In 1908 adventurer and big-game hunter Harry Whitney traveled to northwestern Greenland as a paying passenger aboard the Erik, which was steaming north carrying supplies for Robert E. Peary’s North Pole Expedition. Whitney had no interest in the Pole, or exploration. He was after big game and planned to spend the summer hunting, returning south with the Erik in the fall. The few weeks he spent in Greenland were not enough, however, and on the spur of the moment he decided to stay the winter, living among the Inughuit and hunting with them until the following summer. He established his base at Anoritok, using a shelter built there by Frederick Cook as he prepared to go to the North Pole in 1908. Whitney was the first American to meet Cook when he returned to Anoritok in the summer of 1909. Whitney took many photographs, and published a book about his adventures, Hunting with the Eskimos, but remained silent on the subject of Cook’s North Pole claims.

This exhibit is made possible by the generous support of the Friends of Bowdoin College.