Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Polar Journeys: The Role of Food and Nutrition in Early Exploration

Polar Journeys: The Role of Food and Nutrition in Early Exploration

Feeney, Robert

Hardcover

Medical ReferenceTechnology & EngineeringChemistry

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 0841233497
ISBN13: 9780841233492
Publisher: Oxford Univ Pr
Published: May 1 1998
Pages: 279
Language: English
In this unique book, distinguished biochemist Robert E. Feeney relates the history of polar exploration to the history of the science of nutrition, showing, for example, how advances in food preservation helped make possible human survival on the expeditions. The text covers the problems caused by too scant a supply of vitamins, most notably the role of diminished vitamin C in scurvy and too much of a good thing, in the case of hypervitaminosis from unknowingly overdosing on vitamin A. The author discusses also the Eskimo knowledge of foodstuffs and how the explorers learned valuable lessons from them, as well as how expedition members delayed in applying that learning because of their Eurocentric prejudices.

With extensive quotes from explorers' journals, historical menus, tables, and numerous illustrations, the author presents a vivid description of what the expeditions experienced, making a powerful case that the explorers not only traveled metaphorically on their stomachs, they lived and died by the quantity of their food and especially the quality of their nutrition.

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