(1861- 1930)
Norwegian explorer and philanthropist Fridtjof Nansen was born on the outskirts of Oslo on October 10, 1861, to the family of a lawyer. As a child, Nansen spent a lot of time on the wooded hills, spent several days in the forest. The childhood experience became convenient for Nansen later, during the Arctic expeditions.
1980 Fridtjof Nansen entered the University of Oslo, specializing in zoology, which was attracted by the possibility of expeditionary work.
In 1982, he enlisted on the industrial ship Viking, which was bound for the Arctic, and soon saw all the beauty of Greenland. This trip prompted Fridtjof Nansen to organize his own expedition and the first trek across Greenland.
For a long time, Nansen could not find the means to implement his plan, in the end he interested a Copenhagen philanthropist. In May 1888, Nansen and five crew members set out on a voyage, which, incidentally, was unsuccessful.
1890 Fridtjof Nansen wrote two books - The First Crossing of Greenland and The Life of the Eskimos.
At the same time, he plans a new expedition, just to be the first to get to the North Pole and establish whether there is a mainland there. With funds provided by the Norwegian government, Nansen built the round-bottomed ship Fram, designed to withstand the ice crush.
In the summer of 1893 he set out with a crew of 12 people. The Fram had moved 450 soaps towards the Pole and was covered with ice. In March, Fridtjof Nansen and another crew member went on dog sledding and reached 86 ° 13.6 North latitude. Not knowing where the Fram is, the polar explorers spent the winter on Franz Josef land. In May 1896 they met an English expedition and returned to the Fram. All this was described by Nansen in the book "The Far North".
With the outbreak of the First World War, Nansen actively helps Russian prisoners, is engaged in the repatriation of 500 thousand German and Austrian prisoners of war from Russia, providing housing for 1.5 million Russian emigrants. In 1921, during the famine in Russia, he raised money to save the hungry, thanks to which he resorted to save up to 10 million lives.
For many years of efforts to provide assistance to the defenseless, Nansen was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1922, as the Danish journalist wrote at the time, "This is the first time that this distinction has gone to a man who has achieved such outstanding successes in a short time against the background of protecting peace."
Fridtjof Nansen had no family. He died in Oslo on May 13, 1930, overworked after a ski trip; his funeral took place on the anniversary of Norwegian independence.
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Fridtjof Wedel-Jarlsberg Nansen (October 10, 1861 - May 13, 1930) - Norwegian polar explorer, scientist - Doctor of Zoology, founder of a new science - physical oceanography, political and public figure, humanist, philanthropist, laureate Nobel Prize Peace for 1922, awarded with awards from many countries, including Russia. Geographical and astronomical objects, including a crater at the Moon's North Pole, are named after Nansen.
In his youth, he became known as an athlete-skier and speed skater. At the age of 27, for the first time in history, he crossed the ice sheet of Greenland on skis, which was perceived by the general public as a great sporting achievement. In the course of an attempt to reach the North Pole - an expedition on the ship "Fram" - on April 8, 1895, 86 ° 13 ′ 36 "N." a role model for many world-class polar explorers; Nansen regularly consulted polar explorers from different countries.
Romance is essential in a person's life, and it is it that gives a person the divine strength to travel beyond the ordinary ...
Nansen Fridtjof
Nansen studied zoology at the University of Christiania, worked at the Bergen Museum; his research on the structure of the central nervous system of invertebrates was summarized in his doctoral dissertation in 1888. After 1897, Nansen's main scientific interests switched to the newly created science - oceanography; the explorer participated in several oceanographic expeditions in the North Atlantic.
As a patriot of Norway, Nansen advocated the dissolution of the union between Norway and Sweden in 1905, after which politics became his main occupation for many years. Between 1905 and 1908, he served as Norway's envoy in London, helping to establish Norway's high international status.
The last decade of Nansen's life is associated with the League of Nations. Since 1921, he has been its High Commissioner for Refugees. His contribution to the establishment of ties between Europe and Soviet Russia, and assistance to the starving in the Volga region is great. In 1922, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on the repatriation and naturalization of people displaced by the First World War and the resolution of related conflicts. His most important initiative was the Nansen Passports, which allow stateless refugees to find refuge in other countries. After Nansen's death, his work was continued by the Nansen Refugee Organization, whose headquarters received the Nobel Prize in 1938 for efforts to distribute Nansen's passport.
Nansen was great as a polar explorer,
greater as a scientist and still greater as a man.
Herald Sverdrup
On October 10, 1861, in the suburb of Christiania (now - Oslo), I was born, I am not afraid to express my perception - one of the greatest people ever born on Earth. The boy was named Fridtjof Wedel-Jarlsberg Nansen.
Now a search has arisen in your head: "Why is he so great? And who is greater or equal to him?"
Most readers know about Nansen as a polar explorer who never made it to the North Pole.
That is why I decided to write this post. I will not rewrite his entire biography, which the interested reader can find for himself, both on the Internet and in the library. I will dwell only on the main known and little-known moments of its history.
The Nansen family is of Danish origin, its ancestor was the merchant Hans Nansen (1598-1667), who at the age of 16 made the first voyage in the White Sea, and at the age of 21, at the invitation of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich, explored the Arkhangelsk coast and visited the Kola Bay. Young Fridtjof's father, Baldur Nansen, is a district court clerk, but he looked more like a pastor than a lawyer, so he is invariably measured, neat and quiet. Mother - Frau Adelaide Nansen was the personification of mobility. Born Baroness Wedel-Yalberg, she was alien to aristocratic stiffness, neglected all conventions. Regardless of the opinion of the world, she skated and ski, did not disdain any work. She sheathed children herself, and read a lot in her spare time.
Fridtjof is all like his mother - the same agile daredevil. At seventeen he became the champion of Norway. and then the ice skating world. For 12 years in a row, he has won competitions in long crossings. However, he borrowed something from his father - in the nature of his perseverance and meticulousness more than enough. It was the fusion of these two characters that allowed Nansen to make the most difficult polar expeditions with confidence, invariable success and without loss.
In 1881, Fridtjof entered the Christian University, choosing his future profession - zoology.
In 1882, as they say now: "for practice," Nansen hired the hunting schooner "Viking". Where for the first time and goes to the Arctic Ocean. At first, the Viking sailors saw in the passenger a strange bird that flew into their nest and dreamed of getting into their crew not a student, but an extra St. John's wort. But soon this young student proved that he could not only study the subject of their hunt, but also be one of the best hunters of the "Viking".
It was during his voyage in the hunting game that Nansen began to study the Arctic ice, think about their appearance and movement in the vastness of the Arctic Ocean. His scientific approach made it possible, on the basis of samples of "mud" obtained from the ice, to determine that this soil was brought to Svalbard from the coast of Siberia.
Fridtjof Nansen, the future great polar explorer and traveler on April 28, 1888, 4 days before the departure of the ski expedition to Greenland, defended his doctoral dissertation "Nerve elements, their structure and interconnection in the central nervous system of ascidians and myxines." There was a lot of talk about his defense, but I liked the words of Nansen himself: "Better to have bad defense than bad equipment."
Despite these advertisements in the Norwegian newspapers:
"ATTENTION!
In June this year, Nansen's preparator is demonstrating running and ski jumping in central Greenland. Permanent seating in glacial crevasses. No return ticket required. "
Fridtjof, his future companion in the expedition on the "Fram" Otto Sverdrup and 4 of their companions make an unprecedented ski trip across the whole of Greenland. Frosts reached -40 ° C, woolen clothes did not protect well from the cold, and there was almost no fat in the diet (Sverdrup even asked Nansen to give out a shoe ointment based on linseed oil). The route was 470 km.
They returned to their homeland May 30, 1889 like triumphanthealthy and complete. For most of the people crowded at the pier, Nansen was a Viking, for them he was the personification of the national type.
Ahead of Fridtjof Nansen were waiting for love and new achievements in the name of knowledge, Norway and all mankind.
The wedding took place on September 6, 1889. Nansen did not want to get married and by that time had officially left the state Lutheran church. Eve was the daughter of a priest, and Nansen gave in at the last moment. The day after the wedding, the couple went to Newcastle for a geographic convention, and after it ended - to Stockholm to receive Nansen's awards. The first joint was celebrated in a very original way. New Year- ski trip to Mount Norefjell.
In 1883-1884, the remains of items from an unsuccessful expedition under the command of US Navy Lieutenant George De Long on the ship Jeannette were found on the east coast of Greenland. This expedition crashed in 1881 northeast of the New Siberian Islands. The Norwegian meteorologist Professor Henrik Mohn published an article in 1884 in which he analyzed these findings and confirmed Nansen's conjecture about the existence of a transpolar current; Mona's article became the rationale for Fridtjof's idea of an expedition to the Pole.
Most critics did not question Nansen's theoretical arguments, but argued that practical implementation of the plan was impossible.The leading American polar explorer of that time, Adolph Greeley, argued that Nansen's postulates were absolutely false, suggesting that the things found in Greenland in 1884 did not belong to members of De Long's expedition. According to Greeley, the North Pole is unattainable, as it is occupied by a powerful land mass, crushed by a glacier, which serves as a source of pack ice. He was equally skeptical of the ideal ice ship project, calling Nansen's intentions "a senseless suicide project."
The polar countries have been sleeping like a dead sleep for millennia. No one broke their eternal silence. And not at all because people are so inclined to protect someone else's peace, but because only because they were powerless in the kingdom of night and cold. However, nothing stopped people in their eternal desire to illuminate their lives with knowledge.
Nansen and had a great thirst for knowledge. And now, with his characteristic purposefulness, perseverance and meticulousness, he was preparing for an expedition to the Central Arctic. He had knowledge of ice drift from the coast of Siberia to the Atlantic Ocean. When crossing Greenland, he did without dogs, only because he could not get good sled dogs. But for the trip to the North Pole, he decided to use a kind of transport: a boat combined with a sleigh in a dog sled. And, of course, it was necessary to build a vessel as small as possible, which would fit a five-year supply of coal and provisions for the crew, and the Arctic ice could not crush it in its powerful embrace.
This is how the name of the name "Fram" is described: "Eva Nansen is firmly approaching the bow of the ship. Colin Archer respectfully handed her a bottle of champagne. Immediately the rumble of the crowd ceased: the traditional maritime rite of naming a new ship demanded almost prayer silence. Eve raised her hand high and smashed it with a strong blow. bottle on the stem.
- "Fram" is his name! "
Preserved by the descendants of "Fram" in Oslo.
The Fram is considered the most durable wooden ship ever built. He personified the highest and last achievement of humanity in its passive the fight against ice. The designer laid down the necessary condition for the strength of the hull, capable of withstanding the pressure of ice, in the project, in addition, Nansen conducted experiments on the friction of various materials on ice and came to the conclusion that the hull is much stronger. arctic ice, which has been proven in practice. The ship had a significant draft and contours atypical for that time - the cross-section of the hull corresponded to the shape of half a coconut. The length of the "Fram" at the waterline was - 36.25 m.
The sheathing was oak, triple, so that the sides were more than 70 cm thick. The sides were pasted over from the inside with resinous felt, a layer of cork, sheathing of spruce wood, another thick layer of felt, then linoleum and, finally, board sheathing.
Above the entrance to the Fram Museum in Oslo.
The Fram's side, the frames, the spare crankshaft, the modern fire-fighting blue tube, and me.
Engine.
Propeller-propeller complex "Frama".
Spare screws.
Fram's steering wheel and compass.
Like this: the chain for the tiller is transmitted to the stock ( vertical axis of rotation of the rudder) steering wheel movement.
Galley on the "Fram"
Wardroom.
Cabin and medical instruments.
Bunk-sofa in Nansen's cabin.
On the deck of the Fram.
Back in Greenland, Nansen became convinced of the advantage of a small team of professionals, in which everyone carries an equal share of the work. The total number of applications for participation in the expedition exceeded 600, Nansen selected only 12 people of them (including himself), but the 13th crew member, sailor Bernt Bentsen, was received in Vardø an hour and a half before sailing, who was supposed to go only to the Yugorsky Shar. however, remained until the end of the expedition. One of the applicants was the famous English polar explorer Frederick Jackson ( as it turned out not in vain!), who filed an application back in 1890, but he was refused due to origin, since the expedition was supposed to be national - Norwegian.
The Fram went to sea on June 24, 1893. The captain on it was Nansen's friend Otto Sverdrup, tested in the Greenland campaign.
On July 29, "Fram" entered the Yugorsky Shar Strait, into the Nenets camp of Khabarovo, where E. V. Toll's envoy - a half-Russian, half-Norwegian, Tobolsk bourgeoisie Alexander Ivanovich Trontheim - delivered 34 Ostyak huskies.
On August 3, after loading the dogs on board, saying goodbye to Trontheim and sending him the last letters to relatives and friends, the expedition continued on its way to the East. While performing pilot work, taking the "Fram" out of a narrow strait. Nansen almost burned out in a motorboat from ignited oil.
On September 22, to the West of the New Siberian Islands, the Fram was covered with ice and a 3-year drift began. All other Arctic expeditions that had to spend a long winter night suffered, apart from hunger, cold and disease, from unbearable boredom; as a result of this boredom there were quarrels, recriminations, general discontent and scurvy. Nothing of the kind on the "Fram" could have been expected. Here everyone had their own business, to which he was more capable.
Astronomical observations. Sverdrup (standing) and Scott-Hansen
F. Nansen plays the organ in the Fram saloon
Sigurd Scott-Hansen and Hjalmar Johansen measure magnetic declination.
Measuring the depth of the ocean at 3500m.
Nansen measures the temperature of the water at depth.
Photo from the National Library of Norway in Oslo.
From 3 to 5 January 1895 "Fram" experienced the strongest ice compression during the entire expedition, so the team was ready to evacuate to the ice. But "Fram" withstood these hellish attacks of ice. By the end of January, the expedition was swept by currents to a latitude of 83 ° 34 "N. Soon Nansen realized that they would not reach the North Pole on the ship, the drift would pass much further south. 120 days for people and only 30 - for dogs, entrusting the command of the expedition to the captain of "Fram" Otto Sverdrup, Nansen and Johansen set out on March 14, 1895 on three sledges to the North Pole.
Nansen and Johansen leave the Fram.
The trip to the north turned out to be extremely difficult: headwinds were constantly blowing, hiding the distance traveled due to ice drift (on average, travelers covered from 13 to 17 km per day), dogs were weakened and could not sleep, woolen suits resembled ice armor. Nansen and Johansen repeatedly fell through the young ice, frostbitten their fingers. The temperature was constantly kept between -40 ° C and -30 ° C. Finally, on April 8, 1895, Nansen decided to stop fighting for the pole: reaching 86 ° 13 "36" s. sh., they turned to Franz Josef Land. About 400 km remained to the North Pole.
This decision is crucial. Many polar researchers in the history of the study of the Polar Regions could not make such a decision or made it too late, which always ended in tragedy. With this decision, Nansen saved the lives not only of himself and Johansen, but also of many Norwegians, Swedes, starving people in the Volga region, and Armenians.
On August 10, after going through severe trials and bad weather, the two Norwegians finally reached the long-awaited land. These were the northern, not yet explored, islands of Franz Josef Land. Here they make another well-considered decision - to stay for the winter on the promontory of one of the northern islands and thoroughly prepare for wintering, and not look for a way to the South. Now it is Cape Norway on Jackson Island. Almost until the end of May of the following year, Nansen and Johansen lived in a dugout covered with walrus and covered with bear skins. On May 21, 1896, the Southward advance was resumed, hoping to reach Svalbard. On June 17, at Cape Flora on Northbrook Island, while cooking, Nansen heard dogs barking. So there was a meeting of the Norwegians, who left “Fram” more than a year ago, with Frederick Jackson, who was not taken to the “Fram” team.
Meeting of Nansen and Jackson. A staged photograph taken a few hours after their actual meeting.
On July 26, 1896, the yacht Windward arrived at Cape Flora, on which Nansen and Johansen returned to Norway, setting foot on land on August 13.
"Fram" arrived in Skiervø a week later - on August 20, after three years of fighting the ice in the Arctic without suffering any damage and with a full team. The return of the Fram expedition has become a national holiday. Nansen received awards from all countries. Geographical societies elected him an honorary member. Having passed ice and water, Fridtjof, at 35, was covered with the sound of fanfare. But he remained faithful to science.
Although Nansen did not manage to reach the North Pole, in the words of Sir Clement Markham (Chairman of the Royal Geographical Society), "the Norwegian expedition solved all the geographic problems of the Arctic." The expedition proved that there is no land in the North Pole region, instead establishing the existence of an ocean basin. Nansen discovered that the Coriolis force due to the rotation of the Earth plays a huge role in the drift of pack ice. Based on the analysis of the results of the expedition in 1902, Nansen deduced two simple rules describing the speed and direction of ice drift, which were widely used in polar expeditions of the 20th century. In addition, Nansen for the first time described in detail the process of growth and melting of pack ice.
Expedition roads. Red- the way to the start of the drift. Blue- "Fram" drift. Green- the path of Nansen and Johansen. Yellow- the return of "Fram".
Photo from
Fridtjof Nansen (1861-1930) - Norwegian polar explorer, scientist (Doctor of Zoology), founder of a new science (physical oceanography), political and public figure, humanist, philanthropist, Nobel Peace Prize laureate (1922), awarded by many countries, in including Russia. Many geographic and astronomical objects are named after Nansen. It is difficult to tell about it within the framework of one post. interesting person, I would like to focus on two periods of his life - the conquest of the North Pole and helping the starving in the Volga region.
Fridtjof Nansen was born on October 10, 1861 in Norway, near Oslo (in those years the city was called Christiania). Nansen describes the events of his childhood in his autobiography "On the Free Air", published in 1916. The Nansen family was characterized by order and discipline, as well as a love of sports, especially skiing - it was cultivated by Nansen's mother, Adelaide. Fridtjof was taught to ski from the age of two. V adolescence he and his brother Alexander were allowed to spend a lot of time in the forest; Nansen even compared himself to Robinson. At the age of 10, Nansen tried to jump from the springboard in Huseby and was not crippled only by a miracle, from the age of 15 he regularly participated in ski competitions with his older brother Einar.
01. In the photo - Fridtjof Nansen at the age of 4 years.
In 1877, Nansen set the world record for 1 mile (1.6 km) skating, and in 1878 won the national cross-country skiing championship for the first time. In total, he won this championship twelve times. In 1880, Fridtjof Nansen graduated from high school, passed the exams well and received top marks in the natural sciences and drawing. He was not tempted by a career as a lawyer; on the advice of his father, he applied to a military school, but soon took him away. After he entered the Christian University at the Faculty of Zoology, which greatly bothered his father. The main reason for the choice was that "due to his youthful inexperience, he thought that the study of zoology is associated with a constant stay in nature - in contrast to chemistry and physics, for which he felt a special attraction." Nansen began his studies at the university at the beginning of 1881, at the same time he won second place in the national ice skating competition. Nansen's scientific advisor was Professor Robert Collett (1842-1913), a longtime friend of the family, who was also the head of the zoology cabinet. He convinced Nansen to study the biology of seals, for which he had to go on a fishing boat to the Arctic Ocean. In 1882 Fridtjof made this trip under the command of Captain Axel Krefting off the coast of Greenland on the schooner Viking.
02. Fridtjof Nansen in 1880
Nansen described his journey to the Arctic Ocean in detail in the book "Among the seals and polar bears", published in 1924. When Nansen returned from the Arctic, Professor Collett offered him the then vacant position of the zoology department preparator at the Bergen Museum. At the age of 21, Nansen joined the director of the museum, Professor Daniel Cornelius Danielsen, and worked in this position for the next six years.
03. Nansen at work in the laboratory of the Bergen Museum (photo 1982-1984)
In Bergen, Nansen settled in the house of the priest Wilhelm Holt and devoted himself to scientific work. At the same time, he became interested in art and literature, especially appreciated the dramas of Ibsen and the poetry of Byron. By that time, he was fluent in English, French and German. His talent for painting manifested itself in childhood, and in Bergen, Nansen began to take lessons from the artist Franz Schirtz, a pioneer of the Arctic in painting, a participant in Arctic expeditions, who even advised him to quit science. Nansen's older sister Sigrid Bölling became a famous artist at that time. In February 1884, Fridtjof set another sports record: he single-handedly crossed the mountains from Bergen to Christiania, after which he took part in the ski jumping competitions in Huseby and won them. In 1885, Nansen was awarded the Friela gold medal for his first scientific work- "Materials on the anatomy and histology of the misostome".
04. Fridtjof Nansen in 1886
In early 1886, Nansen left for Germany, where he studied new methods of staining microscopic preparations of nervous tissue under Professor Camillo Golgi. In April 1886, Nansen moved to Naples for the Anton Dorn Marine Biological Station. Nansen spent the summer of 1886 in Norway at a military training camp, in the second half of the year his second work was published, based on materials from a European trip - "The structure and composition of the histological elements of the central nervous system", which became the basis for his doctoral dissertation.
05. Fridtjof Nansen in 1888
Back in 1882, on the Viking ship, Nansen conceived a plan to cross the Greenland ice sheet on skis. In the fall of 1887, he began serious preparations for the implementation of his plan. In November 1887, Nansen came to Stockholm and talked with the famous Swedish geologist, cartographer and Arctic explorer - Adolf Nordenskjold. Nordenskjold did not approve of Nansen's plans, but found them quite feasible and shared his own experience. Despite criticism from the public and the press, Nansen managed to raise funds for the expedition. Four days before the trip, Nansen was able to defend his doctoral dissertation. An expedition of 6 people set off on May 2, 1888. On July 17, there was a landing on floating ice 20 km off the coast of Greenland. At the cost of tremendous effort, the group in boats passed through the floating ice and reached the coast on 17 August. On October 3, 1888, the expedition reached the western coast, making the first crossing over the ice of Greenland at a distance of about 470 km. During the entire trip, Nansen and his companions carried out meteorological observations and collected scientific materials. They returned to their homeland by the steamer "Melchior" on May 30, 1889 as triumphs. Professor Bregger wrote in his biography of Nansen: "For the majority of the people crowded on the pier, Nansen was a Viking, connecting the sagas of the distant past with the saga of the present day, with the saga of a skier rolling down from a dizzying height ..." Based on the results of the expedition, Nansen wrote two books - a two-volume "On Skis through Greenland "and the ethnographic description" Life of the Eskimos ".
On September 6, 1889, Fridtjof Nansen was married to Eva Helena Sars, the daughter of a famous Norwegian zoologist, priest Mikael Sars. Eva was by that time a famous chamber singer (mezzo-soprano), a performer of romances. In addition to music, Eva was fond of painting and sports. A lover of skiing, she invented the women's ski suit, modeled on the Sami.
06. Fridtjof Nansen with his wife Eva Sars in 1889
After returning from Greenland, Nansen was appointed curator of the zoological office of the University of Christiania. The whole year of 1889 passed for Nansen under the sign of hard work - writing two books, a report on the expedition, lecture tours. Inspired by the expedition to Greenland, Nansen had a new grandiose plan to prepare an expedition to the North Pole.
07. Fridtjof Nansens in 1889
On February 18, 1890, Nansen spoke at a meeting of the newly founded Geographical Society of Norway with the rationale for his new expedition. His plan was as follows: to build a small, but very strong ship, capable of withstanding the pressure of ice and go through the Bering Strait in order to quickly reach the New Siberian Islands. Upon arrival at the site, it was supposed to go as far north as possible in open water, then moor to the ice floe and let the ice themselves push the ship to the pole. In case of misfortune and the need to evacuate, or, on the contrary, the expedition will be carried to the shores of an unknown land, Nansen intended to use sled dogs.
08. Fridtjof Nansen with his wife Eva Sars in 1890
Nansen spent 1890-1893 in careful preparation for the expedition to the North Pole. He made reports, raised funds and a team, and looked for sponsors. Many supported Nansen, including in Russia. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia issued him a "Recommendation sheet" and notified the coastal authorities of Arkhangelsk and all Siberian provinces about this expedition and ordered to provide it with all kinds of assistance. At the request of the Geographical Society, the Main Hydrographic Directorate sent Nansen copies of all maps of the polar seas available in Russia. E. V. Toll personally in 1892 made a trip to the New Siberian Islands, where he laid three evacuation bases for Nansen. Toll also bought 40 Ostyak and 26 Yakut dogs for Nansen.
Nansen laid an estimate for the expedition of 300 thousand Norwegian kroner (16 875 British pounds = 168 750 rubles), including the cost of the ship, equipment, salaries for the crew and the maintenance of the families of the members of the expedition. The laying of the ship took place at the Archer shipyard in Larvik on September 11, 1891. Launching took place on October 26, 1892. Eva Nansen presided over the ceremony, she also named the ship "Fram" ("Forward"). Back in Greenland, Nansen became convinced of the advantage of a small team of professionals, in which everyone carries an equal share of the work. The total number of applications for participation in the expedition exceeded 600, Nansen selected only 12 people of them (including himself), but the 13th crew member, sailor Bernt Bentsen, was received in Vardø an hour and a half before sailing, who was supposed to go only to the Yugorsky Shar. however, remained until the end of the expedition. While the ship sailed along Norway, Nansen gave a series of public appearances to cover the expedition's financial shortfalls.
On July 29, "Fram" entered the Yugorsky Shar, in the Nenets camp of Khabarovo, where E. V. Toll's envoy - a half-Russian-half-Norwegian, Tobolsk bourgeoisie Alexander Ivanovich Trontheim delivered 34 Ostyak huskies. We crossed the Kara Sea safely, ending up on the traverse of the Yenisei on 18 August. By September 7, the expedition was near the Taimyr Peninsula, having previously discovered several groups of small islands, which were named after the assistant commander (Scott-Hansen Islands) and in honor of the expedition sponsors (Firnley Islands and Heiberg Islands). Cape Chelyuskin was overcome on September 9 in a strong snow storm, which threatened a forced wintering. Nansen decided not to go to the mouth of the Olenek River, where Toll prepared a coal warehouse and a batch of riding huskies. Instead, "Fram" went north along the open channels, skirting Kotelny Island. Nansen expected to reach 80 ° latitude, but solid ice fields stopped the Fram on September 20 at 78 ° N. sh. On September 28, the dogs were lowered from the board onto the ice, and on October 5, the start of the drift was officially announced.
10. The ship "Fram" leaves Norway, 1893
11. Nansen plays the organ (gift of sponsors) on the ship "Fram", 1893
On October 9, 1893, the Fram design was tested in practice - the first ice compression took place. All this time the vessel drifted randomly in shallow water (130-150 m). The polar night began on October 25, by which time a wind generator had been installed on board. In general, the main enemy of the Fram team was boredom, which led to conflicts between people squeezed in cramped living quarters, as well as depression that began in Nansen.
12. Nansen at the "Fram" stuck in ice, 1894
Only on May 19, 1894 "Fram" crossed 81 ° N. sh., moving at an average speed of 1.6 miles per day. Nansen feared that if the drift rate was constant, it would take at least 5-6 years to cross the polar basin. During this period, a remarkable discovery was made: on the site of the Polar Basin, an ocean with a depth of up to 3850 m was discovered. By the end of the summer of 1894, Nansen was convinced that the ship would not reach the Pole, and firmly decided in 1895 to go on a toboggan trip.
13. "Fram" in the ice, 1894
15. Measuring the depth of the ocean. Depth 3500 meters, 1894
16. Nansen on Ice, 1894
17. Polar landscape. Peder Leonard Henriksen and "Fram", 1894
18. Doghouses next to "Fram", September 1894
Nansen, as the leader of the expedition, decided that two people and 28 dogs with a load of 1050 kg (37.5 kg per dog) would go on a hike to the Pole. After reaching the pole (50 days were allotted for this), it will be possible to go either to Svalbard or to Franz Josef Land. Nansen chose Hjalmar Johansen, the most experienced skier and musher on the expedition, as his companion.
20. "Fram" in the ice, 1894
21. Henrik Greve Blessing with algae harvester, 1894
22. The team digs out the ship. March 1895
By the end of January 1895, the expedition was carried out by currents to a latitude of 83 ° 34 ′ n. sh. Thus, Greeley's record of 1882 was broken - 83 ° 24 ′ s. sh.
24. "Fram" in the ice, 1895
25. Nansen in his cabin, February 1895
26. Flag "Fram", 1895
The sledging expedition was equipped in a limited time (about two months), using only the materials available on board the expedition ship. Initially, it was supposed to ride on four sledges, but an unsuccessful start on February 26, 1895 showed that the chosen design of the sleds was unreliable - the crossbars broke. An attempt to start on February 28 on six sledges also failed: a small number of dogs (28) actually forced them to go the same distance six times. Because of this, food supplies were significantly reduced (850 kg: by 120 days for humans and only 30 - for dogs). It turned out that the polar wolf-fur suits were poorly tailored, and Nansen and Johansen were sweating a lot. Taken off for the night, the fur suits froze. Nansen decided to go back to the wool knitted suits tried out on the Greenland Expedition of 1888. They were also uncomfortable: they did not protect well from the cold, they froze on the move, and at night they thawed in a sleeping bag and were constantly wet.
27. "Fram" still drifts chained in ice, 1895
Nansen and Johansen finally set out on March 14, 1895 on three sledges. The trip to the north turned out to be extremely difficult: headwinds were constantly blowing, hiding the distance traveled due to ice drift (on average, travelers covered 13 to 17 km per day), dogs were weakening, woolen suits resembled ice armor. Nansen and Johansen repeatedly fell through the young ice, frostbitten their fingers. The temperature was constantly kept between -40 ° C and -30 ° C. Finally, on April 8, 1895, Nansen decided to stop fighting for the pole: reaching 86 ° 13′36 ′ ′ s. sh., they turned to Cape Fligeli.
28. Nansen and Johansen on the way (staged photograph by F. Jackson, July 1896)
In April, the direction of the ice drift changed to the north, which greatly restrained the polar explorers. By April 19, food for dogs remained for three days, and the polar explorers began to slaughter the weakest animals, feeding them to the rest. On April 21, Nansen and Johansen discovered a larch log frozen into the ice, which confirmed Nansen's theory of pack ice drift from the Siberian coast to Greenland. By the beginning of June - the time of the ice melting - they had 7 dogs left. From June 22 to July 23, 1895, Nansen and Johansen were blocked by continuous fields of melting hummocks, they called their forced camp the "Camp of languor". The temperature sometimes exceeded freezing, I had to sleep in wet sleeping bags with skis underneath. They had to kill the last dogs and abandon most of the equipment, as well as chop off the three-meter sledges, making them suitable for dragging by one person.
29. Nansen and Johansen on the way (staged photograph by F. Jackson, July 1896)
On August 10, Nansen and Johansen reached the archipelago, which Nansen gave the name White Land - these were the northernmost spurs of Franz Josef Land. Inaccurate maps of that time could not help them in any way, it remained to go as far as possible before the onset of winter. Finally, on August 28, 1895, Nansen decided to stay for the winter in an "unknown country". Wintering took place from August 28, 1895 to May 19, 1896 at Cape Norway (80 ° 12 ′ N 55 ° 37 ′ E) in the western part of Jackson Island. Nansen and Johansen built a dugout from walrus skins and stones. The stones were broken out of the moraines, a piece of sled runners served as a lever, the gravel was loosened with a ski pole, a spade was made from a walrus shoulder blade, tied to the sled crossbar, and a walrus tusk served as a pick. The only means of lighting and cooking in the dugout was a fat lamp made from the binding of sled runners. Polar explorers ate bear and walrus meat and lard obtained during the hunt. Storm winds often blew (once the wind broke Nansen's skis and carried away and badly crushed Johansen's kayak), and large flocks of Arctic foxes periodically plundered the meager property of the winterers.
30. Nansen and Johansen on the way (staged photograph by F. Jackson, July 1896)
On May 21, 1896, they set off again, hoping to reach the Svalbard archipelago. We had to move on foot, and the waterways were overcome by kayaking. If the wind allowed, impromptu sails made of blankets were placed on the sleds (this was the case when crossing McClintock Island). On June 12, a catastrophe almost happened: the polar explorers settled on the shore for hunting, when a strong wind swept the kayaks into the sea. Nansen, risking his life, swam to the kayaks and returned the property piled on board. On June 15, Nansen nearly drowned when a walrus ripped open the canvas side of the kayak, fortunately without inflicting bodily harm on the traveler.
On June 17, 1896, Nansen heard a dog barking while cooking. Not believing his ears, he decided to go on a reconnaissance mission and accidentally stumbled upon Frederick Jackson, who had been at Cape Flora with his expedition since 1894. Nansen described it this way: “On one side stood a European in a checkered English suit and high boots, a civilized man, clean-shaven and trimmed; face so blackened that its natural light color did not appear anywhere ... "
31. Meeting of Nansen with F. Jackson, June 1896 (staged photo taken a few hours after the actual meeting)
On July 26, 1896, the yacht "Windward" arrived at Cape Flora, on which Nansen and Johansen returned to Norway, setting foot on the land of Vardø on 13 August. Literally a week later, Fram returned to Norway (the Fram team, after a long wait, considered Nansen and Johansen dead).
32. The Fram crew after returning to Norway, September 1896
33. The Fram crew after returning to Norway, September 1896
The return of "Fram" has become a national holiday. All the way from Tromsø to Christiania (August 20 - September 9, 1896) there was a celebration in every port. On the way to Bergen, E. V. Toll sat on the "Fram", he also congratulated Nansen on behalf of Russia at the royal banquet. In Christiania, the Fram met the Norwegian Navy, and on the way to the royal audience, Nansen's team passed through a triumphal arch formed by the bodies of 200 gymnasts. University students crowned the team with laurel wreaths.
34. Solemn meeting of "Fram" in Christiania (Oslo), September 1896
Although Nansen did not manage to reach the North Pole, in the words of Sir Clement Markham (Chairman of the Royal Geographical Society), "the Norwegian expedition solved all the geographic problems of the Arctic." The expedition proved that there is no land in the North Pole region, instead establishing the existence of an ocean basin. Nansen discovered that the Coriolis force due to the rotation of the Earth plays a huge role in the drift of pack ice. Based on the analysis of the results of the expedition in 1902, Nansen deduced two simple rules describing the speed and direction of ice drift, known as "Nansen's rules" and which were widely used in polar expeditions of the 20th century. In addition, Nansen was the first to describe in detail the process of growth and melting of pack ice, and also described the phenomenon of "dead water". For polar explorers and athletes, Nansen's technological discoveries play a huge role. He was the first to use the experience of survival of the Eskimos on a large scale, and a number of his inventions (light bamboo sledges with metal runners and an apparatus for cooking food and simultaneously melting drinking ice with an efficiency of 90%) are still in use.
35. Fridtjof Nansen in 1886
36. Fridtjof Nansen in 1887
Nansen's most important task was to write a report on the expedition, based on travel diaries and primary processed scientific materials. The book was named "Fram in the Polar Sea: The Norwegian Polar Expedition 1893-1896" and became extremely popular all over the world: in 1897-1898 its translations into English, German, Swedish and Russian were published. The royalties from editions and reprints made Nansen a wealthy man. In 1897, Nansen was appointed professor at the University of Christiania with an exemption from lecturing until the end of the processing of the scientific materials of the expedition. The work took about 10 years, the last (sixth) volume of the report was published on English language already in 1906. The third volume was written solely by Nansen and was devoted to the oceanography of the Polar Basin. Since 1900, Nansen gave lectures on oceanography at the university, and since 1908 he was approved as a professor of oceanography, not zoology.
37. Fridtjof Nansen with his family in 1902
In 1907, after an illness, Nansen's wife, Eva Sars, died (Sigrun Munte became Nansen's second wife, their marriage took place in 1919, but they did not have joint children). Eva Nansen bequeathed not to bury herself and to burn her body. There was no crematorium in Norway at that time, Fridtjof Nansen and Dr. Jensen took the body to Gothenburg, where it was cremated. The place where the ashes are scattered is unknown.
A few words can be said about Fridtjof Nansen as a politician and diplomat. For the first time, Nansen was connected with the affairs of big politics during his first visit to Russia in April 1898. In St. Petersburg, he was awarded an audience with Nicholas II, during which the issue of Norway's non-intervention in the event of a Russian-Swedish conflict was discussed. In April 1906, Nansen was appointed the first Norwegian envoy (in the rank of minister) to Great Britain and left for London. His main task was constant interaction with representatives of the largest world powers in order to maintain a neutral position in Norway and prepare a Norwegian-British treaty, since Nansen was extremely popular in Great Britain. The Norwegian-British treaty was signed on November 2, 1907 in London, after which Nansen considered his task to be fully completed. Despite the persuasion of King Edward, Nansen resigned on November 15.
38. Fridtjof Nansen with children in 1908
In 1913, Nansen accepted an offer from an American businessman of Norwegian descent, Jonas Crane, to travel on the Correct steamer along the Northern Sea Route, mainly to explore the possibilities of using it for trade between Asian Russia and Europe. It was not a scientific expedition, Nansen was only a passenger. After reseeding at the mouth of the Yenisei (in Dudinka) from "Correct" to "Omul" by Stepan Vostrotin, the polar explorer climbed the Yenisei with stops to Krasnoyarsk, where he spent 4 days in various meetings, and then through China along the Chinese-Eastern Railway reached Vladivostok, from where he returned by cars, horses and at that time by the unfinished northern route of the Trans-Siberian Railway to Norway through Yekaterinburg, where he participated in a meeting of the Russian Geographical Society, reporting on the sailing along the Yenisei. As a result of his trip to Siberia, Nansen wrote the book "Into the Country of the Future". On this journey, Nansen became closely acquainted with the Russian way of life and many active officials, which helped him on further missions in Russia in the 1920s. From that time on, he began to take an interest in the problems of Russia.
In October 1918, Nansen was elected rector of the University of Christiania without asking his consent, but he flatly refused the post. Then he was elected chairman of the Norwegian Union for the creation of the League of Nations, this predetermined all his activities for the next 12 years, until his death. R. Huntford argued that for Nansen this was the best application of his irrepressible energy. Nansen, despite the traditional neutrality of the Scandinavian states, achieved the election of Norway as a full member of the League in 1920 and became one of the three delegates to the General Assembly of the League. Since April 1920, Nansen has dealt with the repatriation of about half a million prisoners of war scattered across the different countries the world. More than 300,000 of the repatriates were natives of Russia, engulfed in the civil war. Already in November 1920, Nansen reported to the Assembly that he had achieved the return of 200 thousand people to their homeland, and stressed that he could not have imagined that he would face so much human suffering. In the final report of 1922, he stated that 427,886 prisoners of war from over 30 countries had been repatriated. Some biographers argue that Nansen's venture is on par with his Arctic endeavors.
39. Fridtjof Nansen in Krasnoyarsk, 1913
Back in 1920, analyzing the situation in Russia, Nansen predicted the beginning of a serious famine. At the suggestion of the British delegate Philip Noel-Baker, on September 1, 1921, Nansen took over as High Commissioner of the League for Refugees. From now on, his main task was to return to their homeland more than 2 million Russian refugees, scattered across different countries of the world due to the vicissitudes of the Russian revolution. At the same time, he, on his own initiative, tackled the problem of hunger, which directly affected more than 30 million people in a country engulfed in civil war. This greatly damaged the reputation of Nansen, who was accused of "Bolshevism" and upholding the interests of the Soviet government. Nansen's work on the repatriation of refugees was also hampered by the fact that most of them did not have documentary evidence of origin or citizenship, as well as no legal status in the host country. Nansen proposed the idea of the so-called "Nansen passport" - an identity card for people who have lost their citizenship. In the early 1920s, more than 50 governments recognized Nansen passports, which allowed refugees to legally cross borders, look for work, etc. Among the holders of a Nansen passport were world-famous figures, for example, Marc Chagall, Igor Stravinsky, Anna Pavlova. Initially, Nansen's passport was intended only for Russian emigrants, but over time it began to be issued to other groups of refugees.
While at the Lausanne conference, Nansen received the news that he had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. According to the recollections of his daughter Liv, he had no idea that the governments of Denmark and Norway had nominated him, first of all, for his merits in the repatriation of prisoners of war and assistance to the starving in Russia, as well as for the contribution that he made by his activities to achieving mutual understanding between peoples and establishing peaceful relations between countries. The prize was 122 thousand kroons. Nansen spent most of the amount received on the device in the USSR of two demonstration agricultural stations in Rostash (Saratov region) and Mikhailovka (Dnepropetrovsk region). These large farms were supposed, according to Nansen, to serve as an example of a more rational mode of production, thanks to which Soviet Russia in the future could export grain.
40. Distribution of bread in Samara, 1921
Having visited the Volga region and brought a large amount of food, Nansen was horrified by the scale of the disaster. From the memoirs of Nansen: “The most terrible visit was a cemetery, which had a mountain of 70 or 80 naked corpses, most of which belonged to children who died in the last two days and were brought here from shelters or simply picked up on the streets. 8 corpses of adults. They are all simply put in one grave until it is full. The corpses are naked, because the clothes are taken by the living. Nansen asked the gravedigger how many dead were brought to the cemetery every day, and received the answer that they were brought in "carts." It was impossible for the gravediggers to cope with the burial of such a number of the dead, because the ground was frozen and it was very hard to dig, so mountains grew out of the bodies of the unfortunate. Many corpses generally remained lying in the streets and in houses, because there was no way to take them to the cemetery. "
41. Died of hunger in the Samara region, Buzuluk, 1921 (photo by Nansen)
The International Committee for Aid to Russia under the leadership of Nansen from September 1921 to September 1922 supplied Russia with 90 thousand 700 tons of food. Emil Ludwig in his book "Leaders of Europe" wrote: "What value Nansen had for the Russian people, I was told by the look of an old peasant woman when I once visited the Lower Volga region three years after Nansen's stay in Russia. When I called his name, she crossed herself and She asked, wide-eyed, if I knew him. Then she touched my chest with her hand, as if wishing to convey the blessing to her savior. "
42. Starving children in Saratov, 1921
43.Died of hunger in Saratov, 1921
44. Children who died of hunger in the city of Marks, Saratov region, 1921
Fridtjof Nansen traveled to raise funds across the United States and Europe, held dozens of meetings with representatives of public organizations and business circles, with ordinary people. And everywhere he said the same phrase "I said my word here and I will repeat it over and over again. I will never forget the death longing in the eyes of Russian children. Save Russia!"
So he appealed to people - and he was heard. The attitude of governments towards the Soviets, of course, did not change, and Nansen's appeal to the League of Nations did not move things, although several states that were members of the League of Nations did provide some assistance. However, public opinion was awakened and resulted in resolutions and appeals addressed to governments, various institutions and ordinary people. Perhaps the world has never seen such an ardent desire to help. Parcels with gifts and large sums of money flocked from individuals and organizations. One Englishman, a friend of Nansen, Major Davis gave 5 thousand pounds. Norwegian shipowners donated about 10 thousand crowns each, two Quakers gave their entire fortune - 23 thousand pounds. The newspapers Politiken and Dagens Nüheter sent 8,300 kroons, and the Berum community (where Nansen lived) raised 5,000 kroons. Often, ordinary people donated their last money. One worker from Montevideo sent all his savings - 12 thousand pesos, one French poet - 48 thousand francs, and one 18-year-old girl - the contents of his piggy bank: 341 dollars. The landlord and friend of Nansen's student years, Pastor Holt from Bergen, now a lonely old man, raised 372 kronor. Nansen thanked them all warmly.
45. Fridtjof Nansen in 1922
46. Fridtjof Nansen in 1922
In 1924, Nansen received an assignment from the League of Nations to deal with the Armenian refugees. However, even before that, at the first session of the League, Nansen made a proposal to admit Armenia to its membership, stressing that the Armenians need help more than ever. Since 1925, Nansen devoted many efforts to helping the Armenian refugees - victims of the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire. His goal was to return refugees to Soviet Armenia. Nansen actively visited refugee camps - including in Egypt, and after a trip to Soviet Armenia, he offered the League of Nations to finance the irrigation of 36 thousand hectares of land (360 km2), which would allow accommodating and providing jobs for 15 thousand people. This plan failed, but Nansen has since become one of the heroes of the Armenian people. In total, Nansen saved about 320 thousand people from the Armenian genocide, who later were able to obtain asylum in various countries, including Syria, using the "Nansen" passports. Upon his return to his homeland, Fridtjof Nansen wrote a book "Around Armenia" full of sympathy and respect for the Armenian people.
47. Fridtjof Nansen in Armenia, 1925
For the last two years of his life, Nansen suffered from heart disease, but he still led active image life. On May 13, 1930, Fridtjof Nansen died on the veranda of his home, and the funeral was scheduled for the national holiday, May 17. According to his will, Nansen's body was cremated, an urn with ashes was buried under one of the birches in Pulhogda.
In 1954, the UN established the Nansen Medal, which was transformed in 1979 into an award in his name, awarded annually on behalf of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Nansen's former estate "Pulhögda" has been home to the Fridtjof Nansen Institute since 1948, an independent institution dedicated to environmental, energy and resource management research and development.
50. Fridtjof Nansen in 1930
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