Summary:

Esa Ruuskanen, Finnish Newspapers’ and Magazines’ Ideas about the Polar Regions, 1870–1910

In this article, I study how increasing human activities to explore and exploit the Polar Regions were followed and reported on by the Finnish print media between 1870 and 1910. I trace whether a basic narrative(s) can be found within the reporting and whether the narrative(s) changed during the period in question. I also examine whether the Finnish press had any particular focus on any geographical areas inside the wide circumpolar region. Data sources included Finnish newspapers and magazines that were found through electronic databases maintained by the National Library (Kansalliskirjasto). Searches of the digitized material produced altogether 1571 and 216 relevant newspaper and magazine articles respectively. The large dataset revealed an obvious interest in the exploration of the Polar Regions among the Finnish press. The race to the poles can be seen as a ‘big story’ that was of interest to Europeans and North Americans in relation to the progress and inventiveness of human beings. However, inside the larger stories are several sub-stories that have various nuances and perspectives can be differentiated according to country.

The narrative(s) of the Finnish print media were analyzed within the theoretical frame of ‘frontiers’.  Three intertwined ‘frontiers’ were discernible from the basic narrative: the ‘adventure frontier’, the ‘navigation frontier’ and the ‘scientific frontier’. Each of these thematic ‘frontiers’ were part of the ‘big story’ of the exploration and exploitation of the circumpolar regions and embodied the aspirations and expectations connected to these activities.  

The basic narrative highlighted the Polar Regions as the lands of ice and snow, where a scarcity of light, warmth and nutrition prevailed. At the end of the expeditions, the explorers were up against a frozen sea, glaciers, icebergs, the extreme winter cold and polar nights for most of the year. It was dangerous and risky to try to get to the poles or to navigate the frozen Arctic and Antarctic oceans. In the eyes of Finnish newspapers and magazines, explorers were represented as admired adventurers whose voyages demonstrated an inborn tendency of human beings to show courage.  As a reward, explorers gained international fame and glory and their empirical findings added to the knowledge of circumpolar regions. 

Before the 1870s, the Europeans or the Americans had not sailed the sea routes that were later named as the Northeast and Northwest Passages. No expedition had ever reached the poles. At the beginning of the 1910s, all of these goals were achieved. The interest of the Finnish print media in the Polar Regions between the 1870s and 1910s was partly an interest in the discovered and opening sea routes in the wide Arctic and Antarctic regions and the possibilities to utilize them commercially. Even though certain commercial benefits were expected to emerge from the discovered sea routes and circumpolar regions, the press reasoned that science would eventually benefit most from these expeditions.  It was believed that these ‘scientific frontiers’ would offer information not only about these unknown areas but about the history of the earth as a whole, as well as about global weather phenomena. Within the basic narrative of the Finnish print media, the race for the poles and the discovery of new sea routes represented a ‘big story’ about how human beings as a consequence of the accumulation of scientific knowledge and technological know-how and their activity would break down geographical barriers and encroach on hitherto obscured territories.