Admiral Peary was born in Cresson, PA in 1855. His father died when he was three years old and he and his mother moved to Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He attended Portland High School and in 1877 graduated from Bowdoin College with a degree in Engineering. After graduation he set up shop in Freyburg, Maine as a surveyor. Eventually he took a job in Washington D.C. as a draftsman and later joined the U.S. Navy Civil Engineering Corps as a Lt. He led a team that surveyed an alternate canal route across Nicaragua, but continued to dream about Artic exploration. He obtained a leave of absence from the Navy several times, to persue his dream in the artic. After seven expeditions , Peary’s dream was realized on April 6, 1909 when he, Matthew Henson and some Intuits – after traveling more than 400 miles over treacherous Artic ice, finally reached the Pole.
Admiral Robert E. Peary: The Man and his Island is a production of The Friends of Eagle Island.
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[Admiral Peary: The Man and his Island originally aired on MPBN Community Films May 29, 2010.]