German Exploration of the Polar World: A History, 1870-1940

by David Thomas Murphy

German Exploration of the Polar World is the story of the generations of German polar explorers who braved the perils of the Arctic and Antarctic for themselves and their country. Such intrepid adventurers as Wilhelm Filchner, Erich von Drygalski, and Alfred Wegener are not as well known today as Robert Falcon Scott, Roald Amundsen, Ernest Shackleton, Robert E. Peary, or Richard E. Byrd, but their bravery and the hardships they faced were equal to those of the more famous polar explorers.

273 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 2002

About the author

Professor Murphy earned his Ph.D. in history from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1992. His research specialties are in the history of modern Europe, modern Germany, and the Holocaust. He is the author of three books: The Heroic Earth: Geopolitical Thought in Weimar Germany (Kent, 1997), German Exploration of the Polar World: A History (Lincoln, 2002) and Murder in Their Hearts: The Fall Creek Massacre (Indianapolis, 2011). He is also the author of numerous scholarly articles, including most recently, ““A Big, New Hitler? Capitalism, ‘Anglo-America’ and Hitler’s War,” in Journal of Strategic Studies, (2020), DOI: 10.1080/01402390.2020.1752196

​Prof. Murphy has also been the recipient of grants from the Program in Arms Control, Disarmament and International Security, the Stiftung Volkswagenswerk, the Social Science Research Council, the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) and the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

At Anderson University, he teaches courses on Western Civilization, the Holocaust, modern Europe, and the history of war in the Western world. He also serves as co-director of the Anderson University Honors Program, a post he has held since the Program began in 2004.