Ships of Wood and Men of Iron: A Norwegian-Canadian Saga of Exploration in the High Arctic

Gordon Turner is the author of Empress of Britain: Canadian Pacific’s
Greatest Ship and the editor of SeaFare, a quarterly newsletter on sea
travel.

In the history of exploration, Otto Sverdrup’s name is relatively
unknown to Canadians, yet he made a significant contribution to our
knowledge of Canada’s High Arctic. Henry Larsen of St. Roch fame rated
him better than Fridtjof Nansen and Roald Amundsen in competence and
versatility. Sverdrup and Nansen, both Norwegians, designed the famed
ship Fram, which began its first Arctic voyage in 1893 with Nansen in
charge of scientific endeavours and Sverdrup as the ship’s captain.

In 1898, with Sverdrup in command of both ship and expedition, the Fram
began an epic four-year voyage of discovery, whose twofold purpose was
to explore several large Arctic islands and to claim sovereignty over
them for Norway. Canada had long considered the islands to be part of
Canada, but had done little to support its claim. Sverdrup’s team
included a cartographer, a geologist, a botanist, and a zoologist, who
performed invaluable scientific work during their four years in the
Arctic and planted their country’s flag on the inhospitable lands. In
this well-researched and capably written book, which contains some good
photographs and useful maps, Kenney describes not only the
accomplishments of the voyage, but also the daunting hardships the men
faced, particularly in the long and bitter winters, often using excerpts
from Sverdrup’s journal to illustrate the privations.

News of Norway’s territorial claims spurred Canada to reinforce its
own sovereignty over the now-disputed islands, but not until 1930 did
Norway relinquish its claims. The author relates at shorter length the
Arctic journeys of Joseph-Elzear Bernier, Vilhjalmur Stefansson, and
Larsen, whose expeditions buttressed Canada’s sovereignty over the
region. Nowadays, with global warming a serious concern in polar
regions, Kenney’s book provides a timely reminder of the importance of
the Arctic islands in Canadian and universal contexts.