By Mark Wolf

It was the Gilded Age, 1879, and a not inconsiderable segment of the scientific community was convinced a warm water channel existed past the polar ice and it was possible to navigate a ship to the North Pole.

James Gordon Bennett, the super-rich owner of the New York Herald, always looking for a scheme to sell newspapers, agreed to finance a U.S. Navy voyage to find the elusive open polar sea. With George W. DeLong at the helm, the U.S.S. Jeanette set sail from San Francisco, loaded with three years worth of food and the latest scientific equipment, including light bulbs and telephone equipment—and casks of a new beer named Budweiser.

It did not go well. The Jeanette was captured by ice, eventually sank and DeLong and his crew set off on a 600-mile journey across ice-covered tundra. Their story is told in bestselling author Hampton Sides’ latest book, In the Kingdom of Ice. The author was the keynote speaker for the Legislative Summit’s Salute to Legislative Staff luncheon and described the qualities of leadership he has observed in the leader of this expedition and in his previous books.

“Almost every other Arctic story has ‘mutiny’ hovering over it but DeLong was able to hold it together,” said Sides.  

Among the leadership qualities Sides said DeLong and his crew displayed during the voyage were:

Competition: DeLong divided his crew into three groups, each with its own motto, leader, flag and songs. Pitting them against each other, they worked even harder and were able to survive.

Routine: During the two years on the ship the crew took measurements of everything from ice thickness to barometric pressure. Modern scientists still examine those records.

Sense of play: There was an organ on board and the crew produced plays, shows and musicals to keep their morale up.

Faith: They had to keep faith in their country, God, the U.S. Navy and their families.

Stoicism: Sometimes you just have to suffer and deal with the regrets.

Sense of wonder: They were seeing places and sights no man had ever seen before, amazing wildlife. It was almost like being on another planet.

Humility: Almost all the expeditions the British launched had a fatal flaw: they wanted to transplant their own society to the new place. DeLong was very interested in the Inuit people and had two on board. It was very helpful when they reached land where other tribes lived.

Improvisation: The engineer was a distant relative of Herman Melville, who wrote “Moby Dick.” When the ship started to leak and was under great threat of sinking, he made a network of windmills that kept the ship going for two years.

Mark Wolf is the editor of the NCSL Blog.

Email Mark.