The lovely quote for this year’s Christmas card, like last year’s, came from a current project (having copyedited it over the summer and being partway through the design process): The Greatest Show in the Arctic: The American Exploration of Franz Josef Land, 1898–1905, by P. J. Capelotti. The vivid description—a good reminder of the beauty of winter—came from an explorer who was endeavoring to be the first to reach the North Pole, an icy wonderland if there ever was one.
————-
from James DeBruler [?], “Reference Notes,” 9 September 1901,in Anonymous, “Biographical Sketches of the Members and Crew of the Baldwin-Ziegler Polar Expedition. S.S. America,” [1901], E. B. Baldwin Papers, Folder “Biographies—Baldwin-Ziegler Expedition,” Box 8, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., in P. J. Capelotti, The Greatest Show in the Arctic: The American Exploration of Franz Josef Land, 1898–1905 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2016), 143.