Robert Peary (1856–1920)
Born 1856 CE, died 1920 CE.
Robert Edwin Peary (; May 6, 1856 – February 20, 1920) was an American explorer and officer in the United States Navy who made several expeditions to the Arctic in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was long credited as being the discoverer of the geographic North Pole in April 1909, having led the first expedition to have claimed this achievement, although it is now considered unlikely that he actually reached the Pole. Peary was born in Cresson, Pennsylvania, but, following his father's death at a young age, was raised in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He attended Bowdoin College, then joined the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey as a draftsman. He enlisted in the navy in 1881 as a civil engineer. In 1885, he was made chief of surveying for the Nicaragua Canal, which was never built. He visited the Arctic for the first time in 1886, making an unsuccessful attempt to cross Greenland by dogsled. In the Peary expedition to Greenland of 1891–1892, he was much better prepared, and by reaching Independence Fjord in what is now known as Peary Land, he proved conclusively that Greenland was an island. He was one of the first Arctic explorers to study Inuit survival techniques.
Text from the Wikipedia article Robert_Peary, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.