Indiana Jones and the Hollow Earth
Page 25
E. B. Baldwin
Evelyn Briggs Baldwin was born in 1862, during the Civil War, and grew up near Edna, in Southeast Kansas. After graduating from North-Western College at Naperville, Illinois, in 1885, he toured Europe by bicycle and returned to Kansas two years later to become principal of Oswego High School. His adventurous spirit refused to be tied down for long, however; in 1891, according to an Oswego Independent report of the time, Baldwin made a night ascent of Pike's Peak—during a thunderstorm.
In 1892 he became an observer of the U.S. Weather Bureau, and his skill with meteorological instruments earned him a spot in the North Greenland Expedition of Robert E. Peary a year later. Having received an impressive endorsement from Peary for perseverance and resourcefulness, Baldwin began to lecture about the Arctic. His goal was to raise enough funds to mount his own expedition in search of the North Pole.
So bitten was Baldwin by the arctic bug that in 1897 he raced to Spitsbergen Island, hoping to convince Salomon Andree to give him a berth on an intended balloon exploration of the pole. Lucky for Baldwin that he arrived late; neither the balloon nor Andree was seen again for the next thirty-three years. Andree's body, and those of his two companions, were found in 1930.
In 1898, Baldwin was the second in command of the Wellman expedition, during which he established Fort McKinley in Franz Josef Land. On the same expedition, he discovered Graham Bell Land.
Baldwin's dreams of his own polar expedition were realized through the generosity of William Ziegler, a retired Brooklyn businessman who had made a fortune in baking powder and real estate. In 1901, Ziegler announced his commitment to plant the American flag at the North Pole. He backed his boast with a quarter of a million dollars for an expedition, to be led by Baldwin.
The Baldwin-Ziegler expedition was reportedly one of the most lavish ever mounted, with forty-two men, fifteen Siberian ponies, and four hundred dogs. Despite careful planning, it failed when a supply ship didn't arrive on time, and Baldwin's stock of supplies began to run low. One of the balloon messages Baldwin sent during June 1902 was found by Russian fishermen in 1949. It read: "Five ponies and 150 dogs remaining. Desire hay, fish, and 30 sledges." Rather than tempt disaster, Baldwin returned to Norway—and brought with him the first motion pictures shot in the Arctic.
Disappointed with the expedition's failure to reach the pole, and because of differences Baldwin had with the expedition's sailing master, Ziegler refused to fund Baldwin a second time. He did, however, bankroll a 1903 expedition led by one of Baldwin's subordinates, Anthony Fiala. Ziegler died in 1905, before learning that Fiala had failed as well.
Baldwin continued to lecture and campaign for funds, and on at least one occasion tried to stir interest by claiming the aurora borealis could be harnessed to provide the world with a never-ending supply of electrical energy. But if he discovered the secret to this (or any other) arctic mystery, he kept it to himself.
Baldwin never again received the funding necessary for another expedition. His ambition was thwarted for good when his old commander, Robert E. Peary, reached the North Pole in 1909. From then on, history relegated the flamboyant adventurer and self-promoter to obscurity.
After World War I, Baldwin took a series of minor government appointments until he lost his last position under the New Deal. In poverty and living on the generosity of his friends, he died in October 1933 of a fractured skull after being struck by an automobile on a busy street in Washington, D.C.
Baldwin never married. His closest surviving relative, a niece by the name of Geraldine Pinsor, died in Oswego in the 1980s. She should not be confused with the entirely fictional niece, Zoe Baldwin. And unlike the portrayal of this event in Indiana Jones and the Hollow Earth, foul play was not suspected in the automobile accident that caused the explorer's death.
Such liberties will be forgiven, it is hoped, in the name of adventure.
About the Author
Max McCoy is an award-winning journalist and author whose Bantam novels include The Sixth Rider and Sons of Fire. He lives in Pittsburg, Kansas, where he is currently at work on the next Indiana Jones novel.
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