Fascination and Danger: Two Ways of Knowing Baffin Bay Icebergs

Ethelind Wright created a wiki to structure her exhibit "Fascination and Danger: Two Ways of Knowing Baffin Bay Icebergs" which focuses on two visions of icebergs: as the object of an artist’s fascination and as a danger to international commerce.

American artist William Bradford, along with Isaac I. Hayes who accompanied him on his 1869 trip to Greenland, tells one story: an imaginative, evocative tale of icebergs as remote, mysterious, and majestic.

The work of the International Ice Patrol, founded in 1913 and still carrying out its mission today, tells a different story: the factual, scientific tale of the danger that this ice poses to fishing and passenger ships, as well as commercial vessels traversing the North Atlantic and carrying goods to and from America.

Oil, America, and the Arctic

Leola Roberts used a "Google Docs" tool to share her research on "Oil, America, and the Arctic," a presentation that takes us from America's history hunting whales for their oil to drilling the seafloor to harvest crude oil.

Elisha Kent Kane: The Restrained Victorian Man

Camille Smalley chose a podcast medium to share "Elisha Kent Kane, Restrained Victorian Man," her interpretation of the sketches of Elisha Kent Kane’s Second Grinnell Expedition of 1853, as they reflect the continuum of masculinity in the early Victorian Period.

The Inuit Image in Popular North American Culture

Jennifer Pictou's exhibit "The Inuit Image in Popular North American Culture, 1800s to 1950s: Selling Mass Market Products and Using Stereotypical "Eskimo" Images" looks at how the misconceptions created by early Arctic explorers, traders, and enthusiasts helped shape the American idea of the Inuit and how that idea has been appropriated by mainstream advertising for the purposes of selling a product or idea.

Captivity as a Colonial Experience

Brittany Vara's exhibit "Captivity as a Colonial Experience: Minik Wallace (a New York "Eskimo") and John Gyles A Puritan Captivity Narrative" focuses on the story of Minik Wallace, a Greenland Inuit boy, taken to the United States by Admiral Peary in 1897 and the story of John Gyles, an Englishman taken captive by the Native Americans of New England. Taken captive in 1689, Gyles' memoir, published in 1736, has a similar story arc to that of Minik Wallace. Her presentation connects these two seemingly unrelated stories together to illustrate the overall story of captivity during colonial times.

The Cold War in the Arctic

In 1958, the world's first nuclear-powered submarine, the USS Nautilus, put the Arctic Ocean in the middle of the conflict between the East and the West. Jeffrey Clark's exhibit "The Cold War in the Arctic" takes us on a tour beneath the ice.

Explorer Matthew A. Henson

Amanda Edmonds' exhibit "Explorer Matthew Henson" offers a comprehensive view of Matthew Henson, an African American explorer, and the recognition he finally received as being co-discoverer of the North Pole alongside Robert E. Peary.

Peary, Henson, and their Inuit Women

Rebecca Roche's exhibit "Peary, Henson, and their Inuit Women" explores the relationships between explorers Matthew Henson, Robert E. Peary and the Inuit women Ahlikahsingwah and Akatingwah, and how the nature of these relationships reflects the men's view of gender relations.

Alaskan Eskimo Adaptation and Recovery from 1800s Whaling Industry

Photo by John Hess

Deborah Briskey's exhibit "Alaskan Eskimo Adaptation and Recovery" is an overview of the Alaskan Eskimos' adaptation to the whaling industry of the 19th and early 20th century. Though the whaling industry's impact on the Eskimo population and culture became extreme during this period of time, the Alaskan Eskimos' resilience, both then and today, has resulted in a resurgence of their culture, as well as new laws to protect their whaling rights.