A Brief History
On December 14, 1911, Roald Amundsen of Norway narrowly beat a doomed English expedition to win the race to the South Pole!
Digging Deeper
Digging deeper, we find the Norwegian team of Amundsen (the tenth most famous explorer in history!) and 4 other men arriving just over a month before the Robert Scott led English expedition reached the South Pole only to find the Norwegian flag and evidence of Amundsen’s feat.
While the Norwegians made it back to base camp safely, the ill fated Englishmen died along the way back, carrying the crushing burden of knowing they had been beaten.
Roald Amundsen was an accomplished explorer and learned during his forays into Eskimo country (Inuit and Aleut Native Americans were then known as Eskimos) gave him the experience and the knowledge from the natives of how to survive in polar conditions.
Key items of knowledge included the use of meat to stave off disease, use of sled dogs, and how to use animal skin based clothing instead of the more conventional but less effective wool then used by Europeans. Amundsen used this expertise to carefully equip and plan his expedition, and set off with 4 sleds pulled by 54 dogs. His plan included eating some of the dogs on his return trip, which they did! The 5 men returned with only 11 of what was once 54 dogs.
The doomed Scott expedition used a combination of inferior dogs, horses ill suited for polar conditions, and motorized sleds (an early version of snowmobiles). In 1911, the state of gasoline engine reliability was nothing like today, and with the failure of his inferior animals, Scott and friends paid for their mistakes with their lives.
Not one to rest on his laurels, Roald Amundsen later led a trip to the North Pole in 1926 and became the first (with his companions) to verifiably reach the North Pole. The previous expeditions of Cook, Peary and Byrd all claimed to have reached the North Pole earlier, but each of those claims are disputed today. (Note: Amundsen’s North Pole feat was achieved via aircraft.)
Amundsen died in 1928 in the Arctic while flying on a rescue mission, probably crashing into the Barents Sea. He is remembered today with numerous land marks and bodies of water in the Arctic and Antarctic named after him.
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Historical Evidence
For a good biography of Amundsen, see the following:
Bown, Stephen R. The Last Viking: The Life of Roald Amundsen (A Merloyd Lawrence Book). Da Capo Press, 2012.
For a gripping account of Amundsen and Scott’s rival expeditions, please read this book:
Huntford, Roland. Race for the South Pole: The Expedition Diaries of Scott and Amundsen. Continuum, 2010.
The featured image in this article, a photograph of members of Roald Amundsen’s South Pole expedition at the pole itself, December 1911, is in the public domain in the United States because it was first published outside the United States prior to January 1, 1926.
<span class="dsq-postid" data-dsqidentifier="860 http://www.crackedhistory.com/?p=860">27 Comments
I love reading expedition stories like these. It is impressive to see what these leaders go through to survive, and seeing the end accomplishments are always so rewarding.
I can only imagine what it was like for Amundsen to see the South Pole for the first time. He was truly someone to celebrate and is one of the great explorers. However, one thing that I didnt like was the competition between Norway and England. The death of those English explorers was very tragic and I think that rather than make it a competition, why couldn’t they have worked together? Why couldn’t Norway share its expertise with the English and the English work with them and they could have done a joint expedition?
Explorers like Amundsen had to be very knowledgable in order to survive during their expeditions in the wild. I can not imagine having to analyze each decision I am faced with to see if it would put my life at risk like they had done. It is sad that they had to eat their dogs in order to make it back. I am sure if I were in the same position I would have done the same thing.
I journey to the South Pole is a courageous one which requires a lot of knowledge in order to survive. This is an impressive race to the finish line by Amundsen.
Very few people in this world would say they are going to make trip to the South Pole. It would take a lot of guts and determination to travel down and be able to survive. Amundsen obviously took a lot of time to prepare and make sure he was not one of the ones to die on this trip.
Reading about stories like Amundsen’s is always interesting. It is amazing to see someone’s will and inner strength to survive in such severe conditions as the ones on the South Pole. Having to eat the dogs that helped them through the journey must not have been easy, but again, the team went out there with a mission and they accomplished it. So inspirational!
Amundsen’s battle to get to the South Pole before anyone else is a courageous battle that is still hard to do in today with the harsh conditions. When traveling in these kinds of conditions sacrifices have to be made and eating your own dog is terrible. Impressive to finish first no matter how hey did it by foot.
I cannot believe the story of the dogs! Although it theoretically makes sense, it sounds terrible! Leaving with 54 dogs and coming back with 11, poor dogs! I wonder what life must be like at those conditions; I can only imagine because I will never be there.
Amundsen was an intelligent man learning from the local Eskimos how to survive a brutal winter by wearing animal skins and eating meat. Unfortunately, the English, either thinking themselves superior to the primitive Eskimos or just being too prideful to learn their ways, we’re not as successful as Amundsen. It’s crazy Amundsen ate over 40 dogs in order to servive the trip to the south poll and back.
Another famous person that died in a plane crash! Either way Amundsen seems to have been a pretty amazing man. It is also nice to see a country other that the US or England win something in those days.
What an adventure. Making it to the South Pole is definitely a huge accomplishment, but it’s sad to see he died from a plane crash on a rescue mission. The fact that he left with 54 dogs and only returned with 11 really shows you the extreme weather these men and animals had to go through.
Reaching the north pole was an incredible feat. That was smart of them to bring their country’s flag with them so show future explorers that they had already accomplished the respectable feat of reaching the north pole. Also, it was wise to listen to the Eskimos because they obviously have a good understanding of what it takes to survive in polar conditions.
Explorers in the early 1900’s were surely not scared of extreme conditions. Roald probably would not have survived his exploration to the South Pole if he had not listened to the ways of the native americans. Too bad the Scotts did not have this luxury.
Amundsen seemed to have really thought this expedition before he went on it with people. He talked to natives to see what his men should bring and how to survive the harsh conditions. This is probably why no one on his team died. As for the Englishmen that tried to be the first ones there, they lost one guy most likely due to the harsh conditions and feeling defeated for not being the first ones there.
Through out the articles from this week multiple famous people have died from plane crashes. It is upsetting to see so many amazing lives lost in this manner. Amundsen had really planned out his expedition and did everything in his power to make sure he came out alive. It is amazing that he was willing to travel through such harsh conditions.
Amundsen is rightly recognized as one of the greatest explorers of all time. Having the intelligence to plan out his trek to the pole beforehand with past knowledge of cold conditions is what made him win the race. I am surprised however that it took mankind until 1911 and 1926 to make it to the south pole and north pole, respectively. With our ambition you would think we would have gotten it sooner.
Amundsen was a great explorer and was the first to discover both the North and South Pole. He must have been an intelligent man to be able to know how to survive in polar conditions. It really saddened me that Amundsen and his men had to eat some of the dogs they brought with them in order to survive. I know it was all in the name of survival, but as a dog lover I cannot help but feel a little sickened by the thought.
For Amundsen to make successful trips to both the North and South Pole with limited resources (compared to what we have today) is a great feat. This article is just another example of how much technology has advanced throughout the years. Although it may seem like a while ago, the 1920s and 1930s was less than 100 years ago, and since then, we have improved travel tremendously both through ground and air travel.
Roald Amundsen was much more equipped for the weather of the south pole than the team led by Robert Scott. Starting with 54 dogs and ending up with only 11 is sad, especially since I am sure they ate most of those that were now gone. Travel has greatly improved since then, but I’m sure Amundsen’s use of dogs is something that stuck with us through time as they are usually the animal then to the such extreme cold.
The Norwegian team was definitely smarter to get advice from the natives on how to survive the Polar conditions. Research is always a good thing to do. If the English would have done some research may be they would not have died on their way back from defeat.
Amundsen was resourceful because he learned some tricks on how to survive from the Eskimos. By following the advice, he was better equipped to complete his mission than the ill fated British team. Amundsen will forever be remembered as the man who went to the South Pole first.
It seems that because Amundsen took his time to figure out the essentials to the expedition, he was first successful.
Being well prepared, or too prepared is never a bad idea. This is why Amundsen was successful on his venture.
A joinery to the South Pole takes someone with a lot of courage and knowledge.
I would never have expected the South Pole to have been vistied BEFORE the North Pole! Amundsen’s exploration explains why Norway still claims a zone of influence in Antarctica and conducts research there.
If he never took the time to prepare himself, he would have never succeeded.
The dog eating really put a damper on my night.