The Royal Naval Exhibition (RNE) of 1891 offers an important entry point for the study of naval mythmaking. Scrutinising one part of the RNE showcase, ‘The Franklin Gallery,’ highlights the imaginative potential of the polar regions as a resource for imperial visions. This paper provides a review of the RNE and, more closely, considers the ideology of polar exploration in the context of political debate and naval reforms. The utility of images of the Arctic presented at the RNE is discussed, in particular, its role in displaying the ‘heroic martyrdom’ of Sir John Franklin (1786–1847). The paper draws upon an extensive study of late nineteenth-century newspapers, illustrated weeklies, periodical reviews, popular adult and juvenile literature, art, poetry, pamphlets, exhibition catalogues and handbooks, and associated ephemera. It argues that the RNE played a central part in the construction and enshrining of narratives of naval and national achievement in the late-Victorian period and in reviving a British commitment to the exploration of the polar regions.

Belgica, which Adrien de Gerlache used on the first expedition to winter in the Antarctic, was originally a bottlenose whaler named Patria, built in Norway in 1884. She was designed and constructed by Johan Chr. Jakobsen, renowned for his design of polar ships. Patria was sold to Adrien de Gerlache and renamed Belgica in 1896. In 1896–97 she was refitted and equipped in Sandefjord, Norway, for an Antarctic expedition. Nansen and Amundsen met for the first time on Belgica's deck. Late in 1899 Belgica returned to Antwerp after more than two years on an Antarctic expedition. From 1901 to 1904 Belgica returned to bottlenose whaling and, in addition, made a voyage to northeast Greenland to establish depots and build houses for the Baldwin-Ziegler Polar Expedition. In 1905 the Duc d'Orléans chartered her to survey the coast of northeast Greenland, and on her return he bought her. In 1907 and 1909 she sailed on Arctic expeditions led by the Duc d'Orléans and captained by de Gerlache. In 1916 she was sold to Det Norske Kulsyndikat and renamed Isfjord. She became a freighter carrying coal from Longyearbyen to ports in northern Norway. In 1918 she was sold and her new owner converted her into a floating cod-liver oil refinery and fish-processing plant. In 1940 she was impounded by British forces and used as a floating ammunition depot. On 19 May 1940 she was sunk during a German air raid. Her wreck was re-discovered in 1990.

This paper discusses map projections suitable for representing the whole of the Earth's surface while drawing particular attention to the polar regions, and proposes a new projection. The projection is a latitudinally distorted variant of the transverse Mollweide projection, relative to which it roughly doubles the linear scale and trebles the areal coverage of the polar regions. It was adopted by the Scott Polar Research Institute in 2005.

Joseph Shackleton, an older relative of Sir Ernest Shackleton, visited Iceland with two friends in 1861. They travelled in Arcturus, a Danish vessel that ran a scheduled service in summer. They visited the two main local ‘attractions,’ Thingvellir and the geysers. Shackleton kept a detailed manuscript account of the trip, which is presented in its entirety. The manuscript shows that tourism was already developed in Iceland, with an infrastructure that was in place and efficient. His account also provides interesting information concerning contemporary Iceland.

To celebrate the centenary of the birth of Boris Osipovich Dolgikh, the great Russian ethnographer of Siberia, this article gives an account of his first field expedition to the Kets, Evenkis, Nganasans, and Dolgans of central Siberia. The author, himself a former student of Dolgikh, argues that Dolgikh's work as an enumerator for the 1926/27 census forged his identity as an ethnographer. He also implies that the expedition for the 1926/27 census was a cradle for the careers of many other scientists. The article is framed by a history of Soviet science by the editor. It also serves as an introduction to the unique polar census expedition, which the editor argues is better understood as ‘an inscription’ of Siberian aboriginal peoples than as a statistical census in the traditional sense.

This year has seen considerable successes for the Institute and its staff in terms of both academic research and our role in projecting the history and environmental significance of the polar regions more widely. In the physical and social sciences, and in our library, archival, and museum activities, we have secured a wide range of external grants. The acquisition of significant external funding for research in the social sciences and humanities, and for museum activities, represents an important addition to our continuing strong portfolio of competitively won research council grants relating to high-latitude environmental change. Institute staff hold grants of almost £2.5 million, and it is this external funding that has supported polar field programmes in both the natural and social sciences during 2004 in Antarctica, Greenland, Svalbard, and the Russian Far East. The information collected, using methods ranging from airborne lasers deployed over glaciers to informal discussions with native Siberian reindeer herders, will provide the basis for a number of forthcoming publications in both academic journals and books accessible to a wider readership.