Knud Johan Victor Rasmussen

Danish explorer

• Born: June 7, 1879
• Birthplace: Jakobshavn, Greenland
• Died: December 21, 1933
• Place of death: Gentofte, Denmark

A pioneer Arctic explorer, Rasmussen was best known for his seven Thule expeditions. In the fifth, the most famous of these, he crossed North America from Greenland to the Bering Strait. A celebrated ethnographer, Rasmussen studied the folkways of the Eskimos and published many works about the peoples and places of Arctic America.

Early Life

Knud Johan Victor Rasmussen was born in the Lutheran parsonage at Jakobshavn, a Danish settlement situated halfway up the western coast of Greenland. The eldest son of Christian Rasmussen, a Danish missionary in Greenland for twenty-eight years, who later became a lector in Greenlandic studies at the University of Copenhagen, Knud was exposed to exploration and ethnography in early childhood. His father took as his parish the entire northern half of colonized Greenland, often working his way by dogsled up the west coast of the island to visit his five remote preaching stations. An excellent linguist who later produced both a Greenlandic grammar and dictionary, the elder Rasmussen taught Knud to regard all Greenlanders as his brothers, and Knud responded by learning their ways and developing a love for them that never waned.

Rasmussen’s mother was herself part Eskimo. Her father, Knud Fleischer, had been born in Greenland of Norwegian parents. Becoming a colonial administrator for the Danes as well as a successful trader, Fleischer married an Eskimo woman. Young Rasmussen grew up celebrating his dual heritage the Scandinavian (Danish and Norwegian) and the Eskimo.

Rasmussen recalled his childhood as a happy one. From the parsonage, he could view Disko Island, the largest off the coast of Greenland, as well as the great glacier and the spring icebergs. Fascinated by the North, Rasmussen rejoiced in a childhood trip with his father and Riis Carstensen, an explorer, to visit his uncle, Carl Fleischer, who headed the Danish settlement at Qeqertak. This Greenland childhood determined the direction of Rasmussen’s later life. Two additional influences affected Rasmussen’s development. In 1888, Fridtjof Nansen attempted the first complete crossing of Greenland, an adventure that had a profound influence on the lad. The impact of his Aunt Helga, his first teacher, was equally decisive. It filled him with a profound love for the ways of Greenland.

Reluctantly, Rasmussen left Greenland for Denmark. Failing his entrance examinations for the Herlufsholm School, Rasmussen studied in Copenhagen. He was not a particularly good student. Completing his baccalaureate education at the University of Copenhagen (Rasmussen later was awarded a Ph.D. by his alma mater and an LL.B. by the University of Edinburgh), Rasmussen flirted with several occupations, such as acting, singing, and journalism. As a correspondent for the Christian Daily and the Illustrated Times, he went to Stockholm to cover the Nordic games; then, at age twenty-one, he went to Lapland to study reindeer breeding. Travels in Scandinavia’s Northland, to Narvik and Tomso, reinforced his fascination with the Arctic.

Life’s Work

At age twenty-three, Rasmussen began his life’s work. He joined the Danish Literacy Expedition of Mylius-Erichsen, an ethnographer, Jorgen Br nland, a catechist, Count Harald Moltke, a painter and illustrator, and Alfred Bertelsen, a doctor, on an expedition to visit the most northern tribe in the world, the Polar Eskimos of upper Greenland. This voyage of 1902-1904 was followed in 1905 by an assignment from the Danish government to travel in Greenland with a group of Lapps to determine the feasibility of introducing the reindeer as an addition to the Eskimo economy. For the next two years, 1906-1908, Rasmussen lived among the Polar Eskimos, studying their folklore. By then it was becoming obvious that Rasmussen’s ability to travel and hunt like the Eskimos was a phenomenal asset. He could speak their languages fluently and maintain friendly relations with them. Rasmussen was able to record much of their oral tradition before it disappeared with the onset of modern civilization.

Returning to Denmark in 1908, Rasmussen married Dagmar Andersen, daughter of Niels Andersen, state counselor, chair of the Employers’ Association, and considered one of Denmark’s major entrepreneurs. Friends considered this marriage a major source of strength for Rasmussen. Within a year, Rasmussen had returned to the Arctic, serving the Danish government on an expedition for educational purposes in 1909. This fired his imagination and caused him to envision the possibility of founding a permanent base for additional explorations.

At the age of thirty, in 1910, Rasmussen established Thule, a center for trade and exploration among the Polar Eskimos. Trade in manufactured goods provided the economic support, but the real purpose of this base on the northwest coast of Greenland was not commercial but scientific. Thule became the starting point for seven expeditions. Rasmussen’s timing was excellent. The discovery of the North Pole in 1909 had aroused considerable interest in the Arctic. Danish claims to the north of Greenland were being contested, and Rasmussen saw such a settlement as Thule as critical to establishing Danish sovereignty over the region. This opinion was vindicated in 1933, when the International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled against Norway and in favor of Denmark, recognizing Copenhagen’s claims to all of Greenland. Following a lecture tour to raise funds for building Thule, Rasmussen sailed to the Arctic. The harbor at Thule was open only twenty-five days of the year (August 1-25), and the environment was harsh. Rasmussen coped with these conditions and became the first to cross Melville Bay by sledge, demonstrating the feasibility of exploration from Thule.

On April 8, 1912, together with explorer Peter Freuchen, a longtime friend, Rasmussen led the first Thule expedition, crossing the Greenland ice cap from Thule to Independence Fjord. This feat had been attempted only once before, by Nansen in 1888, an event that had inspired Rasmussen as a child. This trip allowed Rasmussen to study Eskimo life and to formulate his theory as to their origins. Postulating their Asian origin, Rasmussen believed that American Indians and Eskimos were descended from prehistoric immigrants who came to the Americas across the Bering Strait. On the completion of the first Thule expedition, Rasmussen returned to Denmark to report on his scientific progress and to see his three-year-old daughter for the first time.

Though Denmark remained neutral during World War I, the European conflagration had consequences for the far North. Rasmussen continued his work, however, and a mapping expedition in 1914 was followed in 1916-1918 by a survey of the north coast of Greenland. In 1918, following a visit to Denmark, Rasmussen set out for Angmagssalik in eastern Greenland on an ethnographic expedition to collect Eskimo tales. This was completed in 1919. On the two-hundredth anniversary of the arrival in Greenland of Hans Egede, the pioneer Lutheran missionary, there was a royal visit by the king of Denmark to the island. This event in 1921 honoring “the Apostle of Greenland” encouraged Rasmussen to think in terms of further discoveries.

The fifth Thule expedition, Rasmussen’s most famous journey, lasted from 1921 to 1924, and he explored Greenland, Baffin Island, and the Arctic Coast of America, the longest dogsled journey in history. Rasmussen traversed the American Arctic from the Atlantic to the Pacific, conducting a scientific study of virtually every Eskimo tribe in that region. The expedition began on September 7, 1921, at Upernavik and went from Greenland to the Bering Strait, arriving at Point Barrow, Alaska, on May 23, 1924. During this trip, Rasmussen traced Eskimo migration routes and observed the essential unity of Eskimo culture.

Rasmussen was an excellent communicator, and his works were widely published in Danish, Greenlandic, and English translation. Rasmussen’s works included travelogs, collections of Eskimo mythology and songs, and scientific texts, as well as writings of cartographic, ethnographical, and archaeological significance. Under nordenvindens svobe (1906) and Nye mennesker (1905) appeared in English translation in 1908 under the single title The People of the Polar North: A Record and established his reputation. Gr nland Langs Polhavet: Udforskningen af Gr nland fra Melvillebugten til Kap Morris Jesup (1919; Greenland by the Polar Sea: The Story of the Thule Expedition from Melville Bay to Cape Morris Jessup , 1921) introduced the earth’s largest island to readers throughout the Western world and was followed within the decade by his account of the most extensive expedition yet to explore the Arctic, published as Fra Gr nland til Stillehavet (1925; Across Arctic America: Narrative of the Fifth Thule Expedition , 1927). Rasmussen’s work also included collections of Native American literature such as Myster og sagn fra Gr nland (1921-1925; myths and sagas from Greenland).

Significance

Knud Johan Victor Rasmussen was honored by the world for his many scientific contributions and was a Knight of the Royal Order of Dannebrog (Denmark), a Commander of the Order of Saint Olav (Norway), a Commander of the White Rose (Finland), a Knight of the Royal Order of the North Star (Sweden), and a recipient of a Golden Medal of Merit from the Danish king, among other awards. Rasmussen was a member of many distinguished learned societies, including the Norwegian Geographical Society and the equivalent geographical societies of Sweden, Italy, and the United States as well as the Explorers’ Club of New York and the Scientific Society in Lund, Sweden.

Explorer of the Arctic and famed ethnographer of the American Eskimos, Rasmussen was honored with doctorates from Danish and British universities and memorialized with the Knud Rasmussen room in the National Museum in Copenhagen. More than sixteen thousand artifacts in that museum testify to the thoroughness of his work. On December 21, 1933, Rasmussen died near Copenhagen, at Gentofte, Denmark, of food poisoning contracted during his final expedition, complicated by influenza and pneumonia.

Bibliography

Croft, Andrew. Polar Exploration. 2d ed. London: Adam and Charles Black, 1947. More than a general survey of polar expeditions, this volume focuses on the more prominent explorations of the Arctic regions in the twentieth century. With eight maps and twenty-two illustrations, this text is organized into two parts. Part 1, entitled “The Arctic Regions,” is especially relevant to the life of Rasmussen; it surveys the scientific exploration of the North and contains valuable discussion of Rasmussen’s contribution to geographical knowledge in Greenland and Canada.

Ehrlich, Gretel. This Cold Heaven: Seven Seasons in Greenland. New York: Pantheon Books, 2001. Ehrlich made many journeys to Greenland during a seven-year period, inspired by Rasmussen’s earlier work. She interweaves her explorations with Rasmussen’s in this critically well-received book.

Freuchen, Peter. Arctic Adventure: My Life in the Frozen North. New York: Farrar and Rinehart, 1935. Freuchen was Rasmussen’s best friend, and together they shared many interests and experiences. Enhanced with illustrations and maps, this book is more than a recollection of one man’s life in the Arctic. Contains interesting vignettes of the region, its conditions, and peoples. Invaluable personal recollections and anecdotes.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. I Sailed with Rasmussen. New York: Julian Messner, 1958. This work is not an exhaustive scholarly work on Rasmussen but rather a collection of impressions of a dear friend. A vivid description that is supplemented by useful illustrations.

Stefansson, Vilhjalmur. Greenland. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Doran, 1942. An older work, this history of Greenland from the earliest times until the start of the 1940’s remains a valuable introduction to the world that Rasmussen knew and loved. Readable and reliable, Stefansson’s survey conveys a feel for a region that is as large as the combined twenty-six states east of the Mississippi. Particularly helpful are references to Rasmussen’s works.

Williamson, Geoffrey. Changing Greenland. Introduction by Ole Bj rn Kraft. New York: Library Publishers, 1954. This survey of the history of Greenland from the arrival of the Vikings to the major changes of the 1950’s is organized into two main sections. Part 1, entitled “Old Orders,” helps place the life and labors of Rasmussen in proper chronological and sociological context.