Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 30, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 February 1916 — NAMES LIVE IN HISTORY [ARTICLE]

NAMES LIVE IN HISTORY

Brilliant Array of Fearless Seafaring Adventurers Belonging to Norway. "The Ice party this year consisted of Storkensen, Andreasen and Thomson, all Norwegians except myself,” wrote Vllhjalmur Stefansson in the opening sentence of the account of his polar expedition. Apparently he classes himself as American or Canadian, as he Is, and gives no credit to Scandinavia for the part he played in the narrative of what happened. It was more than coincidence that his companions were "all Norwegians.” The annals of arctic and antarctic exploration are filled with the exploits of Norwegians and few explorers have been more modest than they regarding their achievements. The Norsemen have been fearless seafaring adventurers since the days; when the vikings, in their little ships, overran the west coast of Europe and time after time taided the British _ Isles. They reached out into the unknown north seas to Iceland, then to Greenland, and nearly a thousand, years ago Lief Ericson and his crew visited the land they knew as Vinland and what we know as New England. The old tower at Newport is there as evidence of their coming centuries before Columbus had sailed on his memorable voyage.

Within the memory of all of us Capt. Fridtjof Nansen brought new luster to Norway’s fame in exploration when b he navigated the northwest passage in his ship Fram. Capt. Roald Amundsen hmnght back to civilization the first definite scientific data nn the magnetic pole, which he located in the tar Nortn. A few years later he was first to reach the south pole, having arrived only a few weeks in advance of the ill-fated Scott expedition.—lndianapolis Star. 1 .