4to. 4 photogravure plates, 112 mounted photographic reproductions, folding map (some staining to map). (Title and frontispiece tissue guard foxed, some mostly marginal foxing throughout.) Original publisher’s vellum gilt, upper cover with gilt bust of Peary in profile, top edge gilt, others uncut, cloth ties (vellum very spotted, with some gilt rubbed away, endpaper wrinkled, edges foxed). 

 

FIRST EDITION, LIMITED DELUXE ISSUE, number 153 of 500 copies signed by Peary and R. A. Bartlett. Peary’s account of his achievement of the pole is introduced with high praise by Theodore Roosevelt. Peary wintered at Ellesmere Island before heading North to the pole with a small team. Despite winning a high profile lawsuit against Frederick Cook, who had a competing claim, recent scholarship has cast some doubt on Peary's ability to accurately measure his own location on the ice, having left Bartlett, his expert navigator, behind at the camp. Arctic Bib. 13230.