70. Who is the most famous oceanographer? 



This is a difficult question. The scientists best known for their ex- 

 ploits on and in the ocean have been explorers and aquanauts. Many 

 men who have contributed most to oceanography are virtually unknown 

 to the public. 



One man who was both an explorer and oceanographer was Fridtjof 

 Nansen, a Norwegian who froze his ship, the FRAM, into the Arctic ice 

 off the coast of Siberia to prove the theory that an ocean current would 

 drift a ship across the Arctic Basin. During the 3-year drift he came 

 within 360 miles of the North Pole and then proceeded by sledge to a 

 point 226 miles from the Pole. He is the inventor of the Nansen bottle, 

 which has been the basic oceanographic instrument for decades and is 

 still widely used. A special museum in Oslo houses the FRAM and 

 many other Nansen mementos, awards, and expedition materials. 



Lt. Matthew Fontaine Maury, USN, often called the father of Ameri- 

 can oceanography, was the first man to undertake systematic study of 

 the ocean as a full-time occupation and to write an English language 

 textbook on oceanography. The present U. S. Naval Oceanographic 

 Office is an outgrowth of the work he started before the Civil War. 



Two other Americans who contributed much to oceanography were 

 William Beebe and Professor Henry Bigelow. Beebe, although best 

 known for his work with the bathysphere in which he reached a depth 

 of 3,028 feet in 1934, also directed a number of shipboard ocean- 

 ographic surveys. 



During his long association with the Woods Hole Oceanographic 

 Institution, Bigelow contributed greatly to the coordination of physical, 

 chemical, and geological studies of the oceans, leading to a more com- 

 plete understanding of the interrelationships of life in the sea. 



Many men who were famous for other reasons have been interested 

 in study of the oceans. Included in the long list are Alexander the Great, 

 Prince Albert of Monaco, Captain James Cook, Benjamin Franklin, and 

 Commander Scott Carpenter. 



Deacon, G. E. R. (Ed.) 



Seas, Maps, and Men, Doubleday and Company, 1962. 

 Dougherty, Charles M. 



Searchers of the Sea, Viking Press, 1961 . 

 Lyman, John 



"History of Oceanography," Ocean Sciences, edited by Captain 



E. John Long, United States Naval Institute, 1964. 



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