home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
TIME: Almanac 1990
/
1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
/
time
/
122589
/
12258900.002
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1990-09-22
|
826b
|
16 lines
SCIENCE, Page 73Peary on TopHe did, after all, go to the North Pole
In 1909, two years before Roald Amundsen reached the South
Pole, Admiral Robert E. Peary went in the opposite direction to the
top of the world -- or so he said. Skeptics have long challenged
his claim, contending that he never got closer to the pole than 89
km (55 miles) away.
Last week the National Geographic Society revealed the results
of a yearlong study of the expedition's records. The Navigation
Foundation reviewed celestial positions and ocean-depth soundings
marked in the logs, and even examined the shadows in photographs
to calculate the angle of the sun and help fix the locations in the
pictures. The conclusion: Peary made it to within 8 km (5 miles)
of the pole, close enough to confirm his place in history.