The essays below will help you to understand the goals and objectives of the mission and provide additional context and information about the places being explored and the science, tools, and technologies being used.
By United States Coast Guard, NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research, and NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries – Maritime Heritage Program
U.S. Revenue Cutter Bear is one of the most storied ships in Coast Guard history. Largely associated with polar exploration, and particularly its Arctic service, the ship’s history is a series of compelling stories of bravery, dedication to duty, and legendary exploits. Learn more about the goals, objectives, and operational plans to search for the Bear during this expedtion.
Read moreBy Bradley W. Barr
Given the Bear’s iconic status, it is fitting that such a search be conducted to find its final resting place, and this “Bear Hunt” offers an opportunity to not only insure the preservation of this important heritage resource, but to tell its compelling story, once again, to a wider audience.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
The Bear is more than just a famous ship; she is a symbol for all the service represents—for steadfastness, for courage, and for constant readiness to help men and vessels in distress. – Captain Stephen Evans, The United States Coast Guard, 1790-1915
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
The Bear’s story did not end with the sinking of the cutter. Instead, a new chapter of the cutter’s history had begun and, within about 15 years of its sinking, the search for Bear was on.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
In 1885, Bear began its service career along with Thetis, an Arctic whaler turned over to the Revenue Cutter Service by the U.S. Navy. By today’s standards, these first revenue cutters to operate in the ice were considered “ice resistant” vessels.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
In 1881, Lt. Adolphus Greely, a member of the U.S. Army’s Signal Corps, led an expedition to Ellesmere Island, northwest of Greenland, to study its weather and winter conditions. Attempts to relieve Greely’s expedition in 1882 and 1883 proved unsuccessful and members of the expedition began to die of disease and starvation. In 1884, the U.S. Navy purchased Bear and the Arctic whaler Thetis to support a search for Greely.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
Born in 1839 on a plantation near Macon, Georgia, Healy was the son of a white plantation owner and a slave. Healy became the first U.S. sea service officer of African descent and the first to command a federal ship. His career tied him to the taming of America’s western maritime frontier, earned him the nickname “Hell Roaring” Mike Healy, and made him the most famous captain in Coast Guard history.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
The native people of Alaska relied heavily on whaling and fishing when the territory came under U.S. control in 1867. However, after foreign whaling, fishing, and sealing vessels entered Alaskan waters, fish and game numbers diminished dramatically, causing large-scale malnutrition and starvation in native towns and settlements. To solve the problem, Captain Healy tried to convince authorities that Siberian reindeer should be introduced to Alaska.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
Revenue Cutter Bear served every year on the Bering Sea Patrol, which cutters had initiated in 1874. Each of the Bering Sea Patrols covered between 15,000 and 20,000 miles of cruising. Conditions on these patrols were harsh, dangerous, stressful and, at times, deadly (a fact demonstrated by Bear crewmembers buried in the Aleutian Islands). However, Bering Sea sailors experienced long periods of intense boredom punctuated by terrifying events.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
Revenue Cutter Service officer David Henry Jarvis wrote in his diary, journaling the Overland Relief Expedition, considered one of the most spectacular rescues in the history of the Arctic. As leader of the heroic expedition, Jarvis became one of the Service’s best-known officers to serve in the Alaskan maritime frontier.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
By the mid-1920s, Bear had served Alaska for over 40 years and over 30 Bering Sea Patrols. During that career, the whaling fleet had sailed out of the Arctic fogs into the mists of memory and waves of miners had come and gone. As Alaskan settlements developed, civilizing influences once provided from the sea by Bear became locally available on land.
Read moreBy William H. Thiesen
During World War II, Greenland sat on the northern edge of the Battle of the Atlantic and, early in the conflict, the Germans established weather stations there to provide forecasts for their European operations. In 1941, the United States began military oversight of Greenland on behalf of occupied Denmark to prevent these German incursions, retain control of strategic cryolite mines, and build air bases for military aircraft flying from the United States to Europe.
Read more
