|
330 B.C. ca |
Pytheas of Massilia spends six years exploring Britain and the waters north of Scotland. |
|
870 A.D. ca |
Floki Vilgerdarson discovers
Iceland. |
|
983 |
Erik the Red discovers
Greenland. |
|
1000 |
Leif Eriksson seeks America
crosses the Atlantic to Newfoundland. |
|
1594-1597 |
Willem Barents makes
three journeys to the north and discovers Spitsbergen. |
|
1607-1610 |
Henry Hudson makes three
voyages to Greenland, Spitsbergen, Jan Mayen, Hudson River and Hudson Bay. |
|
1615-1616 |
William Baffin and Robert
Bylot make two voyages to Hudson Bay and Baffin Bay. |
|
1725-1742 |
The Great Northern Expedition takes place led by Bering Chirikov Khariton and Dmitri Laptev Chelyuskin and others to
the Bering Sea and Arctic Siberia |
|
1778 |
Captain James Cook goes
to Northeast Siberia and Alaska; establishes the separation between the Asian
and American continents. |
|
1819-1820 |
William Edward Parry's
first voyage in search of the Northwest Passage reaches Melville Island. |
|
1819-1822 |
John Franklin's first
overland/canoe expedition down the Coppermine River and east to Point Turnagain
in search of the Northwest Passage (in conjunction with the Parry voyage.) It
ends disastrously with eleven members of the expedition losing their lives. |
|
1821-1823 |
Parry's second voyage
in search of the Northwest Passage reaches Fury and Hecla Strait from Hudson Bay.
|
|
1824-1825 |
Parry's third and final
voyage to the Canadian Arctic again in search of the Northwest Passage ends with
the wreck of one of his vessels on Fury Beach Somerset Island. |
|
1825-1827 |
John Franklin's second
overland/canoe expedition to the Arctic Sea coast of the Canadian mainland. His
parties explore and map more than a thousand miles of coastline from Coronation
Gulf to Prudhoe Bay Alaska. |
|
1827 |
Parry's expedition attempting
to reach the North Pole via Spitsbergen; he reaches 82°45' North and establishes
a farthest north that will stand for fifty years. |
|
1831 |
James Clark Ross is the
first to reach the North Magnetic Pole. |
|
1837-1839 |
Peter Dease and Thomas
Simpson of the Hudson Bay Company overland/boat expedition to fill in gaps on
the coastline left by Franklin from Point Barrow in the west to Castor and Pollux
Bay (Rae Strait) in the east. |
|
1845-1847 |
Sir John Franklin's expedition aboard the vessels Erebus and Terror in search of the Northwest Passage. |
|
1848-1849 |
James Clark Ross expedition
in search of Sir John Franklin with vessels Investigator and Enterprise. |
|
1848-1851 |
John Richardson accompanied
by Dr. John Rae leads land expedition to the Mackenzie River Wollaston Peninsula
and elsewhere on Victoria Island in search of Franklin. |
|
1848-1851 |
Plover and Herald reach
Bering Strait; Lieutenant W.J.S. Pullen leads expedition by boat in search of
Franklin exploring the Arctic coastline to the Mackenzie delta. |
|
1850-1854 |
Robert McClure leads
expedition in Investigator through the Bering Strait in search of Franklin. He
establishes the last link in one route of the Northwest Passage and claims the
parliamentary award for its discovery. |
|
1850-1855 |
Richard Collinson commands
the Enterprise part of the expedition through the Bering Strait in search of Franklin.
|
|
1850-1851 |
William Penny expedition
with the Lady Franklin and Sophia to the eastern Arctic in search of Franklin.
|
|
1850-1851 |
Horatio T. Austin commands
official four-ship Admiralty expedition to the eastern Arctic in search of Franklin.
|
|
1850-1851 |
Sir John Ross aged seventy
three leads a private expedition in search of Franklin. |
|
1850 |
Charles Codrington Forsyth
leads Lady Franklin's privately financed expedition in search of her husband on
the Prince Albert. |
|
1850-1851 |
Edwin J. DeHaven leads
the first U.S. expedition to the Arctic in search of Franklin. Elisha Kent Kane
is surgeon on one of DeHaven's two vessels. |
|
1851-1852 |
William Kennedy accompanied
by Joseph-René Bellot leads another expedition privately financed by Lady Franklin
in search of her husband. |
|
1852-1854 |
Sir Edward Belcher leads
a five-ship Admiralty expedition in search of Franklin. |
|
1852 |
Edward A. Inglefield
explores Smith and Jones Sounds returning to England with the (false) story that
Franklin had been murdered by Greenland Eskimos. |
|
1853-1855 |
Elisha Kent Kane leads
the second U.S. expedition in search of Sir John Franklin choosing a Smith Sound
route. |
|
1853-1854 |
Dr. John Rae sent by
the Hudson's Bay Company to complete a coastal survey in the area of King William
Land and Boothia discovers relics of the Franklin Expedition in the possession
of the Eskimos. British authorities gave him the $10000 reward for establishing
the fate of the expedition. |
|
1857-1859 |
Francis Leopold M'Clintock
leads the Fox expedition financed by Lady Franklin that confirms Rae's report
of Franklin's fate. |
|
1860-1861 |
Issac Hayes leads a U.S.
expedition in search of the open Polar Sea. |
|
1860-1862 |
American, Charles Hall, makes his first Arctic journey in search of Franklin survivors. |
|
1864-1869 |
Hall's second expedition
reaches King William Island. |
|
1871-1873 |
Charles Hall's third
expedition in search of the North Pole aboard the Polaris Hall dies under mysterious
circumstances in November 1871. On the return voyage half the Polaris' crew are
stranded on the ice in a storm and drift for six months before being rescued by
whalers. |
|
1875-1876 |
George Nares leads the
British Navy's last attempt at Arctic exploration in search of the North Pole.
His two ships were based in north Ellesmere Island. |
|
1878 |
Baron Nordenskiãld completes
the first successful navigation of the Northeast Passage. |
|
1879-1882 |
Lieutenant George Washington
DeLong of the U.S. Navy commands the ill-fated Jeannette expedition searching
for the North Pole from Siberia. |
|
1881-1884 |
Adolphus Greely leads
an American expedition to Ellesmere Island as part of the First International
Polar Year. His junior officer Lieutenant Lockwood establishes a farthest north
taking from the British a record they have held for three centuries. Only six
of twenty-four expedition members survive. |
|
1886 |
Robert Peary attempts
and fails to cross Greenland. |
|
1888 |
Fridtjof Nansen makes
the first crossing of Greenland. |
|
1891-1892 |
Peary's first large Arctic
expedition to North Greenland. |
|
1893-1895 |
Peary's second Greenland
expedition. |
|
1893-1895 |
Fridtjof Nansen with
Otto Sverdrup in the Fram drifts across the Arctic Ocean and establishes a new
farthest north. |
|
1898-1902 |
Peary's third Arctic
expedition fails in its attempt to reach the North Pole. |
|
1899-1900 |
The Duke of Abruzzi leads
an expedition in search of the Pole from Franz Josef Land; Lieutenant Cagni establishes
a farthest north 22 miles beyond Nansen's. |
|
1903-1905 |
Roald Amundsen completes
the first successful navigation of the Northwest Passage. |
|
1905-1906 |
Peary's fourth Arctic
expedition fails in its attempt at the Pole but establishes a new farthest north.
|
|
1907-1909 |
Frederick Cook claims
to have reached the North Pole. |
|
1908-1909 |
Peary claims to have
reached the North Pole. |
|
1921-1924 |
Knud Rasmussen's 5th
Thule Expedition across Arctic America. |
|
1926 |
Richard E. Byrd overflies the Pole in a Fokker trimotor plane. |
|
1958 |
U.S.S. Nautilus (nuclear
submarine) passes under the Pole. |
|
1958 |
The Skate becomes the first submarine to surface through the ice at the Pole. |
|
1968 |
Ralph Plaisted reaches the Pole using snowmobiles with air support. |
|
1969 |
Wally Herbert leads a dogsled expedition from Alaska to Svalbard with air support. |
|
1977 |
Naomi Uemura makes a solo overland trek to the Pole. |
|
1986 |
Paul Schurke and Will
Steger lead a dogsled expedition to the Pole without resupply. Ann Bancroft becomes the first woman to complete such an expedition. |
|
1992 |
Helen Thayer does a one-woman solo trek to the Pole. |
