails, rigging, boats and equipment—should be as light as possible, to permit more coal in the hold; and second, that not a dollar was to be wasted on fittings or frills, everything to be for strength, power, and effectiveness.

The keel of the Roosevelt was laid October 15, 1904, in the McKay & Dix shipyard at Bucksport, Maine, and the ship was launched the 23d of March, 1905, Mrs. Peary shattering a block of ice containing a bottle of champagne against the steel-clad stem as the hull glided down the ways and christening the ship Roosevelt.

The installation of the machinery began two days later at Portland, Maine, and was practically completed in less than two months.

The official measurements of the ship are as follows: length, 184 feet; breadth, 35.5 feet; depth, 16.2 feet; gross registered tonnage, 614 tons; maximum load displacement, about 1,500 tons. The backbone of the ship, viz. keel, main keelson, stem and stern posts, as also her frames, plank sheer, the waterways, and garboard strake, are white oak. Beams, sister keelsons, deck clamps, ’tween-deck waterways, bilge strakes, ceiling, and inner course of planking, yellow pine. Outer planking, white oak, and decks, Oregon pine. Both the ceiling and outer course of white oak planking are edge-bolted from stem to stern and from plank sheer to garboard strake. The fastenings are galvanised iron bolts, going through both courses of planking and the frames, and riveting up over washers on the inside of the ceiling.

Special features of the ship are as follows:

First, in model, a pronounced raking stem and wedge-shaped bow; very sharp dead rise of floor, affording a form of side which cannot be grasped by the ice; a full run to keep the ice away from the propeller; a pronounced overhang at the stern to still further protect the propeller, and a raking stern-post.

Second, peculiarities of construction; the unusual fastening, as noted above; the unusual and massive arrangement of the beams, and bracing of the sides to resist pressure; the introduction of screw tie rods to bind the ship together; the development of the ’tween-deck beams and waterways on a water-line, instead of on a sheer, like the upper-deck beams; the placing of the ceiling continuous from sister keelson to upper-deck clamps, and the placing of the ’tween-deck waterways, deck clamps, and the bilge strakes on top of the ceiling; the filling in of the bow almost solid where it meets the impact of the ice; the massive and unusual reinforcement of the rudder post to prevent twisting; the adoption of a lifting rudder, which may be raised out of danger from contact with the ice; the armouring of the stem and bows with heavy plates of steel; the protection of the outer planking with a 2–inch course of greenheart ice sheathing.