Swimming to Antarctica

by Lynne Cox

  It turned out that Ed Salazar and Peter Kassander were best friends; at one point, Kassander had worked with Salazar at the State Department. When Salazar told me about this friendship, I felt that finally things were starting to move into place. Salazar agreed, which made me even more excited. Then I told him I’d also written to President Reagan and his wife, Nancy, as well as Secretary of State George Shultz. Salazar asked if I’d gotten responses. President Reagan’s office hadn’t responded; Nancy had said she couldn’t get involved in the politics of what I was doing but had wished me luck. Secretary of State Shultz said he had passed the proposal on to Assistant Secretary of State Rozanne Ridgway I had spoken with her. She said she would meet with the Soviets on my behalf about the project. Salazar explained that Roz Ridgway was his boss and that he would brief her about our conversation and serve as my point man. If I had any questions at all or needed any suggestions, he would do his best to help me.

  We immediately began working together. I told Salazar that I had been in touch with the Soviet consulate in San Francisco and that I had met with Alexander Terehkin. Salazar suggested that I write to him as well as Mr. Potemkin, the cultural attaché at the Soviet embassy, with updates on my progress and news about my contacts with Bob Walsh and the Goodwill Games.

  What we were working toward at that point was simply a response from the Soviets. Would they permit the swim to happen? We waited. On a daily basis I began talking with Salazar, Kassander, Evans, and Bob Walsh’s assistant, Gene Fisher, discussing what to do next. I also kept writing more letters and making more phone calls. Eventually, they began talking to one another, and they came back with suggestions for me. This team knew how the world worked and how the Soviets worked, and they gave me insights into how our government and the Soviet government worked. With their help, I started getting calls back from the Soviets.

  Then a call came from Congressman Dan Lungren’s office. Lungren said that his office had sent letters to the Soviet embassy as well, and they would let me know when they heard anything. Meanwhile, Bob Walsh met with Mr. Gramov of the Soviet Sports Committee in Moscow. Gramov was thrilled with the idea, and he put his best man, Alexander Kozlovsky in charge of the project. Kozlovsky began contacting the Soviet Foreign Ministry, the KGB, military officials, the governor of Siberia, various diplomats, and people within the Soviet Sports Committee. His job was to secure Soviet permission; if he managed to get it, he would be in charge of organizing the swim from the Soviet side.

  Kozlovsky was given carte blanche by Mr. Gramov to do and to spend whatever he needed to on this project. At that point, I didn’t know all of this, only that Mr. Kozlovsky was our guy on the inside trying to get Soviet support.

  One of the largest considerations on the Bering Strait swim was the cold and how it would affect me. I had been writing to Dr. William Keatinge at the University of London, William McCafferty’s friend who was the world’s foremost expert on hypothermia. Dr. Keatinge wrote to me and said that yes, he would like to come on the swim and provide medical backup. He could also use the swim as an opportunity to take my core temperature readings during the crossing, information that would be very useful in his research on hypothermia.

  I also received a call from Dr. Jan Nyboer. Nyboer was a physician and long-distance runner in Anchorage, who read about me in a local newspaper. He was calling to say he would like to offer his help, to join the swim crew as a medical support person. He also offered to open his home, so that my crew and I would have a place to stay if we needed one when we stopped over on our trip from Anchorage to Nome. And he offered to bring his father along. His father was a world-renowned cardiologist from the Detroit area who had done research on physiological responses to the cold and was very interested in the way blood flow was altered. I thought it was a good idea; my only worry was that his father was eighty years old, and I wasn’t sure how well he would do in the difficult conditions. Dr. Nyboer said that his father would be fine. Dr. Nyboer was so energized over the swim that he made me even more excited.

  One of my largest concerns was what kind of boat we would use for the swim. When my brother Dave had flown to Wales in 1976, he’d reported that the only boat support on Little Diomede were umiaks, walrus-skin boats. While the distance from Little Diomede to Big Diomede in a straight line was only 2.7 miles, I knew that we would go farther, which meant that we would need some kind of backup for these boats if something went wrong. I wrote to the U.S. Navy; to the coast guard; and to Elizabeth Dole, who was in charge of the Department of Transportation—I hoped that through her we could get coast guard backing. A letter came from an admiral in the U.S. Navy saying that they would look into it, but he didn’t think we should count on their support. Nyboer offered to follow up with a call to Washington to the admiral, and also to make contact with local officials. The admiral suggested contacting the coast guard. So as a follow-up to that, I asked Bruce Evans in Senator Murkowski’s office if he would send a letter of support to them as well.

  Then a call came from the office of Steve Cowper, the governor of Alaska. Governor Cowper offered to send a letter of endorsement for the project to Soviet officials in Siberia, as well as to the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C., and to the coast guard. Now there were people in Washington, Seattle, Moscow, Alaska, and Siberia working toward the same objective. One of my largest concerns, though, was how I was going to pay for this.

  For years I had continued trying to secure sponsorship from large U.S. corporations, but I had not gotten anywhere. It was very discouraging. Didn’t they understand what it would mean to open a market with something like 286 million Soviets? And maybe through this swim, not only American projects could pass through Soviet borders, but also American ideas and ideals. Maybe this could be a way to further bridge the distance between the two countries.

  I didn’t know the right people in high places in corporate America. Because of support I’d received from Coca-Cola on my around-the-world swim in Iceland and, later, in Japan, I decided to go to Coca-Cola headquarters and try to make contact on my own. I flew to Atlanta not knowing how I was ever going to meet with Mr. Goizueta, the CEO of Coke, but I had to try. I had tried calling but I had gotten nowhere, so I hoped that appearing in Atlanta in person would help me meet with him.

  When I got to the entrance to the Coca-Cola building, I had no idea how I was going to get inside. I didn’t have an appointment and I didn’t know anyone there, but I did have letters of reference from Iceland and Japan, as well as newspaper clippings.

  As I paused outside the building, a young man said, “Oh, you must have forgotten your employee pass. Here, let me help you.” He slid his card into the electronic lock.

  There must have been at least ten women sitting side by side in a receptionist bay at the entrance to the international division. One kind woman in her thirties with chestnut brown hair looked up and gave me a big smile. “May I help you?”

  The way she looked at me, I knew she meant that she did want to help. So I explained to her why I needed to see the head of Coca-Cola. She was very impressed and picked up the phone to call his secretary. The secretary wouldn’t let me see him. The receptionist kept working on her, but she could not gain entrée. I was visibly disappointed. I couldn’t help it; it seemed like it would work. The receptionist got an inspiration and called the vice president of the international division. He met with me, and he liked the idea, so he brought in his assistant, who had been a swimmer for the Spanish National Team. But this man was totally opposed to it. He had certain money earmarked for his own project, and he didn’t want any of it going anywhere else. So they wished me well, and I flew off to meet with two editors at National Geographic, William Graves and Tom Smith. I had written to them off and on since 1976. By 1987, they’d said they were very interested in the swim. They had flown me to Washington to meet with them over lunch. I was ecstatic and hopeful that they would embrace the project; ever since I was seven years old I had been looking at the pictures in and reading Nat
ional Geographic. What a privilege it was to meet the top editors at the magazine. I hoped that I could write a story for them.

  Intentionally I got to the National Geographic building early so that I could wander through Explorers Hall, see the photographs on display and find out where they housed the map section. There, a mapmaker invited me in to see their map collection. I loved maps. Naturally, I asked if I could take a look at some of the Bering Strait region, hoping that I could study a chart or just be able to see what the coastline of each island looked like. There were a few good maps of the region, but no nautical charts. I would have to wait until later for that.

  Mr. Graves met me in his spacious office. He was a tall man with dark, curly hair who moved like a hummingbird, in quick bursts, then hovered over his desk. We met Mr. Smith in the lobby. He was smaller in stature, soft-spoken, with a fair complexion. When we stepped outside, he complained of the cold. He had forgotten his jacket, so I offered him mine. He thought that was kind of odd, but he was cold and I wasn’t.

  During lunch we talked about kiwifruit propagation. Mr. Smith had a male and female vine, as did I. His were producing fruit. Mine weren’t, even though I was using a paintbrush to hand-pollinate them. He had some suggestions and I think that is how we connected—but not strongly enough.

  Over crab cakes we discussed the swim. Mr. Smith and Mr. Graves thought the idea was very exciting, but then I told them I did not have Soviet permission yet, though it was already early May. They didn’t say so, but I knew that they didn’t think I would get it in time. They said they’d enjoyed meeting me, asked me to stay in touch, and added that if it came together I should make sure to take some good pictures. How was I ever going to take pictures when I was in the water swimming? Plus, I had no idea how I was going to be able to purchase a new Nikon on my budget or learn how to use it in three months’ time. I flew home feeling frustrated, but then thought that at least I’d had a chance to meet them, and although they didn’t completely support my project, they’d shown an interest. And if they did, there would be others, and maybe from that I could gain the support the project needed.

  In the meantime I continued working a variety of jobs to earn money both to pay my bills and also to save money for this project, and I continued writing letters to corporations and smaller companies seeking corporate sponsorship. The problem was that no one believed that the Soviets would allow me to make the swim. No one thought that it could happen, so no one was able to support it. How do you get people to think a new way? People were still afraid of the Soviets. How do you make people less afraid? Is it through trying to understand them, trying to see them differently? That’s what I thought, and that’s why I was trying to do this swim. What else did I need to do to try to get people to understand?

  But the Alaskans seemed to understand what I was doing. I got a call from David Karp, who worked at the Visitors and Travelers Bureau in Nome, and he immediately offered to help once I arrived in Nome. He said that I could use his office for incoming phone calls from the people on the team coordinating the project and from the media. Karp said he would try to help us. Aware that I had written to Alaska Airlines requesting their sponsorship, he told me that there was someone there he thought would really get behind the project. Also, in summertime, the only way to travel out to Little Diomede was by helicopter. He would make some calls to Evergreen Helicopter for me.

  My own efforts were easier now because all of a sudden there was momentum. Each day I heard something from a team member, or discussed another idea with someone, or sent a draft and had someone read it and send it back with comments.

  Gradually the path became clear too. Dr. Nyboer said that he had a patient in Nome named Dennis Campion who was a member of the Rotary Club; he had a teenage son and a home where I could stay while I trained in Nome in preparation for the swim. Dr. Nyboer thought it would be a good idea for me to stay with Dennis because he thought I would need a quiet place away from the fray. So I called Dennis, felt very comfortable with him, and, grateful for his offer, I accepted it. Then Dave Karp called and said he had a friend who had a rental house with four bedrooms where the team could stay.

  In the middle of June I decided to leave for Alaska. I had some sponsorship from local companies and individuals. Some of the kids whom I had taught to swim handed me their weeks allowance and wished me good luck on my swim. Their parents wrote out checks too. I was so touched. Alaska Airlines came through with one airline ticket, which I used for Dr. Keatinge; an outdoor clothing company gave us some sleeping bags; Quaker Oats gave me a check for five thousand dollars; and Johanna Zinter, a friend from Los Alamitos, had T-shirts made and sold them to raise money for the swim. The local high school swim team did a swim-a-thon and raised $230. Friends sent checks, and so did some people I had never met before but who believed in what I was trying to do. It was wonderful and very humbling. I knew I would think of all of them often, especially whenever I hit a major stumbling block.

  All of this was helpful, but it wasn’t nearly enough pay for the project. Once again I asked myself, How can anyone believe in me unless I believe in myself? So I emptied out my bank account. That, along with the contributions, paid for the crew’s transportation, the rental house, food, phone calls, a helicopter (if we could get a group rate), and the support boats (if they were reasonably priced). Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough to pay for my plane ticket. I couldn’t take out a loan from the bank, so I took one out from my folks. All of this was hard; it took everything I had, emotionally, physically, and financially.

  Dr. Keatinge called and confirmed that he would provide the medical support along with Dr. Nyboer; and Dr. Nyboer said he would bring his father out for the swim. Out of the blue I got a call from a man from New York named Joe Copeland. He had read about the swim in April in an article in the New York Times. He said we had a friend in common. Joe had a background in fund-raising for major events, and he offered to help in return for having his expenses covered.

  And I had another volunteer, Maria Sullivan. We had met through the Special Olympics. She had volunteered as an organizer for the Special Olympics, and I’d gone to the games as a guest athlete, to meet with the athletes who were participating.

  Maria had read an article in People magazine about me while she was in a hospital bed in Los Angeles. She said what caught her attention was what I said about cold and pain—that I didn’t focus on the pain of the cold; I focused on getting through it to the other side. She said she was using this idea with her own pain. She had fallen four stories from a building and had broken her back. She’d had rods implanted in her back, and she was just starting to sit up again. She asked if she could help me. She knew I needed support, and it would divert her mind from her pain. I thought about it, and eventually she started making phone calls for us. She had her mother lighting candles at a local Catholic church and saying prayers for us. Then Maria offered to come to Alaska at her own expense to help out. It was a tough call for me because I was worried about her health. Finally I realized that she needed a chance as much as I did. I said I would love her help, but she had to watch herself. I didn’t want her to have any problems in Nome. In fact, as a precaution, I asked her to speak with one of the physicians at the hospital in Nome to make sure they could take care of her if the rods presented her with a problem. And I told her that if permission came through from the Soviets, I wanted her to remain on Little Diomede. I was afraid she would have a problem in the umiaks, and more than that, we would need someone to stay in touch with us as well as with the outside world. Maria would take some of her first steps in Nome. And she would become an incredibly valuable member of the support team.

  When I arrived in Anchorage in mid-June, Jeff Berliner, a reporter from UPI, met me at Dr. Nyboer’s office to interview me. After an hour, he put down his paper and pencil, scratched his head, and said, “So you mean to say you don’t have Soviet permission, you don’t have escort boats, you don’t know how cold the water is, and you don�
�t have sponsorship, but you think you can do it?” My reply was confident. “Yes, I think I can,” I said, and a sudden surge of excitement filled the room. It was electric. Berliner shifted forward in his chair and said, “Gorbachev has been talking about glasnost, a new openness between the United States and Soviet Union. Do you think he is aware of you and this project?”

  “I sure hope he is—I’ve written to him at least four times,” I said.

  “If Gorbachev approves of this swim, this action could signal a new relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union,” Berliner said. Contemplating the depth of his statement, he shook his head and hurried off to file his story.

  As he rounded the corner, I was overwhelmed by his questions. In all my planning I hadn’t looked at all of the challenges piled one on top of another, as he had presented them to me. Instead, I had kept everything horizontal, dealing with each challenge one at a time. When he’d asked me if I thought I could do it, I’d had to say yes, because otherwise there would be no point whatsoever in going through all that I had so far. But I still wasn’t sure how it was going to happen. I just continued believing that it could.

  In Nome, Dennis Campion, Dr. Nyboer’s friend, met me at the airport, drove me along the main dirt road to his home, and showed me to the guest room. He immediately made me feel welcome. A large Irishman with dark eyes, dark hair, and a rumbling laugh, Campion was an amazing person. He had traveled the world as a dredger, using special equipment to remove silt from harbors, canals, and, in this case, the gold mines around Nome. Campion had a nautical chart of the Bering Strait, and the day that I arrived at his home, he spread it out on the kitchen table. He was so excited about the swim, and he provided me with some valuable information. As a dredger he was well versed in reading nautical charts, especially in looking at changes in the ocean floor. He pointed out a deep trench immediately off Big Diomede. He said that there was a strong current immediately offshore and it was cutting away at the ocean floor. In summer the prevailing current flow was from south to north; in winter it flowed from north to south, bringing with it pack ice. Campion suggested that I start at the very southern tip of Little Diomede and compensate for the strong current flowing north. In calm water the current between Big and Little Diomede Islands ranged from half a knot to one knot. That meant that I would have to crab against the current, go sideways into it, always angling to the left. I had to do this: Big Diomede was only four miles long, and if I missed the island, I would end up in the Chukchi Sea. There would be no way to turn back and fight the current. The current was too strong, but more than that, the water was even colder there than in the Bering Strait.