Bernier Of The North
PHOTOS: G.R. Lancefield, library and archives canada—PA96482; JOSEPH-ELZÉAR BERNIER, LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA—C-023204; LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA—C-025960
From top: Arctic and her crew visit Port Burwell at the mouth of the Hudson Strait in 1907; A dog team is used to explore Baffin Island in 1910; Capt. Joseph-Elzéar Bernier in his cabin on board the Arctic in the 1920s.
The Arctic Archipelago, explored at great cost by Britain, had been virtually presented as a gift to Canada in 1880. Some cabinet ministers would have preferred to decline the gift, but Sir Hector Langevin had argued that Canada's future lay in the Far North. The settlement of the Alaska Boundary Dispute in 190...