Photographs

Historic photographs are one of the strengths of The Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum collections. There are nearly 30,000 images, most from the eastern North American Arctic. The core of the collection are the 15,000 images taken by Donald B. MacMillan between 1908, when he was a member of Peary's North Pole expedition, and 1954, his last expedition to Greenland. These include black and white images, hand-tinted glass lantern slides, and 35mm transparencies. MacMillan re-visited the same communities in Labrador, Greenland, and Baffin Island on his many expeditions, and in doing so documented their history during a period of significant cultural change. His photographs are supported by photographs taken by other members of his expeditions.

Other highlights of the photograph collection include Emil Diebitsch's photographs of the 1895 Peary Relief Expedition to Greenland, Marius E. Johnston's photographs of the 1910 Rainey-Whitney expedition to Greenland, and photographs of the Crocker Land Expedition donated by the families of expedition members Elmer Ekblaw and Maurice Tanquary. More recent images include an album of photographs from Bluie West 1, an important US military base in Greenland during the Second World War.