Expedition History

While Moby Dick remains a staple among students, Melville was actually inspired by a true story: the shipwreck of the whaleship Essex in 1820. While it was always dangerous to work on a whaleship, the Essex was the first known American ship to be badly damaged by a massive sperm whale's attack, and though whales would sink other ships in the ensuing decades, the entire ordeal encountered by the crew made headlines when the survivors were rescued.

John C. Frémont was the most celebrated explorer of his era. In 1842, on the first of five expeditions he would lead to the Far West, Frémont and a small party of men journeyed up the Kansas and Platte Rivers to the Wind River Range in Wyoming. At the time, virtually this entire region was known as the Great Desert, and many Americans viewed it and the Rocky Mountains beyond as natural barriers to the United States.

"Il Milione" è considerato l'opera storica, geografica, politica e scientifica più importante e preziosa del Medioevo, prima della scoperta dell'America. Nessuno prima d'allora, aveva riportato notizie certe sull'Oriente. I suoi territori, i suoi popoli, le loro usanze, la fauna e la flora autoctone, erano un mistero, che con le sue esplorazioni, Marco Polo svelò. Quando il mercante veneziano tornò nella Repubblica Serenissima, i suoi racconti destarono interesse e meraviglia.

Into the Frozen South, by Scout Marr, of the Quest. Originally published, September 1923, now in the public domain.

In We Could Perceive No Sign of Them: Failed Colonies in North America, 1526-1689, historians David MacDonald and Raine Waters tell the fascinating stories of the many attempts to establish a European foothold in the New World, from the first Spanish colony in 1526 on the coast of Georgia to the final disastrous French endeavors near the arctic.

In California, in a mill race on an undistinguished stream, an astonishing discovery was made. It was gold. Gold said to be so plentiful that it just lay there waiting to be picked up. Nuggets of gold that you could just bend down and put in your pocket. Big nuggets, some weighing six ounces or more. A six ounce nugget was worth $120 in 1849. Today? $3,000 in today’s dollars!

Nel 1519 l’esploratore Ferdinando Magellano si imbarca dalla Spagna con cinque navi e più di duecento uomini alla volta delle Isole delle Spezie, in cerca di una più rapida via. Per arrivarci compirà un viaggio lungo tre anni attraverso gli oceani, e realizzerà un’impresa che rivoluzionerà la concezione geografica del mondo conosciuto: circumnavigare la terra per la prima volta nella Storia.

During his life and even after his death, Captain William Kidd’s name was known around England and the American colonies. He was infamous for the very crime for which he was hanged, piracy. This book by Rebecca Simon dives into the details of the two-year manhunt for Captain Kidd and the events that ensued afterward. Captain Kidd was hanged in 1701, and from that sprung a massive hunt for all pirates led by the British during a period known as the Golden Age of Piracy. Ironically, public executions only led to pirates’ growth in popularity and interest.

Unfurling a tapestry of surprising and historically overlooked figures spanning forty centuries and six continents, historian Matthew Lockwood narrates lives filled with imagination and wonder, curiosity, connection, and exchange. Adventurers from every corner of the globe search for the unknown and try to understand it, remaking the world and themselves in the process. Exploration is for everyone who sets off into the unknown. It is the inheritance of all.

It is the most fabled and storied journey in American history. From 1804-1806, the first expedition across the North American continent was commissioned by President Thomas Jefferson, who had recently bought a vast swath of territory from France. Though he knew he had bought a huge amount of land, Jefferson wasn't entirely sure of what he had bought, so he asked a team, led by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, to traverse the continent until they reached the Pacific, studying everything from ecology to geography along the way.

Get up close and personal with science as Andrew Kessler narrates his hilarious journey inside NASA’s Phoenix Mars mission - a historic enterprise manned by a motley crew of rocket scientists. The Phoenix Mars mission was the first man-made probe ever sent to the Martian arctic.

It was November 1806. The explorers had gone without food for one day, then two. Their leader, not yet thirty, drove on, determined to ascend the great mountain. Waist deep in snow, he reluctantly turned back. But Zebulon Pike had not been defeated. His name remained on the unclimbed peak-and new adventures lay ahead of him and his republic. In Citizen Explorer, historian Jared Orsi provides the first modern biography of this soldier and explorer, who rivaled contemporaries Meriwether Lewis and William Clark.

En agosto de 1897, el joven comandante belga Adrien de Gerlache partió para una expedición de tres años a bordo del barco Bélgica con sueños de gloria. Su destino era el extremo inexplorado de la Tierra: el continente helado de la Antártida.

Over the centuries, the West has become fascinated by the Vikings, one of the most mysterious and interesting European civilizations. In addition to being perceived as a remarkably unique culture among its European counterparts, what’s known and not known about the Vikings’ accomplishments has added an intriguing aura to the historical narrative. Were they fierce and fearsome warriors? Were they the first Europeans to visit North America? It seems some of the legends are true, and some are just that, legend.

By the mid-17th century, the existence of a land in the south referred to as Terra Australis was generally known and understood by the Europeans, and incrementally, its shores were observed and mapped. Van Diemen’s Land, an island off the south coast of Australia now called Tasmania, was identified in 1642 by Dutch mariner Abel Tasman, and a few months later, the intrepid Dutchman would add New Zealand to the map of the known world.

A land of almost 3 million square miles has lain since time immemorial on the southern flank of the planet, so isolated that it remained entirely outside of European knowledge until 1770. However, the first human footprints on this vast territory were felt 70,000 years earlier. The history of the indigenous inhabitants of Australia is a complex. For generations after the arrival of whites in Australia, the Aboriginal people were disregarded and marginalized, largely because they offered little in the way of a labor resource, and they occupied land required for European settlement.

In 1798, an initial review of France’s naval forces had led Napoleon to conclude his navy could not hope to outfight the power of the Royal Navy, which had been the dominant naval power for centuries, so he was forced to look elsewhere. After months of planning, Napoleon crafted a scheme to attack and conquer Egypt, denying the British easy access to their colonies in India, with the ultimate goal of linking up with the Sultan Tipoo in India itself and defeating the British in the field there.

Breaking All The Rules: The Inside Story of the New Race traces the origins of a second Space Race that began at the end of the original 1960s US-Soviet space race and eventually led to SpaceX and the explosive growth in commercial space being seen today. The story covers how this revolution began with a band of misfit engineers and scientists and the inside story of how this was eventually ignited with the money and vision of billionaires such as Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Richard Branson.

Personal Narrative provides fascinating insight into the earliest clashes that were beginning to occur between citizens of the travelers from the east, Native Americans and Mexicans as United States began its great westward expansion. Pattie’s book fully explores the dangers of life as a trapper in the wilderness of the far west, including during one episode after Pattie and a group of French trappers were attacked and only three of them survived.

Dive into the captivating world of money with "Money Is Factscinating," a treasure trove of more than 100 entertaining, informative, and educational stories that explore the many facets of currency. From mind-blowing tales and historical anecdotes to hilarious mishaps and cutting-edge financial technology, this book offers a fresh and engaging perspective on the subject that makes the world go round.