Born in Brigus, Newfoundland on August 15, 1875, Robert Abram Bartlett was one of the great explorers of the 20th century.  At the age of fifteen he was sent away to become a Methodist minister but soon left this program of study in order to pursue the life of a sea captain.  In 1909, Bartlett was awarded the National Geographic Society’s Hubbard Medal for his contribution to the success of Robert Peary’s final expedition to the North Pole.  Equally laudable was Bartlett’s courageous leadership of his crew after the destruction of the flagship of Vilhjalmar Stefansson’s 1913 Arctic expedition.  Having completed more than forty expeditions into the arctic and become world-renown as a public speaker and lecturer, Bob Bartlett died in New York City on April 28, 1946 at the age of seventy.