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Walter Wellman
Walter E. Wellman (November 3, 1858 – January 31, 1934) was an American journalist, explorer, and aeronaut.
Walter Wellman was born in Mentor, Ohio, in 1858. He was the sixth son of Alonzo Wellman and the fourth by his second wife Minerva Sibilla (Graves) Wellman. Walter's father, Alonzo, served three years in the American Civil War while Walter was young. He was initially with Company D of the 105th Ohio Infantry before becoming a ship-carpenter with the Mississippi River Squadron. When he returned from the war, he took his family west from Ohio to become pioneer settlers of York County, Nebraska.
At age 14 Walter established a weekly newspaper in Sutton, Nebraska. At age 21 Walter returned to Ohio to establish the Cincinnati Evening Post and married Laura McCann in Canton, Ohio on 24 December 1879. They had five daughters. In 1884 he became political and Washington DC correspondent for the Chicago Herald and Record-Herald.
For a news story, Wellman was asked by the Chicago Herald to visit and assess various candidates for the initial landing place of Christopher Columbus in the Americas. He marked the presumed location on San Salvador Island in the Bahamas with a monument in 1892.
In 1894, Wellman led a polar expedition. He chartered the Norwegian ice steamer Ragnvald Jarl from Ålesund and assembled a team of 14 expedition members, mostly from the US and Norway. After an easy passage to the north of Svalbard, the ship reached the ice pack at Waldenøya. With sledges and aluminium boats, the expedition made their way to Martensøya from where they intended to continue to the pole when the Ragnwald Jarl lying at Waldenøya was pierced by ice and sank. Wellman gave up his polar ambitions and instead explored the northeast of Svalbard, reaching a latitude of 81° N. The exploring party and the ship's crew then retreated to Lågøya, where they were found by the Norwegian seal-hunting ship Berntine. Wellman offered the captain 800 $ for taking the whole expedition back immediately.
Wellman made another attempt on the North Pole in 1898. Evelyn Briggs Baldwin was his second-in-command. Two more Americans and five Norwegians, among them Paul Bjørvig and Bernt Bentsen, completed the expedition.
They sailed from Tromsø in the chartered ice steamer Frithjof. After arriving at Cape Flora, they gathered supplies left by the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition, before sailing east, in an attempt to find a navigable path northward. Due to the extent of the ice, Wellman was finally forced to erect his base camp, "Harmsworth House", at Cape Tegetthoff on Hall Island. The ship then left the expedition, without Wellman having made any arrangements for a relief ship to bring them home again. He left that to his agent Andreas Aagaard in Tromsø.
On 5 August, he sent Baldwin and three Norwegians to establish an advance camp further north, preferably at Cape Fligely. With inadequate equipment and untrained dogs, the party made very slow progress, hauling and rowing much of the equipment by hand. They eventually reached Cape Heller on Wilczek Land where Baldwin had the Norwegians construct a hut he named "Fort McKinley". On 22 October Baldwin left Bjørvig and Bentsen for the winter to guard their northern outpost with minimal supplies. They were left with no medicine, were to use no fuel for heating and consume no food other than walrus and polar bears. Bentsen soon fell ill and became delirious. He died on 2 January 1899. Bjørvig continued to share his sleeping bag with Bentsen's corpse throughout the winter so as not to attract polar bears.
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Walter Wellman
Walter E. Wellman (November 3, 1858 – January 31, 1934) was an American journalist, explorer, and aeronaut.
Walter Wellman was born in Mentor, Ohio, in 1858. He was the sixth son of Alonzo Wellman and the fourth by his second wife Minerva Sibilla (Graves) Wellman. Walter's father, Alonzo, served three years in the American Civil War while Walter was young. He was initially with Company D of the 105th Ohio Infantry before becoming a ship-carpenter with the Mississippi River Squadron. When he returned from the war, he took his family west from Ohio to become pioneer settlers of York County, Nebraska.
At age 14 Walter established a weekly newspaper in Sutton, Nebraska. At age 21 Walter returned to Ohio to establish the Cincinnati Evening Post and married Laura McCann in Canton, Ohio on 24 December 1879. They had five daughters. In 1884 he became political and Washington DC correspondent for the Chicago Herald and Record-Herald.
For a news story, Wellman was asked by the Chicago Herald to visit and assess various candidates for the initial landing place of Christopher Columbus in the Americas. He marked the presumed location on San Salvador Island in the Bahamas with a monument in 1892.
In 1894, Wellman led a polar expedition. He chartered the Norwegian ice steamer Ragnvald Jarl from Ålesund and assembled a team of 14 expedition members, mostly from the US and Norway. After an easy passage to the north of Svalbard, the ship reached the ice pack at Waldenøya. With sledges and aluminium boats, the expedition made their way to Martensøya from where they intended to continue to the pole when the Ragnwald Jarl lying at Waldenøya was pierced by ice and sank. Wellman gave up his polar ambitions and instead explored the northeast of Svalbard, reaching a latitude of 81° N. The exploring party and the ship's crew then retreated to Lågøya, where they were found by the Norwegian seal-hunting ship Berntine. Wellman offered the captain 800 $ for taking the whole expedition back immediately.
Wellman made another attempt on the North Pole in 1898. Evelyn Briggs Baldwin was his second-in-command. Two more Americans and five Norwegians, among them Paul Bjørvig and Bernt Bentsen, completed the expedition.
They sailed from Tromsø in the chartered ice steamer Frithjof. After arriving at Cape Flora, they gathered supplies left by the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition, before sailing east, in an attempt to find a navigable path northward. Due to the extent of the ice, Wellman was finally forced to erect his base camp, "Harmsworth House", at Cape Tegetthoff on Hall Island. The ship then left the expedition, without Wellman having made any arrangements for a relief ship to bring them home again. He left that to his agent Andreas Aagaard in Tromsø.
On 5 August, he sent Baldwin and three Norwegians to establish an advance camp further north, preferably at Cape Fligely. With inadequate equipment and untrained dogs, the party made very slow progress, hauling and rowing much of the equipment by hand. They eventually reached Cape Heller on Wilczek Land where Baldwin had the Norwegians construct a hut he named "Fort McKinley". On 22 October Baldwin left Bjørvig and Bentsen for the winter to guard their northern outpost with minimal supplies. They were left with no medicine, were to use no fuel for heating and consume no food other than walrus and polar bears. Bentsen soon fell ill and became delirious. He died on 2 January 1899. Bjørvig continued to share his sleeping bag with Bentsen's corpse throughout the winter so as not to attract polar bears.