'The Enigmatic Dr. Frederick Cook'
My presentation on the Terror Camp panel at the Shackleton Autumn School in Athy on 24 October 2025. [Detail of photo in the collection of Fabiënne Tetteroo] Introduction While I am currently fully engaged in researching 19th-century British Arctic explorers, I became fascinated by American Arctic and Antarctic explorer Dr. Frederick Cook when my Twitter friends began posting about him. Handsome man! What, he lied about his discoveries?! Twice?! He went to prison?! Wanting to read an introduction to Cook that I could finish during my Christmas holiday before I had to get back to writing essays for my MA Naval History, I read Julian Sancton's Madhouse at the end of the earth (2021), about the 1897-99 Belgian Antarctic Expedition on which Cook served as Surgeon. Cook's later reputation as a liar and a fraud is at odds with his behaviour on the Belgica Expedition. An excellent doctor who saved the entire expedition from scurvy and depression. An innovator. A hardworking and relia...