The Jeannette Expedition of 1879–81 was an attempt led by George W. De Long to reach the North Pole using a route through the Bering Strait to the fabled temperate Open Polar Sea. The expedition was financed by James Gordon Bennett, Jr., the proprietor of the New York Herald, and based on the ocean current theories of the German cartographer August Petermann. The attempt failed; the expedition's ship, USS Jeannette (pictured), drifted in the polar ice for nearly two years before being crushed and sunk, north of the Siberian coast. De Long then led his men on a journey by boat and sled to the Lena Delta. Before ultimate rescue, more than half of the ship's complement died, including De Long. During Jeannette's long drift the expedition discovered what were later called the De Long Islands, and collected significant meteorological and oceanographic data. Although the ship's fate demolished the long- standing Open Polar Sea theory, the appearance in 1884 of debris from the wreck on the south-west coast of Greenland indicated that an Arctic current carried the ice from east to west. This discovery inspired Fridtjof Nansen to mount his Fram expedition nine years later.

Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeannette_Expedition

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1283:

War of the Sicilian Vespers: An Aragonese fleet of galleys inflicted a crushing defeat on an Angevin fleet at Malta, forcing Charles I of Naples to postpone his plan to invade Sicily. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Malta

1758:

French and Indian War: French forces defeated the British at Fort Carillon on the shore of Lake Champlain in the British Colony of New York. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Carillon

1808:

Joseph Bonaparte approved the Bayonne Statute, a royal charter intended as the basis for his rule as King of Spain during the Peninsular War. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayonne_Statute

1889:

The first issue of The Wall Street Journal, the world's most circulated business daily newspaper, was published. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall_Street_Journal

1962:

In response to student protests at Rangoon University, Burmese General Ne Win ordered the demolition of the school's Students Union building. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1962_Rangoon_University_protests

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

decommission: 1. To take out of service or to render unusable. 2. To remove or revoke a commission. 3. To remove or revoke a formal designation. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/decommission

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

I would rather hire a man with enthusiasm, than a man who knows everything.   --John D. Rockefeller https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_D._Rockefeller