The Coldest Crucible: Arctic Exploration and American Culture

by Michael F. Robinson

In the late 1800s, “Arctic Fever” swept across the nation as dozens of American expeditions sailed north to the Arctic to find a sea route to Asia and, ultimately, to stand at the North Pole. Few of these missions were successful, and many men lost their lives en route. Yet failure did little to dampen the enthusiasm of new explorers or the crowds at home that cheered them on. Arctic exploration, Michael F. Robinson argues, was an activity that unfolded in America as much as it did in the wintry hinterland. Paying particular attention to the perils facing explorers at home, The Coldest Crucible examines their struggles to build support for the expeditions before departure, defend their claims upon their return, and cast themselves as men worthy of the nation’s full attention. In so doing, this book paints a new portrait of polar voyagers, one that removes them from the icy backdrop of the Arctic and sets them within the tempests of American cultural life. 

With chronological chapters featuring emblematic Arctic explorers—including Elisha Kent Kane, Charles Hall, and Robert Peary— The Coldest Crucible reveals why the North Pole, a region so geographically removed from Americans, became an iconic destination for discovery.

Genres: Adventure, Nonfiction, History

206 pages, Hardcover

First published July 1, 2006

About the author

Michael F. Robinson is a professor of history at Hillyer College, University of Hartford. He is the author of The Coldest Crucible: Arctic Exploration and American Culture (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), winner of the 2008 Book Award for the History of Science in America, and The Lost White Tribe: Explorers, Scientists, and the Theory that Changed a Continent (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016) winner of the History of Science Society's Davis Prize.

Robinson has given lectures about his work at the American Museum of Natural History, The Explorers Club, The British Library, the Library of Congress, and NASA headquarters among others. He is a frequent guest on radio and television programs including American Experience, BBC World Service, the Smithsonian Channel, and the Travel Channel and has been a news source for the Wall Street Journal, the Christian Science Monitor, the Associated Press, and USA Today.

He hosts the exploration podcast Time To Eat the Dogs .

Reviews

[Jules · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really compelling book about Arctic exploration, in part because it’s more about American cultural responses to different eras of exploration than just nuts and bolts summarisation of adventures. Roughly structured so that each chapter positions two explorers in contrast, the book explores evolving attitudes towards the Arctic, first as a place of progress and then as a means of retreating from overindustrialised society. There’s another current concerning constructs of masculinity as it evolved over the latter half of the 19th century which is also quite fascinating. Overall a very pleasant start to 2026!

[Karenbike Patterson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Explorer or Scientist? For the glory of man and country, for new knowledge, or for commercial gain? In the mid-1800s men explored to show the "man against nature" theory could be won by civilized men who were brave, strong, and risk-prone. If they kept records of what they learned they were often objective. Some explorers raised money among academics and scholars. Then there were disasters and people wanted to hear about scandals like murders, cannibalism, and stealing food or they wanted to hear about the barbaric lives of the Eskimos. It sold papers. Once the north pole was discovered and it was determined that there was no northwest passage and no commercial value was gone, the trips toward the pole became tourist cruises (for the uber-rich- much like outer space travel is today). Exploration was over and much of the scientific research was over as well. People today have that spirit of exploration and there is as much scandal and controversy as there was then- just newer frontiers.

[Amanda D. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I started to read this book about 15 years ago and it didn’t draw me in so I put it to the side. Last week while going through old books I came across this and decided to give it another try. The second time around it captured my attention. I know very little history around the journey to the North Pole and I found this book very informative. It was incredible to read about the challenges explorers faced to even justify their expeditions and how they were constantly being compared to each other and how the views of the explorers changed so much by the public.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enjoyable, thought-provoking read, but I'm a sucker for anything Arctic and this particular book overlaps with a past research project of my own (wish I'd had this available then!). Robinson relies on a device of pairing explorers to propel the book, with most chapters engaging two different men who embody different attitudes about masculinity and science as they came to bear on Arctic exploration - Wellman and Peary, Peary and Cook, Hall and Hayes, etc. It's a helpful device, and lets him pin down key shifts over time as well as creating some narrative tension. I wish, though, that more attention had been paid to the "American Culture" of the title beyond the wealthy sponsors of expeditions (including newspapers and geographic societies). There's little sense of how mass culture responded to the age of Arctic Fever, and I think that would have added a dimension. This doesn't mean there's anything wrong with the book as it is, just that it didn't address (or claim to address) some of the questions it raised for me.